2025 Folk Arts Partnership Professional Development Institute Highlights

A partnership of the American Folklore Society, the National Assembly of State Arts Agencies, and the National Endowment for the Arts, the Folk Arts Partnership Professional Development Institute (FAP PDI) supports folk and traditional arts program managers at state arts agencies, regional arts organizations, and their partners by providing professional development, networking, technical assistance, mentorship, and planning consultation. The following 2025 Annual Meeting selections have been compiled by FAP PDI staff in consultation with the Folk Arts Partners cohort.

AFS is excited to engage partners before and after this year’s meeting in Atlanta from the Oral History Association and Society of Ethnomusicology.

Friday, October 17, 2025 (Atlanta, GA)

John C. Campbell Folk School Field Trip

Saturday, October 18, 2025 (Atlanta, GA)

Teaching with Folk Sources

Restoring Self, Stories, and Community: Addressing archival absences and other traumatic collections encounters

Community Writing Workshop: The Troubling Intersection of Past and Present: A Place-based Creative Writing Workshop with Eder J. Williams-McKnight (There is a registration fee of $30, with a limited number of scholarships available. Registration includes the workshop, lunch, and coffee/snacks. Registration is capped at 25 participants, and will be on a first-come, first-served basis. Register by October 8.)

Foodways Excursion throughout ATL

Block Party with the Oral History Association and the American Folklore Society

Folklore and Museums Section Museum Visit: Center for Puppetry Arts (Register by September 17)

Folklife in the South Gathering

Atlanta Folklore Film Series, Double Bill

Sunday, October 19, 2025 (Atlanta, GA)

2025 Gathering at the Intersections of Folklore and the Environment

Lessons In Crafting Community: Narratives Of The African American Craft Alliance And John C. Campbell Folk School Building And Bonding Partnership

Comparative Studies of the Inheritance, Promotion & Development of Chinese Festival Customs in China & US: Dragon Boat Culture

Roots of Knowing: At the Intersection of Folklore Studies and Library Science

Sustaining Tradition, Building Careers: Public Folklore, Applied (Ethno)musicology, and University Partnerships in the 21st Century

Folklore and ReStorying Legislative Advocacy

First Time Attendees

Diving Deep into Culture Learning: Folklife Education in K-12 Music Classrooms

Folklore, Pedagogy, and Cultural Bridges

Forced Migration, Restoring, ReStorying, Missing Stories, and Moving Forward

Rethinking the Sonic Archive

Patacones, Paintbrushes, and Power: Restorying Diaspora through Art and Oral History

Awards and Recognitions

AFS Community Tools Meeting

Holy Cars and Sacred Hearts: Lowriders of Northern New Mexico

Candidate’s Meet and Greet

“You Gotta Go with Your Gut:” ReStorying Women’s Intuition in the Face of Risk

Daniel Crowley Storytelling Concert: Western North Carolina Ballad Keepers

Monday, October 20, 2025 (Atlanta, GA)

Kinkeeping: The Sacred Work of Sorting Things, Restoring Stories, and ReStorying Lives after a Loved One has Died

Rethinking Folklore and Pedagogy

Woven Resistance and Revitalization: Restoring and Restorying Basketry Traditions

sounding: dark matter

Telling Stories Anew and Ways to Tell New (Cultural) Stories

OpenFolklore Meet Up

Benefits to Artists: Gatherings and Festivals

Core Concepts in Folklore Studies: Authenticity, Assemblage, Belief, and Ostension

Folklore in Education Today: Methods and Tools in Action

Re-queering, Re-hearing, and Keeping the Record (not) Straight

Heritage in Motion: Restorying Chinese Pasts, Contested Presents,..

Recentering Indigeneity, Fieldwork, Identity and Narrative

Core Concepts in Folklore Studies: Motifs, Genre, Performance, and Narrative

Possibilities, Challenges, and Strategies for Museums to Grow, And For Collections To Be Made More Accessible in Times of Political Turmoil

Restorying the Streets: Space, Politics, and Recuperative Discourse in Urban Street Art

Folklore Fieldwork and the Safety of Ethnographers

Listening Back, Moving Forward: Northwest Folklife’s Participatory Archive Project

Resituating Folk Music in Places

Tuesday, October 21, 2025

Restorying oral history traditions

Communities Structuring/Structured by Labor, the Land, and Foodways

From One Body to Another: The Transmission of Physical and Cultural Knowledge and the Stories We Share

Museum Practice and Policy

Remaking Community through Storying and Restorying

Profits from Prison Recordings: Folklorists’ Ongoing Legacies of “Honor” and Exploitation

RE-storying folklore and expanding our futures

(Re)Storying Objects: The Ever-changing Lives of Things

The Art and Ethics of Community Storytelling

AFS Business Meeting

Developing a Practical Guide to Applying Folkloristic Approaches in Museums

Folklore and Climate: Working Cross Sector

Climate and Folklore Group Meeting

Re-storying the Folk School Histories -Community Interventions on the 100 Year Anniversary of the John C. Campbell Folk School

Re-storying Place, Presence, and Narrative as Bridges to Cultural Sustainabilities

Putting Music to Uses New and Old

Dance Workshop: “From One Body to Another”

Closing Reception

Virtual sessions will be listed once the schedule is finalized.

Learn more about the Folk Arts Partnership Professional Development Institute.