AMERICAN FOLKLIFE CENTER THE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

Summer 1988

Volume X, Number 3

LOWELL FIELDWORK COMPLETED

By Doug DeNatale On May 31 the fieldwork phase of the Lowell Folklife Project was completed. Lowell, Massachusetts, boasts of hav­ ing over fifty ethnic groups repre­ sented among its citizens, and the city's cultural diversity posed an exciting challenge for the project workers. The field team-Michael Bell, Barbara Fertig, John Lueders­ Booth, Mario Montano, Martha Norkunas, Tom Rankin , David Taylor, and Eleanor Wachs-doc­ umented a range of community events and expressive activities, predominantly among the Irish, Franco-Americans, Greeks, Portuguese, Puerto Ricans, and Cambodians who comprise the city's largest ethnic groups. The Center wi ll publish an illustrated study based on the Lowell Folklife Project in about a year. A full analysis awaits that publica­ ti on, but some preliminary observa­ tions about the city's contemporary cultural landscape have emerged from the project's research. The city's population was in a gradual decline Continued on page 2

Sophia Pargas crocheting at her work station in the computer sub-assembly ~~---- area, Wang Laboratories, Pawtucket Boulevard, February 12, 1988. The traditional activity carried on in the high-tech setting symbolizes the juxtapositions of cultural groups, old and new ways, that are part of daily life in Lowell. (LFP-TR-B392-3) Photo by Tom Rankin LOWELL PROJECT The stereotype that burdens AMERICAN FOLKLIFE CENTER Continued from page 1 Lowell's Hispanic population, but­ THE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS tressed by the confusion between street from the 1930s, but within the past life and a well-publicized drug traffic, Alan Jabbour, Director twenty years the influx of three major Ray Dockstader, Deputy Director tends to negate the perception of populations-the Portuguese, the cultural traditions entirely. Early Carl Fleischhauer Hispanics, and the Southeast Asians­ skepticism over the Folklife Project's Mary Hufford has brought a variety of new cultural efforts to document Hispanic culture David A. Taylor resources and pressures to Lowell. were countered by the richness and Folklije Specialists While these populations respond dif­ variety of the traditions uncovered. Peter T. Bartis, Folklije Researcher ferently to their new social environ­ Within the Hispanic population, a ment, political and educational issues strong religious community, both Gerald E. Parsons, Reference Librarian are equally critical for each. During Catholic and Protestant, fights the James Hardin, Editor the year of the project, housing prob­ stereotype and attempts to deal with Magdalena Gilinsky, lems, political representation, and the serious social issues. The Public Events Coordinator bilingual education were issues of Colombians and Puerto Ricans of the Lisa Oshins, Program Specialist public debate. Catholic community have consciously Jennifer A. Cutting, Program Assistant There is a strong tendency among fused a number of cultural religious Lowell's older populations to perceive Doris Craig, Administrative Secretary traditions to further their common the newer groups as unified ethnic social and spiritual goals. Tel: 202 287-6590 groups. Yet among the Portuguese From a longer historical perspec­ there are significant cultural differ­ tive, the challenges and opportunities ences between those of Continental, Archive of Folk Culture faced by Lowell's newer immigrant Madeiran, or Azorean origin. Lowell's groups may prove no greater than Joseph C. Hickerson, Head Hispanic population accommodates a those faced by its earlier immigrant fundamental national and cultural communities. Yet this assertion is no Marsha Maguire, Archivist distinction between Puerto Ricans and rationale for failing to connect public

