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NEWS FROM THE LOUISIANA FOLKLIFE PROGRAM Since last January, lots has happened. The two new Regional Folklorists positions for LSU
and UL-Lafayette did not get funded after all, the Creole State Exhibit is no longer in the State
Capitol, and Tamika Edwards Raby is the new Folklife Program Assistant. The Division of the Arts has
awarded many grants in folklife, the three Regional Folklorists have been busy, and lots has been
going on around the state. See below for details. If you would prefer to not receive this update, please let me know. Maida Owens
Update from the Louisiana Folklife Program Also See Past Folklife Updates NEWS FROM THE LOUISIANA FOLKLIFE PROGRAM Regrettably, the Louisiana State Legislature did not provide continued funding for the new Regional Folklorists positions at Louisiana State University and the University of Louisiana at Lafayette. We learned of this possibility early enough to stop the hiring process, so no job offers were made. The Louisiana Division of the Arts was also targeted to get a 75% budget cut. But that was resolved only five days before the end of the session, so the Division did not receive the cut. We have compiled a list of organizations that want to use these services. We will continue to add to this list and keep trying to get these two positions funded. During the last two weeks of June, Louisiana State Museum staff removed the Creole State Exhibit artifacts from the cases in the Capitol breezeway. Then in early July, the exhibit cases were removed and given to two non-profit organizations. Carolyn Breedlove with the Kent House Museum in Alexandria will use about one fourth of the cases in an expansion of exhibit space. Annette and Grayhawk Perkins with Atcha Kostini: Spirit River will use the remaining cases in a museum under development in Covington that will feature Native American cultures. The Creole State Exhibit artifacts will be used in the various exhibits planned for the new Louisiana State History Museum under construction in Baton Rouge. In August, the three Regional Folklorists and I met with State Museum curators to brainstorm on how the artifacts can be used and what other artifacts could be added. We will be assisting the staff to identify and locate items. Adrienne Berney is curating an exhibit called "Louisiana People," which will feature the different cultural groups in Louisiana. Steve Teeter is curating the "Louisiana Music" exhibit, which will focus on Louisiana's influence on music around the world. Wayne Phillips is curating the "Louisiana Mardi Gras" exhibit. Kathryn Page is curating the "Louisiana Foods" exhibit. And Keith Hardison, who will head the new museum once it is open, is handling the Mississippi River exhibit. The "Natural Abundance" exhibit is being handled by Alecia Long. Tamika Edwards Raby began working as the Louisiana Folklife Program Assistant in February. She is a native of Baton Rouge and brings to this position a love for and appreciation of Louisiana folk culture. Her particular area of interest is African-American folklore. Currently she is embarking on an independent project which focuses on African-American burial traditions within the state. Tamika is a graduate of Louisiana State University (Baton Rouge), where she earned a BA in English, and an MFA in Creative Writing. In her free time she enjoys spending time with her family, writing, reading, designing websites, and dabbling in her long-time hobby of fashion design. Recent efforts to increase the number of folk artists submitting applications for Fellowships and Apprenticeships were successful, but not for Artist Mini-Grants. The Division of the Arts often receives 1-4 fellowship applications each year even though there are so many folk artists worthy of this $5000 award for artistic merit. In January, I mailed a letter about these programs to about 900 folk artists in the Louisiana Folk Artist Database maintained by the NSU Regional Folklorist, Dayna Lee. I listed the 15 folk artists who won fellowships in the last 10 years since these were the only folk artists not eligible to apply. As a result, we received 21 fellowship applications and 18 apprenticeship applications for the March 1 deadline. And the number of folklife fellowships awarded increased from two to four! See below for the winners. Regretfully, this strategy did not result in an increase in Mini-Grant applications from folk artists. We received 3 Mini-Grant applications at the August 1 deadline, which is typical. The Louisiana Folklife Commission met on Thursday, May 23 in Baton Rouge to discuss funding of the two new Regional Folklorist positions. Even though the Louisiana Regional Folklife Program was not fully funded for the next year, we were able to complete quite a bit with the funds we had for FY02. Both universities purchased all the equipment needed for the program, which will remain with the universities in anticipation of the program being funded in FY04. At the University of Louisiana at Lafayette, the Center for Cultural and Eco Tourism (CCET) continued the process of digitizing rare or less easily accessed recordings, like the Lomax recordings from the 1930s, in order to make those materials available to the various community members and visiting scholars who have already begun to take advantage of the facility. It's the Center's hope to make much of this material available for ready use by visitors and to make some portion of the various audio, text, and visual collections available online under the auspices of the Louisiana Digital Archives and the Louisiana Digital Folklore Archives. There are some pages already up and running for those interested in seeing what's planned. Carl Brasseaux also reports that the computers are already being used by a variety of researchers and students, and the field recorders and equipment are already being used on projects. Debbie Clifton was hired to work with student workers to create a website for the Center for Cultural and Eco-Tourism, www.louisiana.edu/Academic/LiberalArts/CCET/. They have ambitious plans to put samples of the oral history tapes online. At Louisiana State University Dept of Geography and Anthropology, Jay Edwards and LSU Grad Student Satomi Fukutomi completed an Excel database for the collected LSU student folklore papers. There are actually two inventories. The first and largest