By defining folklore as artistic communication in small groups, Dan Ben-Amos led the discipline of Folklore in new directions. In Folklore Concepts, Henry Glassie and Elliott Oring have curated a selection of Ben-Amos's groundbreaking essays that explore folklore as a category in cultural communication and as a subject of scholarly research. Ben-Amos's work is well-known for sparking lively debate that often centers on why his definition intrinsically acknowledges tradition rather than expresses its connection forthright. Without tradition among people, there would be no art or communication, and tradition cannot accomplish anything on its own-only people can. Ben-Amos's focus on creative communication in communities is woven into the themes of the theoretical essays in this volume, through which he advocates for a better future for folklore scholarship. Folklore Concepts traces Ben-Amos's consistent efforts over the span of his career to review and critique the definitions, concepts, and practices of Folklore in order to build the field's intellectual history. In examining this history, Folklore Concepts answers foundational questions about what folklorists are doing, how they are doing it, and why.

DANIEL JOHNSTON, raised on a farm in Randolph County, returned from Thailand with a new way to make monumental pots. Back home in North Carolina, he built a log shop and a whale of a kiln for wood-firing. Then he set out to create beautiful pots, grand in scale, graceful in form, and burned bright in a blend of ash and salt. With mastery achieved and apprentices to teach, Daniel Johnston turned his brain to massive installations. First, he made a hundred large jars and lined them along the rough road that runs past his shop and kiln. Next, he arranged curving clusters of big pots inside pine frames, slatted like corn cribs, to separate them from the slick interiors of four fine galleries in succession. Then, in concluding the second phase of his professional career, Daniel Johnston built an open-air installation on the grounds around the North Carolina Museum of Art, where 178 handmade, wood-fired columns march across a slope in a straight line, 350 feet in length, that dips and lifts with the heave while the tops of the pots maintain a level horizon. In 2000, when he was still Mark Hewitt's apprentice, Daniel Johnston met Henry Glassie, who has done fieldwork on ceramic traditions in the United States, Brazil, Italy, Turkey, Bangladesh, China, and Japan. Over the years, during a steady stream of intimate interviews, Glassie gathered the understanding that enabled him to compose this portrait of Daniel Johnston, a young artist who makes great pots in the eastern Piedmont of North Carolina.

By defining folklore as artistic communication in small groups, Dan Ben-Amos led the discipline of Folklore in new directions. In Folklore Concepts, Henry Glassie and Elliott Oring have curated a selection of Ben-Amos's groundbreaking essays that explore folklore as a category in cultural communication and as a subject of scholarly research. Ben-Amos's work is well-known for sparking lively debate that often centers on why his definition intrinsically acknowledges tradition rather than expresses its connection forthright. Without tradition among people, there would be no art or communication, and tradition cannot accomplish anything on its own-only people can. Ben-Amos's focus on creative communication in communities is woven into the themes of the theoretical essays in this volume, through which he advocates for a better future for folklore scholarship. Folklore Concepts traces Ben-Amos's consistent efforts over the span of his career to review and critique the definitions, concepts, and practices of Folklore in order to build the field's intellectual history. In examining this history, Folklore Concepts answers foundational questions about what folklorists are doing, how they are doing it, and why.

Irish Folk History Tales from the North Henry Glassie "A valuable edition of the principal tales and songs from "Passing the Time in Ballymenone.""--"Worldview" "In this setting the words take on a more mysterious quality; we can easily notice the spontaneous invention."--"Village Voice" Made of the words of the people who live today in the beautiful, embattled countryside of Ulster, "Irish Folk History" is, in essence, the people's own statement of their past. In story, song, and spontaneous essay, these texts, selected from "Passing the Time in Ballymenone," tell of the coming of Christianity, of endless war, of the hardships and delights of rural life. During a time of trouble, Henry Glassie came into a community of active story-tellers in County Fermanagh in Northern Ireland, and in this book he sets their voices--their chuckles, whispers, and anger--before us. The words of Hugh Nolan, Michael Boyle, of Peter Flanagan, Hugh Patrick Owens, and their neighbors, echo from the page to present a tale that is at once the story of their tiny community and the story of all of Ireland. Henry Glassie is College Professor of Folklore and codirector of the Turkish Studies Program at Indiana University. 1982 176 pages 5 3/8 x 7 7 illus. ISBN 978-0-8122-1123-8 Paper $24.95s 16.50 World Rights Anthropology Short copy: In story, song, and spontaneous essay, these texts tell of the coming of Christianity, of endless war, of the hardships and delights of rural life.

Listen to the artists of the Brazilian Northeast. Their work, they say, comes of continuity and creativity. Continuity runs along lines of learning toward social coherence. Creativity brings challenges and deep personal satisfaction. What they say and do in Brazil aligns with ethnographic evidence from New Mexico and North Carolina; from Ireland, Portugal, and Italy; from Nigeria, Turkey, India, and Bangladesh; from China and Japan. This book is about that, about folk art as a sign of human unity.