Sebastian LoCurto, Program Specialist Colombians. The Southeast Asians policies with cultural consideratiqns. Aldona M. Kamantauskas Joseph, likewise derive from the separate Lowell's agencies charged with Staff Assistant nations of Cambodia, Laos, and integrating the city's cultural resources Vietnam. At the same time, these and public programs, in particular the Tel: 202 287-5510 populations have necessarily drawn Lowell Historic Preservation together as commumties in their Commission, the Lowell National Federal Cylinder Project relationship with the city. Their Historic Park , and the Lowell internal politics are shaped by their Heritage State Park, have been Judith A. Gray own dynamic of cultural difference mindful from their inception of the Ethnomusicologist and also by their reception by the problems inherent in establishing Tel: 202 287-9022 outside community. respectful interaction between The ethnic stereotyping that masks Lowell's people. and visitors. The cultural diversity is necessarily limit­ original impetus for establishing these BOARD OF TRUSTEES ing, even where the stereotypes are agencies came from a grassroots Bruce Jackson, Chairman, New York positive, as they are for the Portuguese movement in Lowell during the 1960s Barre Toelken, Vice Chairman, Utah and Southeast Asians. Both of these to develop itself as an "educative city" Johnnetta Cole, Georgia communities are positively stereotyped where cultural contrasts could act as Russell W. Fridley, Minnesota as hardworking and quiet. In the community resources rather than William L. Kinney, J r. , South Carolina Portuguese community, the younger Judith McCulloh, Illinois limiting stereotypes. Marta Weigle, New Mexico members from the secondary wave of Toward the dream of an educative immigration in the 1960s have been city where cultural knowledge would angered by the tendency to neglect have a liberating effect in social rela­ Ex Officio Members their needs in the recent bilingual tions, it is essential that the agencies James H. Billington, education controversy, and have involved engage in a process of develop­ Librarian oj Congress begun to build a political network ing new models for cultural presen­ Robert McCormick Adams, among the various groups in their tation and self-evaluation. Lowell's Secretary oj the community. The work ethic sum­ agencies have been noteworthy for Francis S. M . Hodsoll, Jr. , Chairman, National Endowment jor the Arts marily attached to the Southeast Asian developing innovative alliances of Lynne V . Cheney, Chairman, community can trivialize the major public and private resources and also National Endowment jor the Humanities cultural differences stemming from the for recognizing and weighing the nec­ Alan Jabbour, Director, Hindu and Buddhist traditions and essary social effect of the programs American Folklife Center the deep scars left by the holocaust they have fostered. But there is always among the refugee population. a danger of lapsing into forms of

2 FOLKLIFE CENTER NEWS FOLKLIFE CENTER NEWS

James Hardin , Editor Don Shomette, Design Consultant

Folklife Center News is a quarterly report on the programs and activities of the American Folklife Center, available free of charge from the Library of Congress, American Folklife Center, Washington, D.C. 20540. Folklife Center News was temporarily suspended in 1986 with volume IX, numbers 2 and 3 (there was no volume IX, number 4). Publication resumed with volume X, number I.

duplicate fieldnotes and logs, and a large selection of tluplicate slides will be available at the Patrick J. Mogan Cultural Center in Lowell. The field data, including fieldnotes and catalogs of interview tapes and photographs, have been indexed according to sub­ ject, place name, and personal name using an innovative computer pro­ gram devised for the project. The American Folklife Center is currently working with the Lowell Historic Preservation Commission to create a regional folklife center. The development of the center and the forthcoming publication provide assurance that the work of the Lowell Folklife Project will not end with the completion of field research. 0

Doug DeNatale is Project Coordinator for the Lowell Folklife Project.

FOLKLINE For timely information on the The wedding of Cambodians Sopheap Kuth and Pen Hing at the home of Pen Hing's field of folklore and folklife, mother, Mrs. Chounn Chen, September 26, 1987. Ethnic stereotypes applied to including training and profes­ Southeast Asians often mask the richness of the cultural and religious traditions the sional opportunities and news new immigrants bring to and carryon in Lowell. (LFP-JB-B254-13) Photo byJohn items of national interest, a Lueders-Booth taped announcement is available around the clock, except during presentation that at their worst rein­ reducing the city's social relations the hours of 9 A.M. until noon force stereotypes and deny historical under an overly simplistic model of (eastern time) each Monday, change. Folklorists can play an ethnicity. The project collection con­ when it is updated. Folkline is a important role in guarding against this tains approximately 200 hours of joint project of the American tendency by insisting on attention to sound recording, 10 ,000 black and Folklife Center and the Ameri­ ongoing cultural interaction. white negatives, 3,500 color transpar­ can Folklore Society. Dial: The Lowell Folklife Project has itself encies, and 2,500 pages of manuscript become an active part of this process material. Original negatives and trans­ 202 287-2000 through its documentation of cultural parencies will be housed at the Ameri­ resources and its argument against can Folklife Center; contact sheets,

SUMMER 1988 3 FOLKLIFE AND MEMORY IN RUSSIA: AN INTERVIEW WITH JAMES H. BILLINGTON

Conducted and edited by James Hardin Jam es H. Billington became Librarian oj Congress in 1987, after serving since 1973 as director of the Woodrow Wilson Inter­ national CenterJor Scholars at the Smithso­ nian Institution. A specialist in Russian cultural history, he is the author oj The Icon and the Axe and Fire in the Minds of Men. In June, Dr. Billington was part oj the American delegation that journeyed to Moscow Jor the summit talks between President Reagan and General Secretary Gorbachev. He stayed on to participate in celebrations oj the Millennium of Christianity in Russia. The interview Jrom which the Jollowing is excerpted and edited took place in theLibrarian 's office in the Jam es Madison Memorial Building on June 28, 1988.

