In Oral History: A Very Short Introduction (Oxford University Press), Douglas A. Boyd examines the oral history interview, recording techniques and strategies, technologies for making oral history accessible, and the legal and ethical implications throughout the work of oral history.
Recent Releases
In Mythopedia (Princeton University Press), Adrienne Mayor shows how geomythology is expanding our understanding of our planet’s history, revealing the human desire to explain nature and weave imaginative stories intertwined with keen observation, rational speculation, and memory.
In Concept Work (Indiana University Press), AFS Fellow and President-Elect Jason Baird Jackson illustrates scholarly concept work in folklore studies through accounts of four concepts that are significant to the field but not yet richly explored—colonization, cultural heritage, cultural appropriation, and world-systems.
Festival Activism (Indiana University Press) is a collection of case studies from scholars, performers, and arts administrators, all of whom argue that festivals do more than simply celebrate culture; they also shape culture, creating new forms of aspirational community with direct political effects.
Out now, a special issue of JAF: A Global Quarterly on “Folklore, Comics, and Graphic Storytelling” (Fall 2025) is groundbreaking in its combination of scholarly essays, creative non-fiction, pedagogical strategies, and public-facing pieces, curated by Erin Kathleen Bahl and Andy Kolovos.
Exploring Anthropology through Folklore and Mythology (Routledge) is a comprehensive textbook which examines how people around the world express themselves culturally, and how these practices provide a window into the diversity of human culture.
Gatherings is a six-part TV documentary series exploring some of Britain’s most enduring folk traditions. It will be available to buy/watch in the United States on select streaming platforms from October 6, 2025.
Careful Village and Other 'Khashag' from Tibet (Open Book Publishers) offers a unique glimpse into the world of khashag, a vibrant genre of Tibetan spoken comic dialogues from the area Tibetans call Amdo. The book is freely available to read and download in both PDF and HTML formats.
The Strange Tools of Human Communication (Routledge) reframes communication as a set of tools through which humans actively shape social life. Clear, non-jargon prose and chapter-end prompts make the book teachable for courses in folklore and beyond. It translates theory into practical analytic lenses that instructors and students can immediately apply.
The 2025 Journal of Folklore and Education (JFE) "Cultural Frameworks for Transformative Documenting and Learning" is now freely available. The theme for the 2026 JFE will be "Teaching with Monsters: From Whimsy to Shadow." It is accepting submissions until April 1, 2026.