FINAL SESSION OF THE CONFERENCE

DEAN STITH THOMPSON (Indiana University) : In this conference we have informally discussed various methodological problems. You will remember that we went first into the general question of how best to go about collecting folklore and, next, the manner in which it should be preserved, and put into good neat packages, or archives, and kept so that it could be used. Then we considered what to do with our folklore after we had it, how to make it available so that it will not merely stay on the shelves. Finally, we have discussed a number of separate problems of interest to those who try to study folklore and interpret it.

We have, I think, a right to feel considerable satisfaction with the way in which these symposia have gone. The method used was experimental, for we didn’t know quite how to conduct such discussions. It seems to me that our opening statements have been given with a good deal of clarity and the problems to be opened up have been well-defined and we have gone over a good deal of ground. We haven’t settled the problems, but we have at least talked them out, so that we know about what is left to be resolved. Though we have plowed up much territory, the crops have still to come in. Perhaps in the course of years each individual scholar will cultivate his small plot and bring in his harvest.

All of us have certainly had our imaginations stirred here and there. We have often seen that what we individually are doing is interesting to people in other parts of the world and that they may have suggestions as to how we can occupy our time more valuably in the future.

In looking over the material that we have covered, I wish to suggest certain things that we have left almost undiscussed and that perhaps later conferences may well consider and that certainly should be treated in the folklore journals and meetings. (1) We have left pretty much in the air the use of questionnaires and guide books. We talked a bit about the preparation of them, but we did not discuss the question of how best to use these things in the field. I am sure that I don’t know the best way these should be used and I regret that we didn’t have some more time to discuss that point. (2) A general question in our symposium on the archiving of folklore: What uniformity should be sought in indexing systems? Should each country work out its own separate indexing systems adapted to the particular material found there, of should some over-all system be attempted that would be applicable with proper adaptations to all the world? (3)1 feel also that we never did really get around to the question of making the material of archives available to scholars. We talked about the public, but the scholars we rather took for granted and assumed that the archives could reach them in some way. And yet the problems involved there, for example that of making surveys of the material to be found in archives is all tied up with indexing systems and with publication. I know that in most archives the actual publication of any large proportion of the material is almost prohibitive because of the cost. Even in the United States there are large collections of folklore in private hands for which no publisher can be found. I am looking over several of these now and in the end will probably have to say, “I don’t know how these can be published, because I don’t know where we can find a publishing fund.” (4) In that connection there is a matter that should, I think, eventually be explored, namely the facilities in all the archives for microfilming or otherwise duplicating the collections. It is a question as to how many different centers should have such duplications. That is a practical problem and one that we have had some private conversation about, but it remains to be resolved. (5) We have said nothing about the publication of record albums from archives. We know that the Library of Congress and some places in South America have published record albums from their archives, but I am sure there is much more to be. learned about this.

A good many loose ends, then, have undoubtedly been left. I suppose that it would be unfortunate if there were none of them left and we could wrap up the whole thing neatly and say, “Here it is; the problems of folklore have been solved.” They will never be solved completely. The whole subject would lose a good deal of interest if there were nothing left for future conferences.

It has been a great pleasure and also a great privilege to have so many distinguished scholars here together in this room to discuss all these things. I suppose that it is fair to say that for many of the problems we have talked over we have had assembled here in this small compass the best talent to be found anywhere. We have made recordings of these discussions so that we can preserve them, and we expect to issue a publication of these four symposia. Such a publication should be a major event in folklore scholarship and will permit us to share with other folklorists the remarkable stimulation that has come from these three weeks of close association and discussion.

It occurs to me that some of you may wish to add some reactions about the work of the conference.

DR. REIDAR TH. CHRISTIANSEN (University of Oslo, Oslo, Norway) : Dear Professor Thompson, I am very anxious to have a few words within this session, because I wanted them classified according to the Motif-Index 821.98.X.Y. I speak in gratitude to you from all of us who have come from abroad. What I say is personally directed to you because we are perfectly well aware that this strange thing has happened because you have spent I don’t know how many hours in planning, arranging, making the different factors work together. All of us have discovered that Bloomington is not only a dot on the map, but a very real and fine place. Of course, these few words on behalf of your guests from abroad will be first an expression of my own feelings, of the things, I have learned and discovered here. As folklorists we are working each in our own field, but the first thing we have learned here is a respect for the work you have done here in this vast area and a real, deep, sincere gratitude for all the contacts we have established. Each of the different scholars we have met has presented a field that to us in most cases was new and unexpected. As folklorists we have acquired sense of direction in all these studies, a direction certainly having you and your work as a kind of symbol. That’s a very great thing.

And allow me to give my words a still wider aspect. We have come from many places; we had our ideas of your country; we have had to revise them. We have learned how extremely different things are here, how the dominating factor seems to be size and diversity. But strange things happen, that in spite of all this the remaining impression is that of unity. We have been working on perhaps the only common heritage of all people, that thing which is most intimately connected with our being human, and next to that has been the realization of all belonging to the same pattern of culture. We see more clearly its values in spite of all defects, and in spite of all needs of new balance. We have learned to see more clearly how much it is all bound together.

In talking for all of us I have expressed my impressions. We wanted, however, each in our turn to give a small expression of what we felt, and we have done it in a very simple way, Dean Thompson, in putting each of us a small expression in this volume which I have the honor to give to you.

DEAN THOMPSON: I shall look at this with great pleasure and— words rather fail me at the moment to thank you sufficiently, Dr. Christiansen.

MR. ALAN LOMAX (New York City) : I thought it was important too for the United States to speak up about how it felt concerning this conference and especially to say something in gratitude to Dean Thompson. The first thing that occurred to me was that he was living in my house when I was born. Now, I don’t quite remember this, but it was certainly a good augury for the future family ties between the folklorizing Thompson and the folksongizing Lomaxes. It has always been a very deep kind of tie and now as all of us have watched Dean Thompson build here in Bloomington a center for scientific folklore study in the United States we have felt a special kind of family pride because he has turned into a sort of roving folklore ambassador for the whole country, and whereas before it might not have been thought in Sweden and France and elsewhere abroad that we had scientific folklore, but only more guitar-playing cowboys mounted on horses, his visits around the world have made people aware that there is a deep truth-seeking in this folklore of America.

I think it is also something that Americans can feel especially happy about in Dean Thompson’s work that out of it came the Motif-Index of Folk-Literature,⁷ which in a way is a sort of handbook of the dreams and aspirations for all people everywhere. And since America is a sort of melting pot, a big kettle into which all the races and all the countries have poured their hearts and their people, and something new is coming here, it is especially important that an American should have had such a big hand in making this index. And now with his magic wand and his seven-league boots he has reached out and pulled not only all the folk tales but all the workers in the field together. And for my part I regard it as the first real folklore meeting I have attended in these states, because coming in contact with the scholars from other parts of the world has made our problem at last make complete sense. We feel where we fit in, and what we have to do, and I am sure that the publication that is coming from this meeting is going to open a new era for folklore research. So for my friends and colleagues of the United States, it has been the most pleasant experience of all our folklore work to sit down with our friends from abroad and to discuss our common problems.

DEAN THOMPSON: If I were only in South America the proper thing would be to give you both a hearty abrazo. You all realize that bringing this Conference together has long been a dream of mine, but it could never have been accomplished without the enthusiastic support of Indiana University and the cooperation of all of you who have made the journeys from distant parts of the earth. As we now leave I know we shall all find our lives enriched not only with the memory of stimulating and valuable talk but with new and strengthened bonds of friendship.

End of Conference