Hardin: In The Icon and the Axe, you say that the highest good in Muscovy was not knowledge but memory, and that the ideal Russian prince is the guardian of tradition. I wonder if you think Mikhail Gorbachev is an " ideal Russian prince."

Billington: Well, I wouldn't quite describe him as an ideal Russian prince, but I think there is no question that he is seen as paying greater attention to Russian tradition. ... Having talked about a society that was going to build a new Soviet man, was going to get rid of ethnic diversity in a kind of homogenized new heroic proletarian society, they are now­ and they have been for some time­ James H. Billington. Photo by Carl Fleischhauer slowly realizing that not simply the preservation of the artifacts of their a past which they no longer look down culture but the preservation and The preservation and en­ on quite as much as they once did, enrichment of memory as a social richment of memory as a particulady their religious past, and phenomenon is essential to the health social phenomenon is es­ also to find an identity for the Russian of the society, particulady to a large sential to the health of the people that's something other than multi-ethnic and diverse society like Stalinism . . . , which was the most theirs. And so they are simultaneously society. distinct political identity of the Soviet . acknowledging the failure of commu­ system. .. . nism as a totally satisfying ideology literary and artlstlc traditions... . But it's also seen as something that and acknowledging the positive They're more interested now in might help them with their contempo­ impGrtance and worth of diverse memory than they were, both to honor rary problem, which is not just an

4 FOLKLIFE CENTER NEWS administrative, political, economic prob­ "deep strain of religious life" in do you mean in numbers of people lem, it's a cultural, psychological, Russia, which you describe in your who are attending the services? spiritual problem of identity: What is book. Has that survived the repression the affirmative identity of the and brutality of the Stalin era? Is there Billington: In numbers of people who dominant Russian people? And the still a deep strain of religious life? are believers and affiliate themselves very fact that the other nationalities­ with that denomination-it isn't we've read of the Armenians and the Billington: Yes, and I think again it's always possible for them to attend Baltic republics, and these people are partly as a result of the failure of services. You have to have state anxious to get more distinctive communism as an ideology to prove permission to run a church .... recognition- that only increases the very spiritually satisfying. It never There are many church buildings, anguish of the dominant majority dealt with the great mysteries of life deserted church buildings, but there nationality to find out who they are and death, creation, marriage, new are many less churches licensed to and what they are .. . life-all that was never part of it. It exist than there are believers. You see was a social and political ideology, and them in the big cities, but if you were Hardin: Then there's a good deal people have increasingly found, not to travel in the great interior there are more going on in the Soviet Union only in the Communist world but large sections where they just don't than just the sense that the economic generally, that social and political allow them to open up, but where system has not worked, that the ideologies, when they overextend there are many believers.... Re­ economic system needs reform and themselves and purport to explain all member you're thinking of something decentralization-there's a sense, too, the aspects of life , prove very almost the size of America and that there is something to be drawn unsatisfying. Of course, in [the Canada combined- vast recesses of upon and learned from the past. Russian] case, their social 'and political the interior, where a lot of these older ideology hasn't even been a very traditions are beautiful. Wild cold Billington: Oh, very much so. I can satisfying explanation of social and weathe~, forbidding nature, for the give you two examples: One is political reality. most part, but a great deal of beauty architectural restoration. The society and a great deal of mysticism about for the restoration of histofic Social and political ideolo­ nature. It enriches and envelopes their monuments now has 35 million whole literary and formal cultural members in the Soviet Union. So it's, gies, when they overextend tradition and has left a substratum of in a way I suppose, the largest private themselves and purport to folkloristic and ethnographic traditions organization in the Soviet Union. explain all the aspects of and forms of expression- which is Now, it's not a very powerful life, prove very unsatisfying. sometimes [expressed as] modern organization-they just pay small kitsch versions of the Moiseyev dues, all those members. But the fact Dancers, the little dolls in the foreign that many people would pay anything But beyond that, their culture is so currency stores, or the knitted aprons, at all, and affiliate themselves with permeated with a thousand years of with patterns on them, all of that kind historic preservation, the restoration Christian history, Orthodox Christian of thing which is kitsch touristic of old historic monuments, is an history, and many of the other folklore. indication of the importance of this­ nationalities have rich traditions .... and, by the way, they're not all To have an atheist ideology that rejects Hardin: Does that derive from a state Russians. Other nationalities are as all of these religious traditions attempt to manipulate folk culture? numerous as the Russians. A second superimposed on it left a lot of illustration would be the enormous dissatisfaction. Khrushchev, inciden­ Billington: Not so much manipulate interest in the .. . restoration of icons tally, persecuted the Church almost as as-they view it as harmless because and the restoration cleaning of old much as Stalin did, that wasn't it's something colorful to entertain Russian religious paintings. But you generall y realized. . . . He was to tourists with. You see in restaurants could point to other aspects of their some extent a liberal reformer, but he and hotels in the Soviet Union" you artistic and creative culture- great was simultaneously a tremendous per­ see people dressed up in old peasant interest in old Russian music .. . secutor of the Church. H e cut the garb playing balalaikas, which is not [and] the revival and the ringing of number of open churches to less than something you'd see in the countryside bells. They destroyed many of the bells half. So it's only recently that the anymore. They'd have rather in the early anti-religious campaigns Church has begun to make a return, than balalaikas, for instance, and of the Soviet period, and now there's and it's not just the Orthodox church, they'd be playing things that represent an almost desperate desire to recover but there's a very active Protestant partly old Russian things and partly that lost link, to recreate the old church- the Baptists are faster things they've heard on cheap sound-scape, as well as the landscape growing than the Orthodox, the Japanese tape recorders and were of old Russia. ... Pentecostals some feel are even faster recorded from the Voice of America growing, Adventists, various groups. and increasingly from some of their Hardin: Most people in this country own rock bands. would be surprised to hear about the Hardin: When you say"growing," But, of course, folklore, like religion,

