“All Power to the Periphery”: The Public Folklore Thought of Alan Lomax

Abstract

Alan Lomax developed a global vision for the protection of traditional cultures at a time when threats to cultural difference were accelerating—a problem he ascribed to centralized media and entertainment industries, as well as government policies. His public folklore thought and practice was informed by a cultural critique that viewed folklore as an alternative to the alienation engendered by modern life. Lomax’s view of folklore can be characterized as counterhegemonic, and he saw folklore as resistance effected both by explicit expressions of protest and through the existence of folklore itself. Anticipating—and shaping—contemporary public folklore practice, Lomax created a repertoire of strategies for safeguarding traditions. These included appropriating the technologies threatening small-scale cultures in order to maintain and disseminate traditions, proposing government folk cultural policies, developing modes of presentation for new audiences, and creating conditions for traditions to be perpetuated locally.