"Applying The Halperts’ Vision to Today," event with MUN Folklore

Please join us on Tuesday, February 11th from 6:30 to 8:30 pm in Gushue Hall DH 2002 (Junior Common Room) for a “Applying The Halperts’ Vision to Today,” a roundtable discussion featuring MUN Folklore Department graduates and/or faculty who worked with or were influenced by Dr. Herbert and Violetta Halpert, the founders of Memorial's Department of Folklore, and the Folklore and Language Archive (MUNFLA).

Our panelists will discuss the Halpert's legacy in the province and beyond, reflecting on public folklore, community facing scholarship, and future applications.

Facilitated by Jillian Gould (Folklore, MUN), this event will feature Amanda Dargan (Education Director, City Lore, New York City); Michael Taft (Head of the Archive American Folklife Center, Library of Congress, retired); Crystal Braye (N.L. Public Folklorist, Octopus Consulting); Philip Hiscock (Folklore, MUN, retired); and Neil Rosenberg (Folklore, MUN, retired).

Light refreshments will be served.

Visitors may park in Lot 22 (Large lot by Business and Social Work. To cross Prince Philip, you may take the underpass from the north side of campus, by the Chapel, right to R Gushue Hall). https://www.mun.ca/cep/media/production/memorial/administrative/campus-enforcement-and- patrol/media-library/parking/Permitted-Lot-Map-2024.pdf

Living Heritage Podcast Ep143 Roadside memorials, anniversaries and conferences with Holly Everett. #FolkloreThursday

Terra Barrett and Holly Everett.

In this episode, Holly Everett discusses her research on roadside memorials, grave markers, memorial assemblages, and culinary tourism as well as the 50th anniversary of Memorial University's Department of Folklore, and the upcoming Folklore Studies Association of Canada conference. Dr. Holly Everett is an Associate Professor in the Department of Folklore at Memorial University, cross-listed with the School of Music’s Ethnomusicology program. She is the author of Roadside Crosses in Contemporary Memorial Culture (2002), as well as articles in Contemporary Legend, Cuizine, Ethnologies, Folklore, the Folklore Historian, the Journal of American Folklore, MusiCultures, and Popular Music and Society. Holly is also the current Head of the Department of Folklore at Memorial and the President of the Folklore Studies Association of Canada.

Download MP3

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The Living Heritage Podcast is about people who are engaged in the heritage and culture sector, from museum professionals and archivists, to tradition bearers and craftspeople - all those who keep history alive at the community level. The show is a partnership between HFNL and CHMR Radio. Past episodes are hosted on Libsyn, and you can subscribe via iTunes, or Stitcher. Theme music is Rythme Gitan by Latché Swing.

UPDATED DATE: Booklet Launch for Coves, Streets, Fields and More: The Places of Bay Roberts

UPDATED DATE - Due to a scheduled weather warning for Saturday the 10th this event has been moved to Saturday, March 24th.
On March 24th, students from Memorial University’s Folklore Department will be in Bay Roberts to officially launch their booklet “Coves, Streets, Fields and More: The Places of Bay Roberts.” 

For three weeks in September 2017, Memorial’s newest folklore graduate students arriving from Northern Ontario, all parts of the United States, Iran, and Israel, were transplanted to Bay Roberts to participate in a three-week long cultural documentation field school. The event was a required course that takes place at the start of the first semester of the graduate program in Folklore.

Students in the 2017 Folklore Field School came to know Bay Roberts through the stories residents shared of some of the community’s special places: Drummer’s Rock, Muddy Hole, Bear’s Cove, Cable Ave, the field on Neck Road, skating locations, “cobby” houses, Powell’s Supermarket, the library, and the Amalgamated School. 

“The special places residents shared with students in the field school give shape to the town of Bay Roberts,” says Memorial University's Dr. Diane Tye, who ran the field school with colleague Dr. Jillian Gould. 

“The field school participants were warmly welcomed by local residents, and this booklet is both a ‘give back’ to the community, as well as a product of what the students learned.” 

The booklet was produced in cooperation with the Heritage Foundation of Newfoundland and Labrador, as part of its ongoing Oral History Roadshow booklet series. The booklet will be launched at a special ceremony at the Bay Roberts Visitor Pavilion on Veterans Memorial Highway, 11 am on Saturday, March 24th. 

All are welcome to attend, reception to follow.

#Folklorephoto How Do You Catch Your Luck? Horseshoe on a Stable Door in Keels

A horseshoe is hung on Kenneth Mesh's stable door in Keels as a good luck charm. Photograph was taken by Claire McDougall in 2012 as part of the MUN Department of Folklore field school.

To see other material from Keels visit MUN Digital Archives Initiative.

Department of Folklore Field School Presentation - Work in Cupids

In the second week of September Dale, Heather, and I spent several days in Cupids with the new folklore students. Each year Memorial University's Department of Folklore holds an intensive three-week field school for the incoming MA and PhD students to focus on fieldwork techniques. This year the students were in the community of Cupids, Conception Bay North and they focused on occupational or workplace folklore.

Dale describing good interview techniques.

During the students' first week in Cupids, Dale spent two days teaching them interview techniques, showing them the basics of working with recording equipment, and doing a staged interview. I also gave a short presentation with suggestions of how to use the material collected in oral history interviews for blogs, articles, audio and video clips, booklets, etc.

Gerard and Emma taking field notes during the Targa Newfoundland Races.

Heather and I also joined the students in class to learn more about fieldwork techniques and how to take better field notes with folklorist Bonnie Sunstein. Bonnie teaches nonfiction writing and ethnographic research at the University of Iowa and gave the students a presentation on how to take field notes and how to work with the field notes taken to produce a piece of data that can be used in future writing. She stressed the need to be descriptive and suggested the students do double entry notes - using one side to describe the situation and the other to describe their feelings and reactions to the situation.

After the students classes in research, writing, and field techniques they went out into the field and conducted their own interviews and research. This Thursday September 29 the students will be presenting their research results to the community. This event is open to the public and everyone is invited to come out and learn more about work in Cupids!

~Terra Barrett

Booklet Launch Sept 10th - Witless Bay: Exploring A Cultural Landscape

The Department of Folklore will launch its latest publication, Witless Bay: Exploring A Cultural Landscape, on Thursday, September 10th, in ED4036, at 12 noon.

This booklet is the result of the 2014 Department Field School. Graduate students and visiting faculty spent three weeks last September 2014 living in Witless Bay, documenting local traditions. Essays cover the history of Witless Bay, as well as some of the most important houses, barns, and fish stages/stores in the community. 

Join us for coffee/tea and snacks.

Quidi Vidi Village: BOOKLET LAUNCH PARTY!

Quidi Vidi from above, taken Sept. 2013 by Xuan Wang (M.A. student in Folklore)

Tuesday Folklore Photo: A Short Film about MUN's Folklore and Language Archive

Host Rob Pitt interviews archivist Peter Narvaez and assistant archivist Philip Hiscock of the Folklore Archive of Memorial University of Newfoundland about the archive and its collections. Created in 1983, this short film was created Memorial University of Newfoundland and Labrador's Education Television Centre.

Sea Lion Woman: the biography of a song