SUMMER 1988 5 has had a revival in the last twenty strength, returning to the country, to be , but it's certainly there . ... years in Russia, not only to some returning to the peasant, returning to Many of them feel that, first of extent tolerated by the officials but the countryside for your subject mat­ all , their traditions, the great writers, promoted by many people who are ter, for your inspiration. And in a that they came late to world culture anxious to find a distinctively Russian deeper sense then, the culture, the but really produced titanic things. identity and are concerned about high culture of the cities, has always They certainly did: Tolstoy and creeping Westernization and creeping drawn [upon these sources], ever since Dostoyevsky are really almost without uniformity in their culture-some of it 's defined itself. ... And the re­ parallel. . .. And, of course, defeating whom, incidentally, view Marxism as corded literature and the number of Napoleon, defeating Hitler .. . . a kind of Western ideology that was museums and repositories, and the Some people certainly think that the imported and has ruined the native, amo~nt of academic study of ethno­ Bolshevik Revolution was a unique indigenous traditions .... graphy and folklore-this began in event in world history. pre-revolutionary Russia, this is a But I think all that's waning a bit. Hardin: In your book, you talk about Rus'sian tradition more than a Soviet Although, part of this return to the "passive, vegetable life, " the tradition, but the Soviets have sus­ Russian roots is an attempt to say, well "brutal, earthbound life of the average tained and developed it pretty well-is look, maybe communism didn't work peasant." Have the peasants been very Impressive.... but Russians are still the greatest able to sustain any sort of rich folklife people around, and aren't we wonder­ that is satisfying to themselves and ful. . . . What really saved Russia might too contribute to this search for A lot of traditions in the in World War II was the Russian identity in Russia? Or has it been peasant culture and in the people, was the same thing that destroyed by the communes? forest culture of Russia have Tolstoy describes as saving them against Napoleon, was this dumb , Billington: Yes, it's been pretty been preserved and to some stubborn resistance-dumb in the largely destroyed. . . . Collectiviza­ extent are reviving. technical sense of being inarticulate, tion was so bloody and so destructive not in the sense of being stupid. of the old peasant culture, particularly in the Ukraine and Great Russia itself, I spent a year as a guest professor Hardin: The enduring strength of where the horrors of collectivization twenty years ago in Moscow and "Mother Russia"? were primarily felt, so many people worked in the Institute of History, were killed that if they were to de­ which at that time was an extremely Billington: The enduring strength of collectivize or seriously modify the dull place; they were also not very "Mother Russia." But the war ended system [now], they would have to own friendly because it was a place for forty-three years ago, and to go on up to what was perhaps the greatest ideological Party hacks. But the waving the bloody shirt when, you of all internal atrocities committed Institute of Ethnography that was in know , you really haven't done as during the Stalin era . ... the same building was a place where much as you should have in the forty­ But despite this terrible devastation the imagination could roam and where three years since then is, for a lot of of the peasantry, in this search for an awful lot of bright people would be the young people in particular, no memory of the last twenty years. the doing intellectual or cultural history of longer really satisfactory, and they recovery of rural Russia, of those the kind that I was doing ... in fact, don't want to hear about the unique­ threads of authentic memory that do fled there because the atmosphere was ness of Russia's suffering. They want exist, has been a very important part better, the tolerance was greater. to hear about what are we doing now, of the activity of writers, painters, you know,' as we're nearing the musicians. And so a lot of traditions Hardin: Is that because folklore was twenty-first century ... . So there's a in the peasant culture and in the forest " harmless" ? certain restiveness. But it's a restive­ culture of Russia have been preserved ness that looks out to the West for and to some extent are reviving .... Billington: Folklore was thought to be technical and managerial and eco­ Now the great question that scholars harmless , and thought to be good for nomic ideas, but it still looks inside for always ask: Is this just urban people producing colorful dancers that could spiritual , psychological , cultural romanticizing? And that's a funda­ make politicians feel good at big peace values. And that's why this whole mental problem in anthropological festivals .. .. inventory of memory is very important. research and folkloristic and ethno­ graphic research. Are we just [project­ Hardin: One final question: In your Hardin: And they're still there to be ing] the wish fantasies of urban book, you talk about the sense in found? intellectuals who are unhappy with Russia of a special destiny. Is this still uniform housing and creeping techno­ true? Do they still think of themselves Billington: And they're still there to logical debasement of the envi­ as having a special destiny? be found. 0 ronment? . .. [But there is a] great tradition in Billington: Many of them do. I think Carl Fleischhauer provided technical assis­ Russia of returning to the earth for that's not quite as marked as it used tance jar this interview.