lists papers submitted in the following classes between 1971 and 2001: ANTH/ENGL 2423 and 3401 Introductory and fieldwork classes), and English 4475 American Folklore. The classes were taught mostly by Frank DeCaro, Rosan Jordan, and Jay Edwards, though Joyce Jackson and other professors also participated. There are 1302 papers in the first archive. For easy use in research, the printouts are sorted by Number and also by Genre and Topic. Grades and professor's remarks have been removed from the archival copies. The index for the archive is 72 legal-sized pages in length! The second, and smaller, inventory lists papers submitted on the topics of material culture and vernacular architecture between 1977 and 2002. These were submitted in ANTH/ARCH 4440, vernacular architecture, ANTH 7909, Anthropology Seminar, and English 4023, Studies in Life Writing. The inventory lists 97 papers, mostly on the topic of folk and historic Louisiana architecture. All papers are numbered and filed in archival boxes in the compact shelves of the Fred B. Kniffen Cultural Resources Laboratory (E212 Howe/Russell Building) at LSU. They include taped interviews and original photographs. They are available to researchers on an appointment basis. Contact Jay Edwards at 225/578-2566 or gaedwa@lsu.edu. If you wish to make use of the electronic format, bring your own copy of Exel on your laptop. Other funds supported the cataloging of the Louisiana Folklife Program Collection, which includes the program's project files housed at the LSU Library Special Collections. They have completed logging another 500 audio tapes. By early September, Tara Zachary will post online a finding aid for the folklife collection, http://www.lib.lsu.edu/special/findaid/lafolklife.html Other projects include commissioning Ben Sandmel to write an essay on Louisiana's musical traditions to support the music unit in Louisiana Voices and identifying 10 audio clips sampling Louisiana music styles. Once music rights are obtained, the clips will be put online for students to use with this unit. Susan Levitas identified another 10 video clips to support this unit. Carolyn Ware provided essays on artifacts in the online Creole State Exhibit that are already posted online. Ray Brassieur has identified photos of Louisiana boats and will provide essays with each. Many of the images were provided by Malcolm Comeaux. Louisiana Regional Folklife Program Laura Westbrook, Regional Folklorist at the University of New Orleans, continues to work with the New Orleans Museum of Art on its exhibit of New Orleans Building Arts, "Raised to the Trade," scheduled to open November 10, 2002. She has been consulting with its curator, NOMA staff, scholars, and with the craftsmen who were interviewed as part of the Building Arts Survey coordinated by Ray Brassieur, upon which the exhibit is based. Dr. Westbrook has worked with numerous other projects that have resulted from the survey, such as the documentary about building trades created by the New Orleans Craft Guild; the Preservation Resource Center's "Jazz Houses" project; "Fourteen Mechanic's Street," a play about the building trades performed by students of St. Leo the Great School at the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival, and varied others. Two folklorists, through stipends offered by the Folklife Program, have made valuable contributions to work begun by the Region Five Program. Mark Sindler of the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival spent part of his off-season documenting German-American traditions, and he continues to consult with the program as he develops JazzFest presentations based on his research. Anita Harris has documented a number of people who were once residents of Chalmette's historic Fazendville community. Dr. Westbrook and Ms. Harris are working to assist this community to fund and undertake further fieldwork that can result in an exhibit about this little-discussed neighborhood and its history. The Region Five Program is collaborating with the National Project for Nonprofit Leadership's Urban Roots Program on a "cultural mapping" initiative to document cultural assets in blighted neighborhoods and develop beneficial community programs. The project was conceived as a way to bring together concerns of Urban Roots, International Project for Nonprofit Leadership, the Louisiana Folklife Program, and neighborhood-based organizations. This partnership was inaugurated on April 10 at a ceremony in Orleans Parish's Central City, the current designated neighborhood. Folklife Program Assistant, Natasha Wilson, after assisting with Café Reconcile's Caribbean Night celebration on July 13, began the process of conducting and transcribing oral histories and folklife interviews. Plans are being formed for a Community Store at which documented craftspersons will be featured through their work and through active demonstrations. Region Five will consult closely in the development of demonstrations and exhibits that are produced as an outcome of the collaboration between UR and the LFP. This partnering will also provide an opportunity to increase local representation at Movin' on the Boulevard (spring), Art in All Places (early fall), and Holiday on the Boulevard (winter), the largest public community events that already take place on Oretha Castle Haley Boulevard. The lack of local representation has been cited as the primary reason for low resident turnout. Region Five and Urban Roots are working to refocus these events on local talents and local culture, making them more authentic community celebrations. Dr. Westbrook and Pam Broom are exploring further ways in which this alliance can benefit existing community plans. St. Tammany Parish is utilizing many services of the Region Five Program. The Mandeville Trailhead and Cultural Interpretive Center sponsored a series of oral history/interviewing workshops, for a documentary project for which Dr. Westbrook assisted with funding applications. The Bayou Lacombe Rural Museum in Lacombe and the UCM Museum in Abita Springs have both sought assistance with development and exhibit planning. U.S. Wildlife and Fisheries will soon develop the Big Branch Marsh in St. Tammany, and Region Five is participating in community meetings to gauge interest in interpretive priorities and assist in planning. A consortium of small St. Tammany museums is interested in developing