American Folklife: A Research Guide

American folklife is the traditional, expressive, shared culture of various groups in the United States. These groups can be grouped by ethnicity, occupation, religious affiliation, and geographic locations. Expressive culture includes a wide range of creative and symbolic forms, such as customs, beliefs, technical skills, languages spoken, drama, ritual, architecture, music, play, dance, drama, ritual, pageantry, and handicraft. These forms of expression can be maintained or perpetuated without formal instruction or institutional direction, as defined by the Library of Congress. This guide introduces the researcher to some of the basic informational sources on the topic. The terms and phrases listed in the subject headings below can be used to search for more materials in the library’s catalog and research databases. If you need further assistance, please ask a librarian.

Folklife and Fieldwork: A Laymen’s Introduction to Field Work, rev. ed. by Peter Bartis. Washington, DC: Library of Congress, 2002.
Instructional guide on collecting, presenting, and preserving materials that represent local folklife.

Folklore: An Encyclopedia of Beliefs, Customs, Tales, Music, and Art by Thomas A. Green. Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, 1997. ISBN: 087436986X.
Includes over 240 in-depth articles that cover historical and contemporary form, figures, and fields of folklore.

Folklore in America by Tristram Potter Coffin and Hennig Cohen. Garden City, NY, Doubleday, 1966.
Includes tales, songs, superstitions, proverbs, riddles, games, folk drama, and folk festivals.

Great American Folklore: Legends, Tales, Ballads, and Superstitions from All Across America by Kemp P. Battle. Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1986. ISBN: 0385185553.
A Treasury of American Folklore: Stories, Ballads, and Traditions of the People by Benjamin Albert Botkin. New York: Crown, 1944. ASIN: 9992604328.

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The American Folklife Center, The Library of Congress
www.loc.gov/folklife/
Clearinghouse for folklife services, information, and guides for the fifty states. Also includes selected collections from the “Archive of Folk Culture” and online collections such as “Voices from the Days of Slavery: Former Slaves Tell Their Stories” and “Folk-Songs of America: The Robert Winslow Gordon Collection, 1922–1932.”

Archives of Traditional Music
www.indiana.edu/~libarchm/index.html
Includes commercial and field recordings of vocal and instrumental music, folktales, interviews, oral history, videotapes, photographs and manuscripts.

The Center for Folklife Programs and Cultural Studies
www.folkways.si.edu
Contains the Moses and Frances Asch Archives (recordings, business records, correspondence, etc. from the Folkways Records) and the documentation done by scholars for Smithsonian projects, exhibits, and the annual Festival of American Folklife held on the Mall in Washington, DC.

Tapnet Links (National Endowment for the Arts, National Council for the Traditional Arts)
http://afsnet.org/tapnet
Includes links to folk arts in education, museums and archives, federal and national folk and traditional arts programs, and state and regional folk arts programs and links.

A Teacher’s Guide to Folklife Resources
www.loc.gov/folklife/teachers/
Information on many useful print and electronic publications for folklife educators, including contact and ordering information.

American Quarterly. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1949– . Quarterly. ISSN: 00030678.
Publishes essays that examine American societies and cultures, past and present, in global and local contexts.

Folklore Forum. Bloomington, IN: Folklore Forum Society, 1968– . Semiannually. ISSN: 00155926.
A communication for students of folklore.

Journal of American Folklore. New York: Published for the American Folklore Society, 1888– . Quarterly. ISSN: 00218715.
Publishes scholarly articles, essays, notes, and commentaries, reviews of books, exhibitions and events, sound recordings, film and videotapes.

Journal of Folklore Research. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Folklore Institute, 1983– . Three times a year. ISSN: 07377037.
Devoted to the study of the world’s traditional creative and expressive forms, the Journal of Folklore Research provides an international forum for current theory and research among scholars of folklore and related fields.

Journal of Popular Culture. Bowling Green, OH: Bowling Green State University Press, 1967– . Quarterly. ISSN: 00223840.
The official publication of the Popular Culture Association.

Western Folklore. Los Angeles: California Folklore Society, 1947– . Quarterly. ISSN: 0043373X.
Devoted to the description and analysis of regional, national, and international folklore and custom.

Winterthur Portfolio. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1964– . Quarterly. ISSN: 00840416. Also available at www.journals.uchicago.edu/WP/journal/.
Interdisciplinary journal committed to fostering knowledge of the American past by publishing articles on the arts in America and the historical context within which they developed.