6 FOLKLIFE CENTER NEWS SUMMER 88 CONCERTS UNDERWAY ON NEPTUNE PLAZA

The Cumberland Music Tour, from a remote Appalachian section of Kentucky and Tennessee, led off the Folklife Center's concert series this year with a variety of mountain music, and tunes, buckdancing, and lyric songs, ballads and stories. From left to right: Willard Anderson, Clyde Troxell, and Ralph Troxell. Photo by Reid Baker

Irish dancers, California bluegrass, Arts. Concerts are held on the third July 21 John Cephas and Phil Vietnamese and Mexican music are all Thursday of each month between Wiggins. Blues from on the program for this year's April and October, from 12 noon until Washington, D.C. Neptune Plaza Concerts at the Library 1 :30 p. m. This year's concerts are Aug. 18 Nguy~n Dlnh Nghia of Congress. Since 1977 the concerts broadcast live on WAMU, 88 FIVE family. Vietnamese from have entertained congressional mem­ FM. Washington, D.C. bers and staff, Library of Congress Sept. 15 Mariachis from San and other federal workers, Capitol Hill Apr. 21 The Cumberland Music Cristobal, Mexico friends and neighbors, and visitors to Tour. Old-time music Oct. 20 The Four Echos; and the nation's capital. The influx of new from Kentucky and Linda Gore and the ethnic groups to the Washington area Tennessee Gospel Spiritualettes. has enabled the series to provide a May 19 Seamus Egan, Mick Black gospel from wide range of musical experiences Moloney, and Liam Washington, D.C. from a variety of traditional per­ Harney. Irish music and formers. dance from Pennsylvania Magdalena Gilinsky contributed to this The Neptune Plaza Concerts are and Massachusetts report. sponsored by the American Folklife June 16 Laurie Lewis and the Center in cooperation with the Gr"int Street Band. National Council for the from California

