The daily Nebraskan. ([Lincoln, Neb.) 1901-current, February 26, 1992, The SOWER, Page 3, Image 15

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    Folklore
versus
fakelore
A1 Schaben/DN
Gwen Meister, the folk arts coordinator for the Nebraska Arts Council, has spent the last year collecting
examples of Nebraska folk arts.
Public misconceptions about traditional arts may lead to lost heritage
By Kristin Karnopp
When Gwen Meister began her
search for Nebraska folk art
ists about a year ago, she
wasn’t sure what her quest
would uncover.
She discovered that Nebraska is full of
living, cultural traditions.
From Albert Fahlbusch’s polka melo
dies in Scottsbluff to the street-corner
rap of children in Omaha, from a double
wedding ring quilt pattern to a recipe for
homemade bread that a mother has
passed down to her daughter, folk arts
are very much alive in Nebraska.
As the folk arts coordinator for the
Nebraska Arts Council, Meister is work
ing to put together a folk arts program for
Nebraska. Nearly 40 states already have
such a program, she said.
In the year that Meister has spent
researching folklore and folk arts in
Nebraska, she has travelled across the
state interviewing folk artists, Indian
tribes, ethnic organizations, rural coop
erative extension services and other
groups.
But while folk art and folklore is alive,
she said, many Nebraskans are unaware
or have little understanding of these
traditions.
“It’s important for people to under
stand and honor traditional craftsmen,”
she said. “Their work represents more
than what they are doing—it represents
a way of life.”
Folk art is representative of the values
of some group or culture, she said, and is
linked to how members of a group live,
their view of the world and their religious
beliefs.
Lynne Ireland, museum director
for the Nebraska State Historical
Society, said a community usu
ally claims a sort of ownership of its folk
artists.
“(Folk artists) are valuable cultural
resources, not only from the skills they
have, but also from the kind of communal
creativity funneling down into them,”
she said.
A community plays an important role
• in passing on its traditions to folk artists.
Meister said folk artists learned their
craft through informal ways. They are
taught one on one, or learn by watching
someone in their family or community.
“People don’t go to school to get a bache
lor’s degree in folk arts,” she said.
And folk arts do change, she said, but
they change slowly in a way that stays
within tradition — like a quilt pattern
that changes a little each time it is passed
down to the next generation.
“(Folk art) has some sort of continuity
of tradition,” Ireland said.
Although folk art helps to preserve a
people’s heritage, the artists who keep
those traditions alive often are not hon
ored or respected; instead, they are ex
ploited.
Meister said she was concerned about
the exploitation of folk artists — so con
cerned that she has talked to folk arts
coordinators in other states to see how
their programs are set up to protect art
ists from exploitation.
“There are a lot of ethical questions,”
she said.
In some cases, she said, folk artists are
naive when it comes to selling their
goods. Dealers can take advantage of folk
artists because they don’t realize the
value of their work.
Unscrupulous buyers may snatch
up everything folk artists have,
she said, pay a small price for
their work and then resell it for
a large profit.
Indian tribes are especially vulnerable
to exploitation from dishonest dealers,
Meister said, because many of the goods
that are labeled as “Native-American
made” actually are shipped in from Hong
Kong or Mexico.
Tribal craftsmen are worried about im
poster wares, she said. They want to
maintain a good market for the things
they make.
But Ireland said exploitation of folk
artists was not as much of a problem in
Nebraska as it was in other states.
“There are no large art galleries here,”
she said. “(Exploitation) occurs where
there is money to be made.”
Roger Welsch, a Nebraska folklorist,
agreed.
“I don’t think (folk) artists are going to
be exploited,” Welsch said. “Nobody
knows where they are, and they’re not all
that interesting once they usually find
them.”
For example, Welsch said, A1
Fahlbusch ofScottsbluffisoneofthe best
hammered dulcimer players in the
United States. He won a National En
dowment for the Arts Heritage Fellow
ship Award in 1984 for playing the dulci
mer, a musical instrument with metal
strings, which are struck with two small
hammers.
‘In Scottsbluff, I suspect nobody has
the foggiest notion of who (Fahlbusch) is.
