Folklore Conference looks to push student boundaries

Throughout a student's undergraduate academic career, professors often attempt to mold students into a cookie cutter of due dates, paper lengths and approved vocabularies.\nThinking outside the mainstream was the theme this weekend as the Indiana Memorial Union was flooded with folk scholars and academics from across the world for the first annual "Pushing Boundaries: Extreme Folklore & Ethnomusicology Conference." Lecture and panel topics included among others "Monarchy, Magic and Mickey Mouse," "Do You Want Fries With That?," "Politics of Cultural Identity," "Stranger in a Strangeland" and "Edjumacation." \nFolklore graduate student Rhonda Dass, whose advanced study involves body art like everyday clothing costumes and an insider's view of tattooing, said the conference was designed as a forum to discuss manageable ways to accommodate overlapping ideas and to reflect upon where, when, why and how students might or might not stretch their academic approach to include innovative ethnographic methodology and dissertation presentation. \n"The main purpose of the conference was to provide a venue to talk about pushing the boundaries of our disciplines and to provide a place for graduate students to do that," Dass said. "So much of what we do in academics depends on the restrictions of our discipline -- labels and expectations."\nKeynote speaker Gregory Barz, an assistant professor of musicology at Vanderbilt University, discussed "Ethnomusicologists and Folklorists as (Accidental?) Meddlers, Mediators, and Activists: Pushing the Boundaries of Fieldwork in the 21st Century." His lecture involved "hope and arts in East Africa," specifically addressing HIV infection education and prevention efforts through song, dance and dramatics he observed in Uganda.\nBarz highlighted the plight of Uganda's AIDS-ravished communities in relation to his fieldwork, identifying what did and did not work since he said he fell into every "anthropological trap."\n"I was led by men to talk to men," he said.\nBarz urged the crowd of academics to reflect a "holistic perspective" instead of "plundering other cultures" in the name of ethics and advocacy.\nDass said the conference was a valuable learning opportunity since university folklore and ethnomusicology departments are often home to otherwise disenfranchised academics studying ideas perceived as outside mainstream scholarly thinking.\n"History has been made from 5 percent of the world population," Dass said. "We look at the other 95 percent of common people and the things they do. Folklore is the music you listen to and the way you treat people when you interact with them."\nFolklore and ethnomusicology Department Chair Ruth Stone said folklorists and ethnomusicologists study what is often perceived as the "trivial" aspects of a particular culture -- the use of space, food and dining rituals, jokes and songs, naming practices, formation of myths and so on. She said these types of folklore often express individual and community repressed feelings, aspirations and beliefs. \n"Folklore addresses a lot of issues about people and social interactions, from hip-hop to the history of communication," Stone said. "I would encourage students to take a look at the courses we offer. I think the most interesting aspect of folklore and ethnomusicology, perhaps, is working closely with people of other cultures: listening to their stories, learning from them, spending time in the community the way folklorists do."\n-- Contact City & State Editor David A. Nosko at dnosko@indiana.edu.