SUMMER 1988 7 PANEL RECOMMENDS BEST FOLK RECORDINGS OF 1987

By Carl Fleischhauer of Traditional Music, Indiana Uni­ information were needed-the brief and Jennifer Cutting versity; Michael Licht, folklorist at the introduction to community, style, or Thirty-four sound recordings have District of Columbia Commission on artist suggested by the criteria. been selected for inclusion in American the Arts and Humanities; Richard Nevertheless, they did admire the and Folklore Recordings 1987: March, folk arts coordinator at the attractive, thoroughgoing booklets A Selected List. The selection was made Wisconsin Arts Board; Jay Orr from that accompanied a number of this by a panel of five American music the Foundation; and year's selections. specialists who met at the Library of Kay Shelemay, an ethnomusicologist Dorothy Lee pointed out that some Congress on March 17 and 18 . A list at New York University. American Indian communities pre­ of the titles selected appears at the end The panel found that two of the ferred that certain sensitive informa­ of this article; an annotated list criteria for consideration were espe­ tion be left unwritten. Richard March describing each of the recordings will cially prominent during their discus­ added that some musicological de­ be published later this year. sions, the requirement that the record­ scriptions could introduce compari­ Most folk 'recordings are published ings feature cultural traditions from sons between cultural groups that by small, independent, and sometimes within the and that they would cause discomfort in some com­ hard-to-find companies, and the include written annotations. In about munities. In short, the panel felt that Folklife Center has been compiling its a half dozen instances, the panel certain information might best be selected lists for the past five years with considered the residence, influences, presented in other types of publi­ the idea of helping interested persons and movement of artists from place to cations. identify these recordings for purchase. place. Records were not selected in Although the panel agreed that the By the same token, the companies some cases because the artists had Selected List should be limited to "roots often have difficulty in reaching edu­ neither lived in nor visited the United traditions,'? they pointed out that the cational and library markets, as well States and in others because the submissions showed that producers as the general public. So the hope is performances or notes focused wholly had trouble understanding this that both buyer and seller will be on the musical traditions of the Old requirement. A number of examples served. For the purposes of librarians Country with no attention paid to contained performances by singer­ and teachers, this brief, annotated New World influences. songwriters, albums of the sort likely publication should be more useful than In considering the criterion on to be filed in "contemporary folk" a comprehensive discography. The annotation, Richard March argued bins in a record store, while a handful Selected List is limited to about thirty that this requirement would exclude of others featured what one might call titles, a number that can easily be interesting community-produced re­ "European art music," recreations of reviewed, and the list represents a cordings, few of which have written ensemble music from the past or process of critical appraisal. To qualify documentation. Mike Licht, who co­ adaptations of folk songs in an for consideration the recordings must ordinated the Selected List project for orchestral setting. three years, recalled his conversations The panel's final selections include (1) have been released in the with several small, community-based fourteen Afro-American recordings, previous calendar year; record labels in which he told them fifteen Anglo-American recordings, (2) feature cultural traditions that"although they are on top of their and fifteen recordings from a variety found within the United own local market with their current of other traditions. The panel felt that States; packaging, they should view written their choice was reasonably (3) emphasize " root traditions" liner notes as a key to the expansion representative of what had been over popular adaptations of of their market. Good liner notes will produced in the categories. But the traditional materials; help them reach new customers." sense of balance that the list conveys (4) be conveniently available to March suggested that the forty-odd is a little deceptive: the fifteen Afro­ American purchasers; state folk arts coordinators might try American recordings are not fifteen (5) include liner notes or accom­ to seek out one or two worthy albums distinct titles, including as they do one panying booklets relating the each year and offer to write notes for five-volume set, one four-volume set, recordings to the performers, them. and two volumes from a four-volume their communities, genres, The discussion of annotation led to anthology. Some panelists asked styles, or other pertinent infor­ other comments. on form and content. whether this meant that more Anglo­ mation. The panel thought that only a few American than Afro-American "roots" products called for lengthy musico­ albums had been produced in 1987. This year's selection panel included logical analysis. Usually, they agreed, This question led to a consideration Dorothy Sara Lee from the Archives only a few paragraphs of background of the representation of other musical