a shared, traveling textiles exhibit, and they are receiving assistance with exhibit development. The Town of Covington has decided to hold its first Covington Folklife Festival, and Region Five has been asked to work closely with the festival committees. Contact Laura Westbrook at laura@roussev.net. Dr. Susan Roach, Folklorist for the Louisiana Regional Folklife Program at Louisiana Tech University, is continuing her Louisiana Quilt Documentation Project. With over 500 quilts currently documented, the project identifies and documents quilts made in Louisiana from the days of earliest settlement of the state to the present. The project goals are to document in detail all types of quilts made in different periods in the state with photographs, measurements, and other formal information; to document quiltmakers and their backgrounds; to assist quilt owners in identifying and maintaining the history of family quilts; to provide community organizations and institutions the necessary tools and approaches to document quilts in their region; to develop appreciation for quilting as an important expressive artistic form; to preserve historic quilts; to assist communities in developing community exhibitions of their quilts; and to compile a searchable database of quilts for publication on the Folklife in Louisiana website. At documentation clinics, quilt owners and quilt makers bring their quilts to the designated site for the clinic where quilt specialists will collect information about the quilt. Based on quilt documentation done in Mississippi and other states, the Louisiana Quilt Documentation Form collects specific information on individual quilts and quiltmakers. Quilt Documentation Clinics since January have been held at Winter Quarters State Park, Newellton; LSU AgCenter, Oak Grove; Natchitoches Folk Festival, Natchitoches; Snyder Museum, Bastrop; Franklin Piecemakers, Winnsboro; and Concordia Parish Library, Vidalia. Upcoming documentations are scheduled for Shreveport at the Spring Street Historical Museum in October and at the LSU AgCenter in Minden on November 12. To supplement this research, Dr. Roach has been collecting information from past quilt documentation projects in the state. In consultation with Sandra Todaro, of Shreveport, and the Louisiana State Archives, she has also located in the state archives documentation of over 3000 quilts collected in Todaro's 1990s project at sites such as Magnolia Mound, Natchitoches, and Shreveport. In quilt-related technical assistance, she consulted with the Southern University Museum of Art, Baton Rouge on curating an African-American quilt exhibit held February 2002. In addition to this research, Dr. Roach has been providing technical assistance to other museums including the Bienville Parish Depot Museum in Arcadia, where she assisted the museum director, project folklorist, and graphic designer with artists' documentation, the resulting permanent exhibit design, interpretation, and installation. Approximately 40% of the 44 artists documented were involved in traditional or revivalist crafts, foodways, arts. She is also assisting the Shadow Plantation Museum and Folklife Center (featuring an ante-bellum dog trot house with late 19th and early 20th century additions), located outside Minden just off I-20, in developing its restoration, interpretive, and exhibition plans. The Cultural Crossroads of Minden, Inc. has received La. Capital Outlay funds to develop and restore the plantation home and outbuildings on 20 acres of land donated to the project. After the first phase of restoration, the group plans to donate the museum to the La. State Parks as an Historic Site. She is planning to collect stories about the plantation from the local community and to train other community members in interviewing to assist with the collection through her interviewing workshop, Collecting Stories and Oral History from Your Family and Community. The workshop has also been presented at the Hermione Museum and Madison Parish Historical Society in Tallulah, the Bienville Parish Homemakers Council, Arcadia, and the Dorcheat Historical Museum Association/Cultural Crossroads, Minden, La. Other museum exhibition assistance was provided to the Snyder Museum of Art in Bastrop and the Opelousas Museum of Art in Opelousas for their exhibitions of Sarah Albritton's paintings and narratives. She will also assist the Stella Jones Gallery in New Orleans with a similar exhibit to be held in October 2002. In other Albritton presentations, Roach will interview Albritton about her work and its relationship to Clementine Hunter's work at the Old Courthouse Museum, in Natchitoches, on October 11, at 5:30 p.m. Roach is continuing her work with Louisiana Voices, and will be a guest lecturer on material culture at the upcoming mini-institute in November. She also assisted with the editing of the final Louisiana Voices unit on music. She will teach English 482: Folklore Studies at Louisiana Tech University, during the winter quarter, Dec. 4-February 27. Artist Assistance with grants was another focus for the program, providing assistance with LDOA Folklife Apprenticeship Applications for Penola Caesar/Seane Kelley (Monroe), Fred Beavers/Ben Robinson (Simsboro and Choudrant), Jim Lowther/Laymon Godwin (Ruston and Monroe) and LDOA Fellowship Application for Penola Caesar (Monroe). She is providing technical assistance to the La. State Fiddling Championship at Rebel State Park to develop a questionnaire to be sent to fiddlers regarding the reorganization of the contest. Contact Susan Roach at msroach@garts.latech.edu, or 318-257-2728 for technical assistance or for information on holding a quilt documentation clinic. Dayna Lee, Regional Folklorist at Northwestern State University, Louisiana Folklife Center, reports that Region 2 partnered with Williamson Museum at Northwestern State University on two projects focusing on Southeastern Indian basketry. Louisiana is home to a number of weavers and basketry traditions represented at the Southeastern Indian Basketry Gathering, held May 17-18, 2002, in Natchitoches, supported by grants from the National Endowment for the Arts and the U.S. Forest Service. Seventeen weavers from nine Southeastern tribes, as well as tribal cultural officers, participated. The gathering afforded basket makers an opportunity to exchange ideas, to learn about state and federal programs