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The Festival: Making Culture Public The Festival: Making Culture Public by Richard Kurin makers, writers, tour operators, and many others. In a public institution like the Smithsonian, an­ he past few years have seen an increasing alysis needs to be coupled with action. Exhibitions, concern with issues of public cultural repre­ programs, and displays often reflect cultural poli­ Tsentation. A host of symposia and books cies and broad public sentiments, but they may also examine how culture and history have been pub­ serve as vehicles for legitimating outdated senti­ licly presented in museums, at Olympics, through ments and policies as well as encouraging alterna­ the Columbus Quincentenary, presidential inaugu­ tive ones. Programs can address public knowledge, rals, festivals, and other mega-events. Controversy discourse, and debate with considerable care, ex­ now swirls around Disney's America and issues of pertise, and ethical responsibility. But scholars and authenticity and accuracy in the presentation of curators have good cause to worry that their efforts American history to mass audiences. will be eclipsed by those with greater access to larg­ More than when the Smithsonian was founded in er audiences. 1846 for "the increase and diffusion of knowledge," How then to understand the Smithsonian's communicating cultural subjects to broad publics is Festival of American Folklife in this context? What big, and serious, business. New genres of represen­ is it? How does it display and represent culture? tation are emerging, such as "infotainment," history And what does it suggest about the role of muse­ and culture theme parks, various forms of multime­ ums and cultural institutions with regard to the dia, and equivalents of local access cable TV across people represented? the globe. Worlds previously separated are becom­ ing conjoined. New technologies from the enter­ METAPHORS FOR THE fESTIVAL tainment industry are entering museums and edu­ I have often wondered whether the Festival is mis­ cational institutions. Entertainment conglomerates named. The word "festival" is too often used and are being forced to take responsibility for the ways misused. At first glance, the Festival of American in which they represent peoples and cultures. The Folklife is not a festival of the same sort as a peas­ lower cost and wide dissemination of modern tech­ ant community's celebration of its harvest, or its nology- tape recorders, video cameras, computers, freedom. Nor does it seem like a festival of the sort and fax machines - have broadened the ability of cities sponsor, a list of events dispersed in space even the most isolated communities to represent and time called an arts festival. Nor does it seem themselves to global audiences. quite like a folk festival- an outdoor concert of Scholars who engage in and reflect upon these pop and revival folk music. Nor does it seem like activities find their work traverses the worlds of ac­ the international festivals organized by many ademia, popular media, and politics. Gone are the schools to show off foods, music, games, and cos­ days of singular, monological, acontextual studies of tumes only tangentially related to students' lives. civilizations, countries, communities, villages, and The Festival of American Folklife has been cultures. Studies that fail to situate their subjects in likened to many things. Existing as part of the a contemporary world of multiple, if not contend­ Smithsonian's museum complex, the Festival has ing, cultural narratives are perilously misleading. been called a "living museum without walls" and a Increased attention and analysis need to be devoted "living cultural exhibit." Dean Anderson, a former to seeing culture within a range of representational Smithsonian official, offered, "Whereas museum is forms, generated by community members, politi­ a noun, Festival is a verb." This highlights the Fes­ cians, scholars, business people, journalists, film tival's dynamism and contrasts it with museums, 6 THE FESTIVAL: MAKING CULTURE PUBLIC FESTIVAL OF AMERICAN FOLKLIFE which in the worst case The Festival has provided are lifeless, sterile, and a forum, a stage, and a silent. The term "muse­ microphone for a broad um" originally meant the diversity of the nation's "place of the muse." A and world's people to museum without mus­ speak to the public. Fes­ ings, music, and amuse­ tival coordinator Lucille ment - words of the • Dawson speaks during a same derivation - would presentation of Native seem to run counter to American culture on the the original purpose. Mall for the American And, indeed, some of the Bicentennial in 1976. best museums around Photo by Andrew Wile, are renowned for their courtesy Smithsonian ability to make us think, Institution participate in and con­ others, it is an annual front the lives of others. lunch break with free The Festival can provoke entertainment. For some thought, does have it is an illustrated book of music, is amusing at