8 FOLKLIFE CENTER NEWS categories. Several panelists pointed (Heritage 070) Southern Maiden Singers: Navajo Skip out that dozens of titles were released Charlie Walden with Emily & Dennis Dance .& Two-Step Songs (Indian every year in the polka, tamburitza, Buckhannon: Traditional Fiddle House IH 1535) and American Indian fields, and Music of Missouri (Marimac 9011) Ironwood Singers: Live at the 106th possibly others. Why do so few of these Everett Pitt: Up Agin the Mountain Rosebud Sioux Fair (Indian House IH reach the Folklife Center? No one was (Marimac 9200) 4322) able to answer the question, although Various artists: Home in West Virginia: Los Reyes de Albuquerque con there was some speculation that many West Virginia Project- Volume II (Old Los Violines de Lorenzo: Tradicion titles in "underrepresented" catego­ Homestead OHCS- l77) y Cultura (MORE Records MO­ ries probably would not represent the Chris Bouchillon:' " The Original 0811 ) roots of those traditions or, more Talking Blues Man)) (Old Homestead Various artists: Nova DomovinalA New likely, would not be very well an­ OHCS- 181) Homeland: Balkan Slavic Music from the notated. The Folklife Center's Emry Arthur: I Am A Man Of Constant Industrial Midwest (Ohio Arts coordinators promised to do what they Sorrow- Vo lume One (Old Home­ Council OAC 601) could to encourage as many submis-' stead OHCS- 190) Various artists: Louisiana Cajun and sions as possible for the 1988 list. Dykes "Magic City" Trio: String Band Creole Music 1934: The Lomax The 1987 Selected List should be Classics- Volume I (Old Homestead Recordings (Swallow LP- 8003- 2) available in early autumn, when OHCS- 191) Various artists: The Wisconsin copies may be requested from the Johnson Mountain Boys: Let the Whole Patchwork (Wisconsin Public Radio Folklife Center free of charge. Copies World TaLk (Rounder 0225) [producer] and the University of of the 1985 and 1986 lists are available The McCoury Brothers: The McCoury Wisconsin [distributor]) while supplies last. The Center does Brothers (Rounder 0230) encourage producers and artists to Jim and Jesse & The Virginia Boys: submit records for the 1988 list. In the Tradition (Rounder 0234) Recordings to be included in the Various artists: Lonesome Homesteader: 1987 list (alphabetically by label): Old-time Fiddling in Wyoming ETHNIC FOLKLIFE (Wyoming Arts Foundation 1987) DISSERTATIONS AFRO-AMERICAN A bibliography listing dissertations on ANTHOLOGY Various artists: The New BLuebLoods indigenous and immigrant ethnic (Alligator 7707) Various artists: Blues Roots, African­ folklife is available free of charge from Various artists: New York Grassroots American , Cajun & Creole the American Folklife Center: Ethnic Gospel: The BLack Sacred Quartet Music, Cuban and Puerto Rican Music Folklife Dissertationsfrom the United States Tradition (a series of five cassettes; (a series of four cassettes : World and Canada, 1960-1980: A Selected, Global Village C 207 through 211) Music Institute/Music of the World Annotated Bibliography by Catherine The Gospel Christian Singers: A WMI- 001, WMI-002, T-llO, and Hiebert Kerst. Cappella Since 1929 (Global Village T - 111) Ethnic studies developed into a C 212) legitimate field of study in the United Various artists: JaiLhouse Blues (Rosetta ETHNIC AND REGIONAL States and Canada during the early RR1316) 1960s, along with the realization that Various artists l National Downhome Clifton Chenier: The King of Zydeco ethnic cultures were maintaining Blues Festival- Volumes One through Sings the Blues (Arhoolie 1097) values, attitudes, and behaviors that Four (a series of four long-playing The Moostash Joe Polka Band: Our set them apart from other groups, And records; Southland SLP- 21 through Favorite Music Volume IV (Czech recently attention has been paid to 24) Records SCR- 80) examining the dynamic and complex Lifshe Schaechter-Widman: Az di processes by which ethnic groups keep furst avek (Global Village C 111) ANGLO-AMERICAN their identities. Ethnic FolkLife Disserta­ Various artists: Cantate Con Noi: Choral tions lists only those dissertations that Harvey Sampson and the Big Possum Songs from Istria and the Alps and give primary attention to folklife and String Band: Flaifoot in the Ashes Vintage Popular Music from South­ shared folk cultural traditions as they (Augusta Heritage AHR 004) Central Italy (Global Village GVM operate within the context of a plural­ The Louvin Brothers: Radio Favorites 678) istic society. The bibliography reveals '51-'57 (Country Music Founda­ Various artists: Nii Mele 0 Paniolo: Songs major trends in ethnic folklife scholar­ tion CMF 009) of Hawaiian Cowboys (Hawaii State ship and indicates the various ap­ Bob Wills: Bob Wills Fiddle (Country Foundation on Culture and the proaches that have been taken to the Music Foundation CMF 01O- L) Arts) subject. It may be obtained by writing Various artists: The Bristol Sessions Various artists: Taos Pueblo Round the American Folklife Center, Library (Country Music Foundation CMF Dance Songs- Volume I (Indian House of Congress, Washington, D.C. 20540. Oll- L) IH 1006) Luther Davis, Roscoe Parish, and Turtle Mountain Singers: Navajo Social Leone Parish: The Old Time Way Dance Songs (Indian House IH 1523)