that provide assistance and access to weavers, and to learn about recent projects designed to conserve basketry traditions. Topics included access to and conservation of natural resources, working with museums and collections, grants and apprenticeships, and baskets as objects of cultural patrimony under the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA). Presentations and discussions were recorded and an edited version will be available this fall. Copies may be requested from the Regional Folklife Program, Region 2 (daynal@nsula.edu). With support from the National Park Service/Lower Mississippi Delta Region Initiatives, Dayna Lee and H. F. Gregory will produce a book on Southeastern Indian split cane basketry traditions. Essays will present perspectives of both practitioners and researchers. Publication is scheduled for Spring 2003. We are in the process of completing a database containing examples of Southeastern Indian basketry from Williamson Museum and private collections. The database, designed by former program graduate student Stacy Fontenot, will offer photographs of each basket with information on process, materials, tribal tradition, and weaver. Upon completion, the database will be accessible through the Region 2 website. Production of the video, Uski Taposhik: Cane Basketry Traditions of the Jena Band of Choctaw Indians, produced in cooperation with the U. S. Forest Service and the Jena Band of Choctaw, was recently completed. The video documents a workshop conducted by Jena Choctaw weaver, Rose Fisher-Blassingame, in which tribal members were taught to gather and process cane and to weave a basket. Tribal elder, Mary Jackson Jones, provided Choctaw translations. Dayna Lee recently conducted a workshop on documenting community traditions, sponsored by the African-American Multicultural Tourism Commission of Shreveport,. A second workshop is planned for community members involved in documentation of Antioch Baptist Church. Founded in 1866, Antioch Baptist is the oldest African-American Baptist congregation in Shreveport. A driving tour of significant African-American sites in Shreveport, developed by the African-American Multicultural Tourism Commission to enhance cultural tourism, will be available soon on the Region 2 website. The commission serves African-American and other minority communities in Shreveport. Region 2 is involved in the development of curricula and training designed to make historically accurate and culturally sensitive information available to tour guides and service personnel within the Cane River Creole National Heritage Area and Park. The project is under the direction of the Cane River Creole National Heritage Area Commission in Natchitoches. Photographic and textual information on a number of regional traditions is available for use by students, researchers, and the public online (http://www.nsula.edu/folklife) Included are a virtual driving tour of the Cane River Creole community, process and tradition in Jena Choctaw split cane basketry, Adaesaño tamale making, occupational traditions of the McNeill Street Pump Station in Shreveport, and African-American and Creole riding clubs documented by student Rolanda Teal. The website is maintained by student Marque Nelson, who recently designed a new brochure for Region 2. Our photograph collection has been digitized and placed in a database. Student Shawna Atkins continues to transcribe taped interviews produced and archived by Region 2, and is engaged in editing records in the Louisiana Folk Artists database maintained by this program. With the Louisiana Folklife Center at Northwestern State University, Region 2 maintains the Louisiana Folk Artists website containing biographical information on traditional artists, which is available online at http://www.nsula.edu/folklife/database/biography/default.htm Former Region 2 graduate student Jodie Blair recently completed a database of audio recordings within the Louisiana Folklife Center archives, making the collections more accessible to the public.
WHAT’S NEW ON THE FOLKLIFE IN LOUISIANA website, http://www.louisianafolklife.org/index.html We've been adding many new resources to the website or linking to them. "Cane River Creole Community" by Dayna Lee, (Regional Folklife Program, Region 2). "Gifts from the Hills: North Central Louisiana Folk Traditions" exhibit booklet essays by Susan Roach and Glynn Ingram. "Excerpts from The Anonymous Breaux Manuscript" with Louisiana Folklore Miscellany. "Choctaw Split Cane Basketry" by Dayna Lee (Regional Folklife Program, Region 2) "He's the Prettiest, Tootie Montana" exhibit booklet by Kalamu ya Salaam, in cooperation with New Orleans Museum of Art. "Making Tamales in Northwestern Louisiana" by Dayna Lee, Regional Folklife Program, Region 2. "Brownie Ford: Lifelines of a Woods Cowboy" CD notes by Nick Spitzer "The Gospel Train: The Zion Travelers Spiritual Singers" Cassette notes by Joyce Jackson "Introduction and Use of Accordion in Cajun Music" by Malcolm Comeaux, from Louisiana Folklore Miscellany/p> "J.D. Miller and Floyd Soileau: A Comparison of Two Small-Town Recordmen of Acadiana" by Shane Bernard from the Louisiana Folklife Journal "North Louisiana String Band" liner notes from the LP, by Susan Roach from Louisiana Folklife Journal "Since Ol' Gabriel's Time: Hezekiah and the Houserockers" liner notes from the LP, by David Evans, from Louisiana Folklife Journal "Calling the Cotton Press" liner notes from the LP, by Don Hatley, from Louisiana Folklife Journal "The McNeil Street Pump Station" a photo essay by Dayna Lee, Regional Folklife Program, Region 2 "Learning from Your Community: Folklore and Video in the Schools" by Gail Matthews-DeNatale and Don Patterson, in cooperation with the South Carolina Arts Council Keeping It Alive: Folklife Apprenticeships: F.B. Snell - chair bottoms , and Rebecca Henry - herbalism. Creole State Exhibit Online and the Louisiana Folklife Photo Gallery:Carolyn Ware provided essays on some of the artifacts in the Creole State Exhibit. The Regional Folklorists will also provide more essays in the coming months. Ray Brassieur is providing essays for photographs of Louisiana boats for the Louisiana Folklife Photo Gallery. To support the Louisiana Voices music unit, we are adding photos of musical instruments being played and typical musical ensembles found in the different music traditions in the state.
