Call for Papers Folklore Society: Working Life: Belief, Custom, Ritual and Narrative

27th — 29th April 2018

• 14:00—14:00

• Museum of English Rural Life, University of Reading, 6 Redlands Road, Reading, RG1 5EX

Working Life: Belief, Custom, Ritual, Narrative

CALL FOR PAPERS

The Folklore Society's April conference 2018 will take place at the Museum of English Rural Life, University of Reading, 6 Redlands Road, Reading, RG1 5EX

Submissions are invited for papers that explore a range of themes, customs, narratives, traditions and beliefs relating to the working life. Proposals of 100-150 words, for presentations of 20 minutes, should be emailed by 7 January 2018 to: thefolkloresociety@gmail.com and copied to enquiries@folklore-society.com. Please include a brief biographical note, including contact details.

Contributions are invited from scholars across the fields of folklore studies, anthropology, cultural studies, ethnology and other related disciplines.

Both members and non-members of The Folklore Society are warmly encouraged to offer papers at this conference.

Themes for discussion might include, but are not limited to:

·       Calendar festivals and working life

·       Working life and the narrative tradition

·       Work songs and occupational identities in ballads and popular poetry

·       Special practices at work – rites of conclusion, taboo expressions

·       Apprenticeship and initiation rituals, trade processions and myths of origin

·       Traditional humour about trades and professions

·       Informal rules of work, office jokes and sanctioned perks

·       The use of custom, omens, mascots and other lore as a bargaining tool with employers

·       Themes from work in folk art, murals and vernacular architecture

Art Fund New Collection Awards open for application

Art Fund launches the fourth round of New Collecting Awards.

The New Collecting Awards programme aims to support curators across the UK to build critical professional skills by pursuing new avenues of collecting for their museums. Offering 100% funding for focused collecting projects of the highest quality, the scheme enables curators to expand museum collections of fine art, design or visual culture into exciting new areas, or to deepen existing holdings in imaginative ways. Each awardee also receives a generous funding allocation towards research, travel and training costs to facilitate their proposed collecting plans and professional development.

Over the last two years the Art Fund have awarded 17 awards totalling £1million for acquisition projects ranging from Modernist jewellery to cartographic material. Typical grant awards fall between £50,000 and £80,000. Applications are welcome from curators who are in the early stages of their career or have had limited opportunities to collect. 

The deadline for applications is 13 February 2018. Please see here for further information on aims, eligibility and how to apply, and here for details of previous awardees and mentors.