SUMMER 1988 9 HELEN HEFFRON ROBERTS, 1888-1985

Word has come recently to the Folklife Center that Helen Roberts died on March 26, 1985, at her home in North Haven, Connecticut. She was ninety­ SIX. Roberts was one of the pioneers of ethnographic field documentation, and , her donations of wax cylinder record­ ings to the Archive of Folk Culture in 1936 provided the Archive's first substantial ethnographic and interna­ tional material. The Archive now holds over four hundred wax cylinders Roberts collected during the 1920s and 1930s-material from Jamaica, Hawaii, California, and New Mexico. She also donated disc copies of an additional 375 cylinders collected by nineteen other anthropologists and writers, primarily containing Polyne~ sian, African, and California Indian songs. Trained in piano and music theory at the Chicago Music College and the American Conservatory of Music, both in her hometown, Roberts con­ ceived an interest in anthropology and archaeology while spending several summers visiting the Pueblo Indians in the Southwest. She studied with Franz Boas at Columbia University and in 1919 received an M.A. degree in anthropology. Boas told her that the music and anthropology combination would give her a field to herself. During the 1920s Helen Roberts studied North American Indian music, as well as musical instruments in the museums of Europe. In 1923-4, she Helen Heffron Roberts in California, 1926. Photo by]. P. Harrington. Courtesy ofthe conducted a s~rvey of ancient Smithsonian Institution Hawaiian music. She did field work in Jamaica, New Mexico, and California In 1937 Roberts went to Tryon, interview with Helen Roberts at her (with J. P. Harrington of the Bureau North Carolina, to look after her home. The lady was ninety-one, and of American Ethnology). During the father. In the 1940s her eyesight began her memory of some periods of her 1930s she continued her work with to fail, and she was unable to be as career was dim. But the session proved American Indian, Polynesian, Tahi­ active in her own research and study. to be informative and interesting. The tian, and South African music and After her father's death in 1944, she following comments are characteristic: culture. She was on the staff of Yale returned to Connecticut, where she University, where she set up an early devoted much of her time to support­ On her facility for languages: I had a recording laboratory. She was able to ing the New Haven Symphony. good ear. I was a musician, you see, duplicate wax cylinders onto alumi­ In December 1979, Maria La Vigna and I had a good ear for language, and num discs, and numerous collectors of the Folklife Center's Federal Cylin­ . I was interested in it. . . . It wasn't sent her cylinders for copying and der Project and David McAllester of any special training ... I just had to transcribing. Wesleyan University conducted an go at it the raw way.

10 FOLKLIFE CENTER NEWS On collecting methods: I tried to get as not tell about this, they knew I would recording and it sang it through and much information about the not tell. And they would give me he looked at me. "Missy, you sure am individual, about his background or material that they might not have God! You am the Lord himself!" he his tribe as I could, you know. But I given to somebody else. said, and with that he got down on the realize that that was something that porch and did somersaults all the way nobody was paying any attention to, On using a phonograph to record sing­ to one end of the porch and back again and it would have its day someday, ers: ... finally I got my phonograph as fast as he could! ... So when I get and I tried to make good records. from New York and records, and so discouraged, I say "You am God!"O I called him in [one of the singers in On relations with her informants and Jamaica she had been working withl, singers: ... for the most part they were and I asked him to sing into it. Well, In addition to the materials in the Folk very friendly. They weren't in the he was a little dubious, it looked kind Archive's collection, there are Helen Roberts beginning, but they knew they could of funny to him, you know, and he papers in the archives of Yale University. trust me, and I made a rule, I never didn't know whether it was going to An article by Maria La Vigna on her 1979 made a promise that I didn't keep. It jump at him or not. But anyway, he interview, "A Visit with Helen Roberts, JJ didn't make any difference how got down and he sang in and I said, appeared in Folklife Center News, vol. awkward it was later to do it, or how "now would you like to hear this?" 3, no. 1Uanuary 1980). Judith Gray and time consuming. IfI had said I would "Oh, yes," he wanted to hear it. So Joseph C. Hickerson contributed to the article do it, I did it. . . . IfI had said I would I put it onto reproducing instead of above.

Center welcomes new board members: At the spring 1988 meeting of the American Folklife Center's Board of Trustees, Marta Weigle, William Kinney, Johnnetta Cole, and AlanJabbour look over a passage in Folklife: Our Living Heritage, a report on folklife in Australia that refers to the Center. Marta Weigle and Johnnetta Cole, from New Mexico and Georgia, respectively, recently joined the board, and William Kinney, from South Carolina, was reappointed for a second term. Photo by Reid Baker

SUMMER 1988 11 The Original Trinidad and Tobago Steelband of Washington, D.C., performed on the Neptune Plaza of the Library of Congress on July 16 , 1987. The program for this year's concert series is listed on page 7. Photo by John Gibbs

THE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS BULK RATE AMERICAN FOLK LIFE CENTER POSTAGE & FEES PAID WASHINGTON, D.C. 20540 LIBRARY OF CONGRESS WASHINGTON, D.C. OFFICIAL BUSINESS PERMIT No. G-103 PENALTY FOR PRIVATE US E, $300

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