Notes from the Editor

Tim Thurston

Articles:

Echoes of Resillience: Storytelling , History, and the Fight for Justice

Darren Parry, Archer Taylor Lecture, 2025

Bio: Darren Perry is the former Chairman for the Northern Band of the Shoshone Nation. An author, speaker, and storyteller, he speaks and teaches nationally and internationally on Native history, indigenous perspectives on environmental justice and climate, and other issues. He is the author of Tending the Sacred: How Indigenous Wisdom Will Save the World.

Embodying Heritage in Cal and Lou Courville's Cajun Dance

Brandon Barker

ABSTRACT: Key folkloristic insights into every macro-level cultural domain, from food systems to religion, depend on those of situated, local participants. In the contexts of heritage and critical heritage studies, this article examines the subjective, cognitive, and embodied experiences of south Louisiana’s local Cajun dancers, Cal and Lou Courville. Based on observations of their dance lessons and descriptions of their folk-dancing careers, this article describes the Courville’s traditional dance techniques and reiterates the importance of the essential province of subjective, embodied experience—even for institutionally sponsored heritage actors.

KEYWORDS: folk dance, Cajun folklore, heritage, body-lore, cognitive folkloristics

A Conceptual Analysis of ICH Safeguarding (Baohu) in China: Internationaal Convention, National Translation, and Local Implementation

Lijun Zhang 

ABSTRACT: This article offers a conceptual analysis of “safeguarding,” exploring how the UNESCO concept has been translated into Chinese and how the differences in interpretation and connotation influence cultural governance in China. The author revisits “safeguarding” within the framework of key UNESCO heritage policy texts. Connecting to, and comparing with, the UNESCO concept of safeguarding, the author examines the term’s translation—baohu—within China’s linguistic and sociocultural context. Baohu is generally used to gloss three concepts (protection, preservation, and conservation), each carrying different meanings and policy implications. The author unpacks each of these concepts and connects them to China’s ICH administrative and policy framework. The article demonstrates that, when the UNESCO conventions are localized, the concept of safeguarding gains space for re-interpretation and reprocessing by various actors. Although this analysis is conceptually driven, the paper shows that it is not merely an abstract, conceptual matter. Actors at every level face practical questions of interpretation and application that shape on-the-ground ICH practice.

KEYWORDS: intangible cultural heritage, safeguarding, cultural governance, conceptual analysis, China

Is there a multispecies folk in the city?

Nicholas Miller

ABSTRACT: This article seeks to update Richard Dorson’s original question, “Is there a folk in the city?” to “Is there a multispecies folk in the city?” Through exploration of spaces of liminality found in cities, including the activities of urban fur trappers in Chicago and fly-fishing guides in Milwaukee, this article investigates human-animal entanglements and discusses larger issues in understanding human behavior at the blurry boundaries between urban and rural. In doing so, it presents a vision for new, multispecies approaches to folklore.

KEYWORDS: folklife, urbanization, multispecies, liminality,

niche environments