He drives a cement truck.”
However, Meister said, some folk art
ists do become well known for their craft.
Losing their obscurity means they also
may lose their privacy, she said.
“Many artists are shy, and they don’t
want to be bothered by tourists who are
always dropping by,” she said. “They’re
not ready for fame ”
The public must make folk artists feel
comfortable, she said, especially artists
who perform.
To help accomplish this, many folk art
program sponsors have someone who
interprets an artist’s performance for the
audience, she said, “so (audience mem
bers) won’t sit there and go, ‘Oh, that’s
really weird.’”
For example, audiences often don’t
understand the meaning behind a
American Indian dance, she said. All
they see is a lot of drumming and noise;
an interpreter helps them see more.
The public’s misunderstanding of folk
art has a flip side — many artists who
claim to be folk artists are not, adding to
the misperception.
“There are always going to be people
who aren’t really folk artists, but are
revivalists,” Meister said. “They’re at
tracted to things that are old-timey, not
what they learned traditionally.”
Welsch has a simpler word for revival
ism — fakelore. Unlike folklore, he said,
fakelore has nothing to do with tradition.
“I’m really worried that what is very
often presented as folklore has nothing to
do with folklore,” he said.
“(Fakelore) is people dressing up in
funny clothes and giving a vision of pio
neer life, which simply is fraudulent.
“You’ll never go to a festival without
some woman wearing a sun bonnet and
running a spinning wheel,” Welsch said,
although spinning and weaving usually
did not happen in Nebraska.
“The reason you find all these spinning
wheels around Nebraska is that they
weren’t worn out,” he said.
“What the hell were they gonna spin
out here? There was very little wool. You
could buy cloth at the local Sears store for
godsakes.
“Why would some woman sit there
making thread when she could go and
buy it?
“It’s just wackiness, but in a way, it’s
interesting because this is what people
think.”
The public has a tainted percep
tion of folklore, Welsch said, and
revivalism, or living history,
adds to the confusion.
However, Meister said, revivalists do
fulfil a purpose — they help people relive
the past.
“There is room for that,” she said. “But
(revivalists) shouldn’t be confused with
traditional arts.”
People unfamiliar with folk art want an
easy way to identify it, Ireland said —
“some sort of acid test to distinguish it
from popular culture.”
But a distinction between folklore and
popular culture doesn’t always exist,
Ireland said.
For example, she said, the cornhusk
dolls that are sold at many craft shows
are folk art, but they have become popu
lar too.
Looking at popular culture may be
the way to discover what Amer
ica really is about, Welsch said.
“When was the last time you
danced at a German-Russian wedding to
a hammered dulcimer player?” he said.
“It’s much more likely that the last wed
ding you were at, they had a disc jockey.”
Ireland compared popular culture to a
river that breaks off into little streams
such as folk or traditional culture.
The river is growing larger as popular
culture becomes more homogenous, she
said, making it difficult for some folk
traditions to take rootv
“Folk art won’t dry up, but it may
eventually meander back to join the
river.”
Popular culture competes with local,
traditional culture, Ireland said, and
young people tend to measure the value
of their community by how closely it
conforms to mass culture.
But folk culture and popular culture
can complement each other as well.
“A kid can have a great love for Beverly
Hills 90210, but can also appreciate
going to a German-Russian wedding
dance.”
But future generations may not have
the opportunity to dance the Dutch Hop
at a wedding because many folk tradi
tions are not being passed down to young
people.
“Folk arts express a lot of things about
Nebraska that are important,” Meister
said. “I’m concerned that some of these
(traditions) are dying out.”
To preserve folk traditions, young
people must become more involved, she
said. Some states have apprenticeship
programs that pay folk artists to teach
their crafls to young people.
And new traditions are always being
born, she said. -
For example, she said, the rap on street
corners by urban children — “that’s folk
art.”
As long as a group or culture maintains
a strong sense of identity, Ireland said,
members of the group are going to ex
press their traditions through artistic
means.
“Folklore is very, very strong,”
Welsch said. “It will never fade
away.”