Born in 1928 in a tent on the shore of Loch Fyne, Argyll, Duncan Williamson (d. 2007) eventually came to be recognized as one of the foremost storytellers in Scotland and the world. Webspinner: Songs, Stories, and Reflections of Duncan Williamson, Scottish Traveller is based on more than a hundred hours of tape-recorded interviews undertaken with him in the 1980s. Williamson tells of his birth and upbringing in the west of Scotland, his family background as one of Scotland's seminomadic travelling people, his varied work experiences after setting out from home at about age fifteen, and the challenges he later faced while raising a family of his own, living on the road for half the year. The recordings on which the book is based were made by John D. Niles, who was then an associate professor at the University of California, Berkeley. Niles has transcribed selections from his field tapes with scrupulous accuracy, arranging them alongside commentary, photos, and other scholarly aids, making this priceless self-portrait of a brilliant storyteller available to the public. The result is a delight to read. It is also a mine of information concerning a vanished way of life and the place of singing and storytelling in Traveller culture. In chapters that feature many colorful anecdotes and that mirror the spontaneity of oral delivery, readers learn much about how Williamson and other members of his persecuted minority had the resourcefulness to make a living on the outskirts of society, owning very little in the way of material goods but sustained by a rich oral heritage.

Where human communication and development is possible, folklore is developed. With the rise of digital communications and media in past decades, humans have adopted a new form of folklore within this online landscape. Digital folklore has been developed into a culture that impacts the ways in which communities are formed, media is created, and communications are carried out. It is essential to track this growing phenomenon. The Digital Folklore of Cyberculture and Digital Humanities focuses on the opportunities and chances for folklore research online as well as research challenges for online folk groups. It presents opportunities for production of digital internet material from items and research in the field of folk culture and for digitization, documentation, and promotion of elements related to folk culture. Covering topics such as e-learning programs, online communities, and costumes and fashion archives, this premier reference source is a dynamic resource for folklorists, sociologists, anthropologists, psychologists, students and faculty of higher education, libraries, researchers, and academicians.