times, has museum-like signs, cultural practice; for the tour minded, a quick and displays, and so on; but is it a museum? Too tem­ easy trip around the world. For the conspiratorial, porary, say some. Too outdoors, say others. Too it is a form of national theater, in which the state frivolous, says a museum curator. Perhaps if only exerts its understandings upon the masses; for the just the objects appeared and not the people who counter conspiratorial it is a demonstration against made, use, and understand them, then it would be the cultural hegemony of the state, a reassertion of serious. "Too messy, but in a good way," says the people's ability to make their culture and define another official in charge of museums. themselves. For yet others it is merely a good time. But if not quite a museum, is the Festival more The Festival of American Folklife is a complex like a zoo, as another colleague once proposed? To form of institutional public cultural display that be sure, as at a zoo, some living beings come to see accomplishes a number of different purposes and other living beings. Zoo organizers provide some occupies a variety of conceptual spaces. It can be information in the form of signs and labels, and try seen in a number of different ways, and its success­ to present creatures with a bit of their natural, es and failures tallied accordingly. home setting. By seeing the creatures, visitors learn The Festival was invented by Ralph Rinzler in about them, appreciate their existence, and some­ 1967 with support from then Smithsonian Secretary times even learn about the larger issues they evoke. S. Dillon Ripley and the head of the Division of Per­ Zoo staff do this to help preserve the animals and forming Arts, James Morris, and help from a score their habitat as part of our diverse biological her­ of inventive thinkers from a range of fields. It itage. Similarly, Festival organizers present people shared some affinity with folk festivals of the time. to visitors to display their culture. Signs, labels, Ralph, and Festival supporter Alan Lomax, had for banners, reconstructions of bits of home settings, example been part of the folk revival and were or­ and photographs help visitors understand and in­ ganizers of the Newport Folk Festival. Don Yoder's terpret what they see, hear, and sense. Hopefully work with the Pennsylvania Folklife Festival and too, visitors gain an appreciation of displayed tradi­ festivals in other countries provided some models tions, national and world-wide cultural diversity. for the Smithsonian. But there are big differences between the zoo and Earlier antecedents existed in forms of cultural the Festival. Visitors are just as likely to see them­ display along the lines of the 1893 Columbian selves on display as "others." And at the Festival, Exposition. This attempt to present the exotic cul­ people talk back and play the major role in shaping tures of the world on Chicago's Midway Plaisance their own self-representation. first engaged and then derailed the public anthro­ There are other metaphors for the Festival. Some pology mission of Frederick Putnam, Otis Mason, people have likened it to a cultural theme park. and Franz Boas. Crass commercialism, lack of Others to a street fair and block party. To some it is framed presentation, journalistic sensationalism, a series of performances and demonstrations; to racism, and a cultural evolutionary framework con- FESTIVAL OF AMERICAN FOLKLIFE THE FESTIVAL: MAKING CULTURE PUBLIC 7 spired to make the living The Festival offers cultural displays at the interesting, even arresting Exposition a critical juxtapositions of cultural failure. life. Here a 1982 This was not true at demonstration of cow­ the Smithsonian in the herding skills by 1960s. The Festival fol­ Oklahoman Sherri Lyn lowed in the wake of Close is set against the Rev. Martin Luther backdrop of the Capitol. King's use of the Photo by Dane Penland, National Mall as a pulpit courtesy Smithsonian to assert civic participa­ Institution tion. The Festival was used to signal the pres­ release valve, so to ence, voice, and cultur­ speak, giving members al/artistic endowment of of society a chance to American populations revolt against the usual underrepresented in order, counter the struc­ public institutions. The ture of relationships Festival signaled to with either inverted ones members of Congress or none at all. Festivals that there was culture typically conjoin and back home, and that that separate people, magnify culture was worthy of and compress space and national pride and atten­ time. tion. In relation to the In the Washingtonian museums, the Festival, for Ripley, was a means of scheme of things, the Festival of American Folklife livening up the Smithsonian, broadening and does operate like a festival. It creates its own space enlarging its visitorship. on the Mall, a sometimes jarring presence in the The Festival has always navigated between the midst of official, neat space.
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