LOUISIANA VOICES FOLKLIFE IN EDUCATION PROJECT Nalini Raghavan reports that Louisiana Voices (LV), always looking for avenues into the state's educational infrastructure, continues to collaborate on projects sponsored by the state Department of Education (DOE). This year, while continuing to present for the DOE-sponsored S.A.G.E. (Supporting Academic Growth for Educators) project, LV also presented for a new group of teachers under the LINCS project. LINCS is a three-year-old initiative of the DOE in which low-performing schools are provided with professional development and financial resources to better address teacher training and student performance. Teachers from schools accepted to the LINCS program must attend intensive summer training sessions; and it is at these July sessions that LV presented its educational resources and teaching strategies. Taking the lead from the DOE's LINCS format, Louisiana Voices has decided to take a different approach to teacher training this year. Rather than providing workshops that accept enrollment from a broad range of teachers - representing various schools, districts, subjects, and grades - LV will focus its efforts on individual schools. A handful of schools, each representing different grade levels and different regions of the state, will be chosen to participate in an intensive professional development program. These programs will involve protracted contact hours with participating teachers, site visits from LV staff, ongoing technical assistance and support, and built-in evaluations. In addition to such school-focused efforts, LV will continue to conduct broad awareness campaigns including direct mailings, a music unit rollout, and conference presentations and exhibits. Previous partnerships and initiatives continued to be nurtured this past spring and summer. LV's annual summer institute was, once again, hosted by the folklore faculty of the University of Louisiana at Lafayette. Under the direction of Jane Vidrine, LV's Education Coordinator, educators from all over the state enjoyed presentations from LV's corps of presenters, ULL faculty, and folk and professional artists. They also enjoyed field trips to a Creole dance hall and a local museum. Funding has also been secured for the coming year. LV was awarded its funding for Phase V of the project by the National Endowment for the Arts. As expected, funding was slightly reduced; however, LV continues to seek new avenues for funding. Attempts are presently being made at keeping the LV constituency of educators networked and engaged. For instance, LV produced the first issue of its newsletter, Giving Voice, last spring. This newsletter will be produced twice a year and will be delivered via email and the world wide web. Most recently, an email group has been established on Yahoo; we hope that this email group will be a format by which educators will brainstorm, share ideas and announcements, and generally connect with one another. As always, the LV web resources continue to be updated. This fall, all of the LV units will be added to an online database of lesson plans called Making Connections. This database is managed by the Department of Education, which maintains strict control over the structure of these lesson plans, thus ensuring high quality lessons that include technology connections. The much anticipated music unit, Unit 6, will also be finished this Fall. Louisiana Voices has been awarded a grant of $24,950 from the National Endowment for the Humanities to support the "Folklife Studies for Louisiana Schools" project. Twelve high school and middle school teachers from East Baton Rouge, West Feliciana, and Iberia Parishes will be selected to participate in an intensive series of four seminars from November through June. The seminars are coordinated by Jocelyn Donlon and Carolyn Ware. Seminar topics are: Folklife and Material Culture: Revealing Ethnic Identities, guest lecturer Susan Roach; School, Work, and Family: Problems in Fieldwork, Ray Brassieur guest lecturer; Space and Performance: Negotiating Cultural Positions, Helen Regis guest lecturer; and Folk Narrative and Literature: Revealing the `Other,' Dayna Lee guest lecturer.
NEWS FROM THE DIVISION OF THE ARTS The Louisiana Division of the Arts supports folklife in a number of its programs. The Louisiana State Arts Council named duck carver, Don Gomez of Houma Folk Artist of the Year at the 2002 Governor's Arts Awards. $5,000 Folklife Fellowships: Penola Caesar, Dr. Watts Hymns, Monroe D.L. Menard, Cajun music, Erath Allison "Tootie" Montana, Mardi Gras Indian, New Orleans Dana Asa Wright, Boatbuilder, New Orleans $500 Artist Mini-Grants: Ann Vidrine, Cajun fiddler, to market a tour. Keith Felder, Boatbuilder, cypress for a pirogue. The Division received only three Artist Mini-Grant applications in folklife. Deadlines for this program are August 1 and December 1. Project Assistance/Design: Cultural Crossroads, Inc., The Roots of Jazz in South Louisiana, Baton Rouge, $9,500 City of Monroe, 2002 Louisiana Folklife Festival, Monroe, $8,900 Louisiana Folk RootsThe Louisiana Folk Roots Heritage Festival, Breaux Bridge, $7,300 Natchitoches/NSU Folk Festival, La's Military and Folk Traditions, Natchitoches, $8,400 Bayou Civic Club, Passing It Down on Bayou Lafourche, LaRose, $3,500 Town of Kentwood, Sweet Home Folklife Days Festival, Kentwood, $2,500 Louisiana Folk RootsDewey Balfa Cajun & Creole Heritage Week, Breaux Bridge, $7,000 St. Augustine Historical Society, Creole Community Music, Natchitoches, $1,700 Operation Recall Inc., Bringing the Art of Gospel Music to Tangipahoa, Hammond, $1,200 New Orleans Museum of Art, Raised to the Trade: Creole Bldg. Arts of New Orleans, $12,000 Challenge America: Louisiana Folk Roots, Breaux Bridge, Artist Residency, $10,000 Apprenticeships (Master/Apprentice): Raymond Sedatol/Keith E. Felder, Wooden Boatbuilding, Pierre Part, Assumption, $2,500 David Allen/Lionel J. Key, Walking Cane Carving, Homer, Claiborne Parish, $3,400 Luke Thompson/Eric James Halphen, Mandolin Building, Baker, E Baton Rouge, $2,900 Penola Caesar/Seane Kelley, Singing Dr. Watts Hymns, Monroe, Ouachita Parish, $1,800 Laymon Godwin/James D. Lowther, Dobro Playing, West Monroe, Ouachita Parish, $2,400 Frederick H. Beavers/Benjamin R. Robinson, Fiddle Repair, Simsboro, Lincoln Parish, $3,300 Alfred John Doucette, Sr./Jerry Butler, Mardi Gras Indian Costumes, New Orleans, $2,600 Otheneil Bridges, Sr./Reginald Bennett, Guitar Playing, Amite, St. Helena Parish, $1,100 Louisiana Touring directory: Conly's Irish Band, Eunice EH, LA-BAS!, Eunice Magnolia Sisters, Lafayette Chubby Carrier & the Bayou Swamp Band, Church Point Crafts Marketing Program: Keith E. Felder, Denham Springs, Wood Ken Grissom, Lafyette, Wood Lionel J. Key, Jr. Baton Rouge, Wood John R. Newman, Wood
