West Virginia Folklife Program

Scotts Run Resonance – Passing it Forward

West Virginia-based Scotts Run Settlement House, The Shack Neighborhood House, and the Scotts Run Museum & Trail have announced Scotts Run Resonance—Passing It Forward with support from Mid Atlantic Arts’ Central Appalachia Living Traditions (CALT) program. This initiative includes a year of events and classes to exchange wisdom and pass on traditions of foodways, history…

West Virginia Day 2023

Join us at the historic MacFarland-Hubbard House as we mark West Virginia’s 160th birthday. This year’s featured speaker is Emily Hilliard, our former state folklorist, who will discuss her recent book–Making Our Future: Visionary Folklore and Everyday Culture in Appalachia.

Announcing the 2022-2023 West Virginia Folklife Apprenticeship Participants

We are pleased to announce our 2022-2023 cohort of apprenticeship participants in the third round of the West Virginia Folklife Apprenticeship Program. Seven apprenticeship pairs from across the Mountain State will study and practice traditions including soul food cooking, fiddle repair, and mushroom foraging. The Folklife Apprenticeship Program offers $3,000 to recognize and honor West…

West Virginia Folklife Collection at West Virginia University Libraries Receives American Folklore Society’s Brenda McCallum Prize

The West Virginia Folklife Program, a project of the West Virginia Humanities Council, is honored to announce that the West Virginia Folklife Collection housed at the West Virginia University Libraries has received the Brenda McCallum Prize, an award sponsored by the Archives and Libraries Section of the American Folklore Society. The West Virginia Folklife Collection…

Mollett Family featured in Black By God

The anniversary issue of Black By God – WV Pride: From Juneteenth to Father’s Day and West Virginia Day is now available! This latest issue features a photo of the Mollett Family taken on Memorial Day 2022. Multiple generations of the family gathered to clean and decorate gravesites, tell stories, and honor their ancestors and…

2022-2023 Folklife Apprenticeship Applications and Guidelines Now Available

The West Virginia Folklife Program, a project of the West Virginia Humanities Council, is now accepting applications for its statewide Folklife Apprenticeship Program. The program supports West Virginia master traditional artists or tradition bearers working with qualified apprentices on a year-long in-depth apprenticeship in their cultural expression or traditional art form. These apprenticeships of traditional music, dance, craft, foodways, storytelling, and more—in any cultural community in the Mountain State—facilitate the transmission of techniques and artistry of the forms as well as their histories and traditions.

Partnership with Central Appalachia Living Traditions

For the past year we have been partnering with Mid Atlantic Arts on their Central Appalachia Living Traditions project, or CALT. CALT promotes the understanding and recognition of folk arts and culture in Appalachian counties of Ohio, Virginia, and West Virginia through a 3-part program that invests in folk arts communities while seeding new folk…

West Virginia Folklife Presents Apprenticeship Showcase: The Power of Storytelling in Midwifery

Please join us at noon on Thursday, May 5th –The International Day of the Midwife– for a pre-recorded apprenticeship showcase featuring midwife Angy Nixon of Putnam County and her apprentice Christine Weirick of Fayette County. The pair recently completed their 2020-2021 apprenticeship with the West Virginia Folklife Program. Read about their apprenticeship here. The virtual…

Introducing Jennie Williams, the State Folklorist of West Virginia

A version of this piece will be published in the Summer 2022 issue of Goldenseal, a print magazine produced by the WV Department of Arts, Culture and History. My name is Jennie Williams, and I’m thrilled to join the West Virginia Humanities Council and direct the West Virginia Folklife Program as the new state folklorist….

West Virginia Folklife Presents Virtual Apprenticeship Showcase: Seed Saving and Storytelling

West Virginia Folklife Virtual Apprenticeship Showcase: Seed Saving and Related Storytelling Friday, November 5 @ 1 p.m. -2 p.m. via Zoom Please join us on Friday, November 5, at 1 p.m. for a virtual showcase featuring apprenticeship pair in seed saving and related storytelling, Mehmet Oztan of Reedsville and Lafayette Dexter of Fayetteville. The event…

2021 Folklife Apprenticeship Feature: Mehmet Oztan and Lafayette Dexter, Seed Saving and Related Storytelling

The West Virginia Folklife Apprenticeship Program offers up to a $3,000 stipend to West Virginia master traditional artists or tradition bearers working with qualified apprentices on a year-long in-depth apprenticeship in their cultural expression or traditional art form. These apprenticeships aim to facilitate the transmission of techniques and artistry of the forms, as well as…

Watch Homegrown Foodways in West Virginia: “Turkish Cuisine and Seedsaving” & “Ravioli and Sauce”

On Wednesday, September 15th at noon EST on the American Folklife Center’s Facebook page, we will premiere the third and fourth films in the Homegrown Foodways in West Virginia series, featuring Lou Maiuri on ravioli and sauce and Mehmet Öztan on Turkish cuisine and seed keeping.