Swarthmore College announces that its Old Science Hall has been renamed Edley-Morgan Hall. The new name recognizes two illustrious members of the Swarthmore community: legal scholar Christopher F. Edley Jr. (1953–2024) and folklorist Kathryn L. Morgan (1919–2010).
Featured Folklorist
Son of the late Albanian folklorist Dr. Ibrahim Krosi started an initiative to preserve and continue the scholarly work of his father whose research focused extensively on Albanian oral tradition and the folklore of the Balkans.
Folklorist Jasper Waugh-Quasebarth's work was recently featured in an episode of the podcast channel New Books in Folklore hosted by fellow folklorist Rachel Hopkin, who is also calling for new hosts for the channel.
Storytelling artist, folklorist, and AFS Executive Board member Kiran Singh Sirah is pleased to share his storytelling toolkit, Telling Stories That Matter, which is designed to offer creative methods to explore compassionate storytelling.
Each month, the African American Folklorist honors individuals dedicated to preserving and advancing Black folklore, oral traditions, and Blues culture. This March, they recognize Dr. Anika Wilson for her groundbreaking work on informal narratives—gossip, rumor, and storytelling as cultural expression.
Emily Hilliard is a folklorist, writer, and media producer based at Berea College in Kentucky. In 2021, she received an Archie Green Fellowship to document U.S. mail carriers in Central Appalachia as part of the American Folklife Center’s Occupational Folklife Project. With insights gained from this project, Hilliard published an article on the Jacobin magazine, arguing that "USPS privatization would cost rural America more than mail."
Dr. Maribel Alvarez converses with Folk music educator and performer Eugene Rodriguez, who founded Los Cenzontles, a youth music group, in 1989 in San Pablo, California, about the joys and challenges of folklore-based education and identity politics.
Los Herederos, a media arts non-profit dedicated to inheriting culture in the digital age, was featured on ABC 7 Eyewitness News on September, 23 for their Queens as Cultural Crossroads installation in the Roosevelt Avenue and 74th Street subway station in Jackson Heights.
Kendell Henry, Folk Arts Manager for the U.S. Virgin Islands, shares his story and looks ahead to the 2024 Folklife Festival.
Oral Traditions in Contemporary China: Healing a Nation (2021, Lexington Books). Second place (along with Christy Williams) for the 2022 AFS Chicago Folklore Prize.