NEWS FROM THE DEPARTMENT OF CULTURE, RECREATION, AND TOURISM Louisiana State Library: Louisiana folklife authors Barry Jean Ancelet, Frank de Caro and Maida Owens are among more than 70 regionally and nationally recognized writers who will present panel discussions, readings, and lectures in the State Capitol at the first-ever Louisiana Book Festival on Saturday, November 2. Participating authors represent a variety of genres, including both fiction and non-fiction. Sponsored by the State Library of Louisiana and the Louisiana Library Foundation, the free, family-friendly celebration of writers, reading and books targets book lovers of all ages. Food vendors and musicians will fuel the celebration, which runs from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. at the State Capitol, the State Library, and in tents on the surrounding grounds. Activities for adults and children include book signings, poetry readings, book arts demonstrations, storytelling, and crafts. Programs at the State Capitol begin at 10 a.m. with the presentation of the Louisiana Writer Award to James Lee Burke, acclaimed by critics as "America's best novelist…a poet of the mystery novel…the Faulkner of crime fiction." Details are available from the Louisiana Center for the Book at the State Library by phone at 225/219-9503 or (toll-free) 888/487-2700 or via the festival website, http://lbf.state.lib.la.us/. Office Of Tourism: Sharon Calcote with the Heritage Tourism Program reports that Jocelyn and Jon Donlon are contracted again this year to locate, identify, and interpret the New Deal era murals in public buildings and assist to "brand" the tri-parish area of East and West Feliciana and Pointe Coupee parishes. The Louisiana Rural Tourism Development Conference will be October 23-25, 2002 in St.Francisville. Louisiana will host the Travel South USA and Louisiana Travel and Tourism Summit, January 20-23, 2003 in Lafayette, LA. The conference will focus on interpretation in tourism with sessions such as "Using an Interpretative Plan to 'Brand' Your Community" and "Interpreting Your Scenic Byway." Donna Onebane will present "Capturing the Distinctiveness of Place Through Folklife-Based Tourism." The schedule is not final, so for more information refer to the Louisiana Travel Promotion Association website, www.ltpa.org Or Cindy Tullier 225/346-1857, ctullier@ltpa.org. Atchafalaya Trace Commission and Heritage Area: Phyllis Mayo is the new executive director of the Commission. Other new staff includes Adriane Kramer. They have recently distributed working copies of the Atchafalaya Heritage Area Interpretive Plan. Jason Stagg, the former director, is now a Deputy Assistant Secretary in the Treasury Department. Louisiana Purchase Commission: Louisiana Purchase events are posted online at www.louisianapurchase2003.com.
NEWS FROM AROUND THE STATE New Orleans filmmaker Rick Delaup will participate in a panel discussion with former 1950s exotic dancers including Evangeline the Oyster Girl and others on Sunday, September 8 at 4 pm at the Shim Sham Club, 615 Toulouse St, New Orleans. $5 admission. www.eccentricneworleans.com. Bennet Rhodes reports that Baton Rouge is getting a blues museum. The Rhythm Museum, will be located next to Buddy Stewart's Rock Shop, 1706 North Acadian Thruway. Phillper Stewart, daughter of the late Buddy Stewart, runs the Buddy Stewart Music Foundation and is working with Baton Rouge area musicians and Bennet to create the museum. The museum is sponsoring Rocktober Fest 2002 on October 19, 2002 - 10am-7 pm, which will feature a Baton Rouge Blues Revue with a host of Baton Rouge's finest blues musicians. They will also feature local gospel and jazz groups, as well as intermission entertainment from the Museum's neighboring schools. Free admission. John Doughty, Jr's website, Junior's Juke Joint has been named the "Most Entertaining Online Ethnography" by the National Anthropological Archives and Human Studies Film Archives, www.nmnh.si.edu/naa/whatsnew.htm Donlon & Donlon (Jon and Jocelyn Donlon) have signed a contract with the Atchafalaya Basin Program to write and publish articles about the Basin's culture and environment. To date, they have submitted articles on the natural life and cultural uses of the alligator, on bird watching in the Basin, and on fly-fishing opportunities. Jocelyn Donlon's book Swinging in Place: Porch Life in Southern Culture was released by the University of North Carolina Press in November 2001. The book takes a serious look at how porches have shaped the southern lives and literature, and includes many porch stories from Louisiana residents. Jocelyn Donlon has received a Fulbright scholarship to teach American Studies at Ege University in Izmir, Turkey. She and Jon will be in Turkey from September 15 to January 15. Jon will use his time to sustain the contract work of Donlon & Donlon, and to do some of his own writing. Job Opening: Museum curator/director position available for the Acadian Memorial, St. Martinville, Louisiana. Administrative experience, BA, bilingual French/English required. Duties include outreach, communications, marketing, computing, conservation. Salary $24,689 plus benefits. Résumés to PO Box 379 Dept AM, St. Martinville, LA 70582. Harold Bernard reports that the Louisiana Master Musicians Series in Lafayette is moving to Saturday nights. The next concert is Saturday, September 7 at 7 pm at the Art House, 704 Lee Avenue and will feature accordionist Harry Trahan with Mitch and Lisa Reed. Harold has an email list for announcements. Contact him at (337) 266-2098, hbernard@mindspring.com.
