New York Folklore Society Fall 2002 Annual Meeting

2002
Annual Meeting of the New York Folklore Society
in conjunction with the

114th Annual Meeting of the
American Folklore Society
Image, Object, and Processes of Documentation

October 16-20, 2002
Rochester, New York

The New York Folklore Society’s programs are made possible in part with public funds from the Folk Arts Program of the New York State Council on the Arts, a state agency.

New York Folklore Society
P.O. Box 764
Schenectady, NY 12301
518/346-7008
Fax 518/346-6617
nyfs@nyfolklore.org

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NYFS CONFERENCE 2002

The New York Folklore Society’s annual meeting for 2002 was held in conjunction with the 114th annual meeting of the American Folklore Society in Rochester, New York, October 16-20, 2002. "Image, Object, and Processes of Documentation" was the theme of the AFS meeting held in Rochester.

Jack Santino, AFS President, and Peggy Bulger, AFS past president.

More than 650 folklore scholars gathered from around the world for four days of AFS paper sessions, plenary speeches, and meetings. Much of the meeting was sign-language interpreted through the generosity of TAP Plus funds of the Theatre Development Fund, and there were several papers on the theme of deaf folklore, organized by Simon Carmel, professor emeritus of the Rochester Technical Institute for the Deaf. Carmel and Jo Radner also produced a storytelling concert that included deaf storytellers. The Music and Song Section of the American Folklore Society worked with the Country Dancers of Rochester to present a square dance, and the meeting ended with a gala dinner and dance at the Macedonian Church of West Henrietta with music by the Campbell Brothers Sacred Steel, Karamfil, and the Rod Nickson Project. See Music and Art to Remember: The 2002 American Folklore Society Conference with photographs by Martha Cooper.

Robert Baron (shown here) and Nick Spitzer won the Benjamin Botkin Prize, awarded each year for outstanding acievement in public folklore.

The New York Folklore Society was a collaborator in this endeavor and was heavily involved at every stage of planning this meeting. Dale Johnson, NYFS director of services, organized several miniconcerts showcasing upstate New York traditional musicians, with support from the New York State Council on the Arts. NYFS also sponsored and organized an audio digitization workshop with Matthew Barton of the Lomax Archives and Ted McGraw of Rochester. Cochairs Ellen McHale, NYFS executive director, and Robert Baron of the New York State Council on the Arts worked with program committee members Beverly Butcher and Le Haring to organize the hundreds of papers into a cohesive conference program. Primary foci for this meeting was vernacular photography, documentation, archival and museum approaches to folklore collections, as well as New York State cultural traditions.

Photo of Ellen McHale and WHF Nicolaisen

NYFS director Ellen McHale with W.H.F. Nicolaisen, who won the first AFS lifetime Scholarly Achievement Award.

The annual meeting of the New York Folklore Society took place on Sunday, October 20, at the Hyatt Regency Hotel in Rochester. Elected to two-year terms were returning NYFS Board members Mary Zwolinski, Ladan Alomar, Beverly Butcher, Pamela Cooley, Jim Corsaro, Eniko Farkas, Nancy Johnson, Stanley Ransom, Bart Roselli, and Lynne Williamson. New elected board members are Midge Stock of Salamanca, Ted McGraw of Rochester, and Hanna Griff of New York City. New officers are Mary Zwolinski, president; Hanna Griff, vice-president; and Ladan Alomar, secretary-treasurer. We said a fond farewell to outgoing board members Cecily Cook, Elly Shodell, and officers Todd DeGarmo (now past president) and David Quinn, treasurer. We appreciate their many years of service to the Folklore Society and the wisdom and support that they shared with us over the years.

In other business, George Ward and the late Vaughn Ward were elected as honorary vice-presidents of the Society. As stated in the bylaws, "The Board of Directors, at their discretion, may elect honorary vice presidents of the Society. Such honorary officers shall not have responsibilities in the governance of the Society; nor shall they exercise voting rights at the meetings of the Board of Directors." George and Vaughn Ward join a select group of honorary vice-presidents who have used folklore in literature, including Carl Carmer, Samuel Hopkins Adams, and Walter D. Edmunds (1944). Other honorary vice-presidents were notable for their promotion of New York State folklore and involvement in the New York Folklore Society, including Louis Jones and Ben Botkin (1949), Harold Thompson (1955), and more recent nominees Bruce Buckley and W. F. H. Nicolaisen, both elected in 1991.