"This is an extraordinary book." -- Progress in HumanGeography

..". fresh and fascinating." --Come-All-Ye

..". an extraordinarily rich and rewardingbook.... it is about the effort of one man to find for himself and us the life'sbreath of the people of Ballymenone.... It is certainly a remarkable tour deforce." -- Emmet Larkin, New York Times Book Review

The lifeand art, the folklore, history, and common work of a rural community in NorthernIreland -- through the eyes and pen of gifted folklorist Henry Glassie. It is aclassic in the fullest sense, reaching beyond folklore to all of humanity.

In the time of the Troubles, when bombs blew through the night and soldiers prowled down the roads, Henry Glassie came to the Irish borderland to learn how country people endure through history. He settled into the farming community of Ballymenone, beside Lough Erne in the County Fermanagh, and listened to the old people. For a decade he heard and recorded the stories and songs in which they outlined their culture, recounted their history, and pictured their world. In their view, their world was one of love, defeat, and uncertainty, demanding the virtues of endurance: faith, bravery, and wit. Glassie's task in this book is to set the scene, to sketch the backdrop and clear the stage, so that Hugh Nolan and Michael Boyle, Peter Flanagan, Ellen Cutler, and their neighbors can tell their own tale, which explains their conditions and converts them into a tragedy of conflict and a comedy of the absurd. It gathers the saints and warriors, and celebrates the stars whose wit enabled endurance in days of violence and deprivation. With patience and respect, Glassie describes life in a time and a place exactly like no other, and yet Ballymenone is like a thousand other places where people work on the land during the day and tell their own tales at night, forgotten, while the men of power fill the newspapers and history books by sending poor boys out to be killed. The Stars of Ballymenone is an integrated analysis of the complete repertory of verbal art from a rural community where storytelling and singing of quality remained a part of daily life.

Irish Christmas mumming, the subject of this carefully researched and beautifully written book, is approached in Part I through the recollections of four old people of the hamlet of Ballymenone who recall the mumming from their youth. In Part II, the author examines the form and function of the mummers' play, showing that contrary to the theories of some folklorists it is not a truncated fragment of a much larger whole but a complete "presentational" statement. He shows how the mummers' play functioned as a means of drawing the community closer together and as an expression of dangers and hopes in the potentially bitter Ulster situation.

Glassie's study treats fully the social and cultural context of the mummers' play. It is a superb study, of obvious value to folklorists, but also of interest to literary critics, literary historians, anthropologists, and others."

Over the last half century, historic preservation has been on the rise in American cities and towns, from urban renewal and gentrification projects to painstaking restoration of Victorian homes and architectural landmarks. In this book, Nancy R. Hiller brings together individuals with distinctive styles and perspectives, to talk about their passion for preservation. They consider the meaning of place and what motivates those who work to save and care for places; the role of place in the formation of identity; the roles of individuals and organizations in preserving homes, neighborhoods, and towns; and the spiritual as well as economic benefits of preservation. Richly illustrated, Historic Preservation in Indiana is an essential book for everyone who cares about preserving the past for future generations.

Prince Twins Seven-Seven (1944-2011) was not only one of Africa's most famous contemporary artists and the leader of the Osogbo School of Nigerian artists, he was known as the modern master of the Yoruba tradition in art. His work has been exhibited on every continent, is collected by major museums throughout the world, and in 2005, Prince was named UNESCO Artist for Peace. Henry Glassie blends life and art to create a vivid portrait of an extraordinary artist. This lavishly illustrated book, part biography and part artist's catalog, addresses tradition and innovation in Prince s art, the development of his personal style, the force of the supernatural in Nigerian life, and the hard times of the immigrant artist in the United States."

"Coming into being, the work of art, this very pot, creates relations relations between nature and culture, between the individual and society, between utility and beauty. Governed by desire, the artist s work answers questions of value. Is nature favored, or culture? Are individual needs or social needs more important? Do utilitarian or aesthetic concerns dominate in the transformation of nature?" from the Introduction

The Potter s Art discusses and illustrates the work of modern masters of traditional ceramics from Bangladesh, Sweden, various parts of the United States, Turkey, and Japan. It will appeal to anyone interested in pottery and the study of folklore and folk art.

Henry Glassie is College Professor of Folklore and Co-director of Turkish Studies at Indiana University. He has been a Guggenheim Fellow and a Fellow of the National Humanities Institute; he has also served as President of the Vernacular Architecture Forum and of the American Folklore Society.

Material Culture Henry Glassie, George Jevremovic, and William T. Sumner, editors
(Note: there is an accent egue on the c Jevremovic)

Contents:
The Potter s Art
Bangladesh
Sweden
Georgia
Acoma
Turkey
Japan
Hagi
Work in the Clay
Acknowledgments
Notes
Bibliography
Index"

Robust and funny, sorrowful and heroic, this collection of 125 lively tales tells the story of Ireland. Spanning the centuries from the first wars of the ancient Irish kings through the Celtic Renaissance of Yeats to our own time, they are set in cities, villages, fields and forestsfrom the wild Gaelic western coast to the modern streets of Dublin and Belfast.