PROFESSIONAL MEETINGS The 2003 Southern Anthropological Society will be held in Baton Rouge, February 26-28 at the Sheraton Hotel. The theme is the Caribbean-Louisiana connection. The theme is "Southern and Caribbean: Transnational Perspectives on the US South." For the Call For Papers, contact Helen Regis, the program chair, LSU Dept of Geography and Anthropology, hregis1@lsu.edu. The 2003 annual meeting of the Louisiana Folklore Society will be hosted by the University of Louisiana at Lafayette this year, with John Laudun as the program chair. The dates are April 4 and 5, with the return of a Friday night speaker and a perhaps slightly modified format for Saturday. They will be posting more information about the meeting within the month, but until then please feel free to contact John Laudun directly with any questions or suggestions you may have, 337-482-5493, laudun@louisiana.edu. Information about the society is available online, http://www.louisianafolklife.org/lafolkloresociety.html. The Folklore and Popular Culture Area Chair of the Popular Culture Association invites interested scholars to submit papers on any aspect of folklore and popular culture for the 2003 PCA/ACA National Convention to be held at the New Orleans Marriott Hotel in New Orleans. The conference runs from April 16-19. The deadline for submission of abstracts and/or papers is September 10, 2002. Visit the Call for Papers website at http://www2.h-net.msu.edu/~pcaaca/. The American Anthropological Association meets November 20-24, 2002 at the Hyatt Regency in New Orleans. http://www.aaanet.org/.
EVENTS/SEMINARS/FESTIVALS Festivals Acadiens will have some changes this year. The Lafayette Natural History Museum will not be producing the Native Crafts Festival since they have moved downtown. The Louisiana Crafts Guild will produce a contemporary crafts show in the park near the Festival de Musique Acadienne, La Vie Cadienne Wetlands & Folklife Festival, and the Bayou Food Festival. Tom Butler with the Center for Traditional Boat Building at Nicholls State University reports that the boatbuilding classes are continuing with the next class starting Sept. 9, 2002. Call 985/448- 4634 for information. The Friends for Traditional Louisiana Boat Building are acquiring a recently found Indian Dugout found in Little Lake back of Golden Meadow and they will attempt restoration. The Sailing Lugger is in the final stages of outfitting. Louisiana Folk Roots Offers Cajun and Creole Culture Programs:
Chênière Caminada: Interpreting a Lost Community and a Vanishing Purchase is a seminar to explore the linguistic, literary, cultural, genetic & historical legacy of one 19th century coastal community that was destroyed in the 1893 hurricane. It will place Chênière Caminada in the larger contexts of The Louisiana Purchase and coastal land loss today. Saturday, September 7, 2002, 10 am - 4:30 pm, at Golden Meadow Jr. High School's auditorium. For a schedule of events, contact Melanie Boulet at melboulet@cajunnet.com or 985-693-6849. The New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival: Nancy Oschenslager, Associate Producer/Heritage Festival, reports that Teresa Parker has been hired as the new Folk Department director, which oversees the Folk Village, Louisiana Marketplace and the Folk Heritage Stage. The 2002 Louisiana Folklife Festival will take place September 14-15 on the historic downtown riverfront in Monroe. Now in its seventeenth year, the festival will again present an outstanding array of Louisiana music, food, crafts, celebration, and explanation. The theme for this year's festival is Hispanic and Latino traditions celebrating a heritage that reaches back well before the Louisiana Purchase and continues today to embrace the state's third largest population group. Among featured artists this year are the Neville Brothers, the Iguanas, Ritmo Caribeño, Eh Las Bas!, Gonzalo Romo y su cojunto, Ebenezer, and, from the movies O Brother Where Art Thou? and Down from the Mountain, it's Chris Thomas King and the Cox Family. Three music stages, our hard rockin' Gospel Tent, a Kid's Stage, a Cookin' Stage, Tales 'n' Talk, and some forty traditional craftspeople. Six stages, two days, and it's all free.
