Sponsored by the Folk Belief and Religious Folklife Section of the American Folklore Society.
The Folk Belief and Religious Folklife Section of the American Folklore Society (AFS) awards travel stipends in honor of the late distinguished professor, folklorist, and religious studies scholar Leonard Norman Primiano (1957-2021). This award is supported by a generous bequest of Leonard Norman Primiano and is restricted to travel by a retired scholar to deliver an AFS annual meeting conference presentation on the topics of vernacular Catholicism or vernacular religion, with a preference for the former, as stipulated in his bequest. Primiano defined vernacular religion as “religion as it is lived: as human beings encounter, understand, interpret, and practice it” (Primiano, 2022, Vernacular Religion, Collected Essays, p.6). He challenged scholars to take seriously the minutiae of how people live their religion in particular contexts, their interaction with material culture, their often-flexible attitude to and use of tradition, their frequently complex relationships and negotiations with institutional forms of religiosity, and above all their agency.
The purpose of this prize is to enable retired scholars to travel to the AFS annual meeting and present their work in vernacular Catholicism and/or vernacular religion in person. Applicants are encouraged to join AFS and must be members of the Folk Belief and Religious Folklife Section of AFS; annual Section dues are $10. Application is open to international and domestic retired scholars. The award ranges from $500 up to $1500, for meeting registration, travel, and hotel expenses, and will be released to the recipient after the annual meeting to assure participation. Two such retired scholar travel awards may be given each year.
Application deadline: June 1, midnight
The award is contingent on the applicant’s acceptance for participation in the AFS meeting. The awardee will be notified after the AFS program committee completes the preliminary program, usually by the end of June.
The scholar may receive this award up to two times only.
To be considered for the award, applicants must submit the following:
- A copy of the long and short abstracts that you will be submitting for AFS meeting evaluation/selection; and/or a summary of your proposed participation in the meeting by invitation for a lecture, workshop, etc.
- A brief curriculum vitae, resume, or biography of your professional life.
- Your budget for travel expenses and the amount requested.
Application materials should be submitted as Microsoft Word documents or pdf to the AFS prize application submission form. For any technical questions related to the submission, please send an email to AFS Executive Director Jessica Turner.
Confirmation of receipt for electronic submissions will be sent. One submission per person, please.Please address other questions to prize committee chair Margaret Kruesi, PhD, and include the Subject Line: “LNP Retired Scholar Travel Award.”
Recipients
Elizabeth Tucker, Bonnie O’Connor, and Yvonne Milspaw (2023)