The announcements on this page repeat the stories indicated on the home page plus any current folklore-related news items submitted to us. As of October 7, 2015, no additional stories have been submitted.

Western Folklore, Vol. 74

Volume 74, Number 1, the most recent issue of Western Folklore, was mailed on September 3, 2015. Visit the Publications page for more information. Volume 74, No. 2 will be shipped in October, 2015.

WSFS celebrates 75 years in 2016

2016 will be the 75th anniversary year of the Western States Folklore Society. We are planning to hold our annual conference at University of California, Berkeley on 8-9 April 2016. Please put these dates on your calendar and check back here as plans develop. We hope to see you there. Click on the 2016 Meeting button for details.

WSFS has a new business manager and a new treasurer

Effective September 1, 2015, Elliott Oring, retired as the Society's Business Manager, an appointive position he held for over 15 years. At the April, 2015 meeting, the Board and membership approved the appointment of Paul Jordan-Smith to take his place as Managing Editor. To effect the change, Paul resigned as Treasurer, turning it over to Erik Aasland.

Elliott's managership was particularly productive for the Society, and he will be missed in that role. However, he will undoubtedly retain his equally much-needed roles as scholar and gadfly at the Society's annual meetings.

Call for papers: Western Folklore

For its upcoming 75th year of publication, Western Folklore: The Journal of the Western States Folklore Society is issuing a call for papers and reviews dealing with folklore in a historical context. Research papers could be focused on particular historical topics, events, trends, persons, schools of thought, and so on, in folklore studies. For this special issue, we are particularly interested in papers dealing with the last 75 years, but writers are encouraged to submit all papers dealing with "Folklore in a Historical Context." We also welcome suggestions for books on historical topics to review in this issue. The deadline for submissions is October 15, 2015, and the publication date is anticipated for Fall of 2016. Papers should be between 6,000 to 9,000 words in length. For further details, please refer to the submission guidelines at www.westernfolklore.org/Submissions.html. For further queries, please email the editor Tok Thompson directly at tokthomp@usc.edu.

Two students awarded travel stipends at 2015 Annual Meeting

The WSFS awards three student travel stipends of $150 each to students coming to the conference to deliver a paper. At this year's meeting, only two students—Magen Olsen and Lee Olsen (unrelated)—applied; each won the award.

Membership benefit: JSTOR access to folklore journals