UNIVERSITY NEWS Loyola: David Estes reports that Loyola University received an NEH grant to create the Center for Catholic Cultures of the South. He has moved into a new position at Loyola and is now Assistant Provost for Teaching, Learning, and Faculty Development, which means he is no longer teaching. LSU English: Carolyn Ware will teach three classes during the Fall Semester: American Folklore, Introduction to Folklore, and The Study of Folklore, a fieldwork class. During the Spring semester, she will teach a graduate seminar in folklore. She will be giving a lecture on the "History of the Cajun Mardi Gras Mask"on Tuesday, September 10 at 12:30 pm in the LSU Union Art Gallery in conjunction with the "Spirit of the Mask" Exhibit August 23-September 29, 2002. LSU Geography and Anthropology: Joyce Jackson led a "LSU in Senegal" trip in June and stayed the summer to do research. Nash Porter also went to photograph. MCNEESE: Folklorist Keagan LeJeune has been hired as an assistant professor in the Dept. of Languages. His dissertation concerned an outlaw in Louisiana's No Man's Land. He has created three folklore courses which will be added to the 2002 catalog. These are McNeese's first folklore courses, but the academic and local communities are already showing interest. For example, he presented at this year's Banners Series (a three-month series devoted to the arts) and had a standing-room-only audience. Talks already have begun about bringing in other folklorists to present in this series in the future. TULANE: Shana Walton is now assistant director of Tulane's Regional Humanities Center. ULL Anthropology: C. Ray Brassieur is now at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette, happily housed in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology there. His colleagues report that he has settled in well, and has already begun to kick up some dust, co-teaching a course with Carl Brasseaux (History) and Robert Twilley (Biology) on heritage landscapes (environmental history with an eye to the dynamic interaction between nature and the various cultures living there). ULL Center for Cultural and Eco-Tourism: ULL created this center a few years ago based on faculty expertise and interests across a range of disciplines as well as an emergent need within the state to have a facility for the advancement and exchange of knowledge about a vital part of our state's future. Last year, the university increased its commitment to a focused and active center by asking Carl Brasseaux, a member of the history faculty and a long-time associate with the Center for Louisiana Studies, to be the director of the CCET. One of Carl's first considerations was to gather together a core faculty of research associates, all of which include the university's current folklore faculty: Barry Jean Ancelet, C. Ray Brassieur, Marcia Gaudet, and John Laudun. The Center has already hosted one conference on tourism and economic development, a standing-room only affair last September, and plans another for later this fall. (www.louisiana.edu, under "Centers of Excellence".) ULL English: John Laudun travels to England this fall to give a paper at a Symposium on Claude Levi-Strauss being hosted by Durham University. He is one of twelve invited speakers from around the world and the only American. His paper uses Levi' Strauss' book, "The Way of the Masks," as a launching point for a consideration of Mardi Gras masking traditions in Southwest Louisiana. ULL English: Marcia Gaudet and James McDonald have a new edition of their reader, Mardi Gras, Gumbo, and Zydeco: Readings in Louisiana Culture, which was published a few years ago with American Heritage Custom Publishers for folklore and composition classes. It has a new introduction, photographs, and an appendix with questions for discussion or essays. It will be available in Spring 2003, published by University Press of Mississippi. Marcia Gaudet also has a book on her research on Carville and the Louisiana leprosorium coming out. ULL English: Donna Onebane is teaching at ULL this fall in the English Dept. Lana Henry is teaching the Introduction to Folklore class. ULL Modern Languages: During the Spring 2002 semester, Debbie Clifton taught French 302/502, Literary or Linguistic Studies: Introduction to Louisiana Creole. This is a survey course that considers the Louisiana Creole language in its cultural context. The primary focus of the course is on Southwest Louisiana, but communities of New Orleans, Southeast Louisiana, North Louisiana and the Creole Diaspora are also considered.
NATIONAL NEWS Luderin Darbone and Edwin Duhon Win National Heritage FellowshipsLuderin Darbone and Edwin Duhon co-founded the legendary Cajun band, The Hackberry Ramblers, in 1933 and have been leading the band ever since. This long-lived ensemble has combined its native Louisiana French repertoire with string band, Western Swing, and popular ingredients to produce a unique but continually appealing musical program. The group became widely popular in southwestern Louisiana and East Texas by the end of the 1930s, appearing on live radio broadcasts and recording for RCA's Bluebird label, cutting over 100 titles by the end of the 1940s. More information is online, www.arts.gov/endownews/news02/Heritage2002.html Louisiana folk artists who won NEA Heritage Fellowships are featured in the Masters of Traditional Arts Education Guide and DVD by Paddy Bowman, Betty Carter, and Alan Govenar. The book, Education Guide, and DVD are produced by Documentary Arts, Inc., and published by ABC-CLIO, Inc., http://www.abc-clio.com/academic/. Weaver Gladys Clark, Mardi Gras Indian Allison "Tootie" Montana are featured in the Education Guide. October 1st is Deadline For National Heritage FellowshipsNominations The NEA annually awards up to twelve $10,000 National Heritage Fellowships for master folk and traditional artists. Fellowships are awarded on the basis of nominations from the public. Nominations may be for individuals or for a group of individuals (e.g., a duo). For more information, http://arts.endow.gov/guide/Heritage02.html The American Folklore Society has been contracted by the American Folklife Center to coordinate workshops for the Veterans History Project, http://www.loc.gov/folklife/fr/fr_top.html /vets/. Folklorists and oral historians will be available to community groups to do workshops on collecting stories from veterans. Donna Onebane of Lafayette and Scott McGraw of New Orleans have been selected to be a trainer for this program. Maida Owens |
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September 2002
