Arts in Earnest: North Carolina Folklife

Published by Duke University Press 1990

Arts in Earnest

North Carolina Folklife

Edited by: Daniel W. Patterson and Charles G. Zugg III

https://doi.org/10.1515/9780822381617

Overview
Contents

About this book

Arts in Earnest explores the unique folklife of North Carolina from ruddy ducks to pranks in the mill. Traversing from Murphy to Manteo, these fifteen essays demonstrate the importance of North Carolina’s continually changing folklife. From decoy carving along the coast, to the music of tobacco chants and the blues of the Piedmont, to the Jack tales of the mountains, Arts in Earnest reflects the story of a people negotiating their rapidly changing social and economic environment. Personal interviews are an important element in the book. Laura Lee, an elderly black woman from Chatham County, describes the quilts she made from funeral flower ribbons; witnesses and friends each remember varying details of the Duke University football player who single-handedly vanquished a gang of would-be muggers; Clyde Jones leads a safari through his backyard, which is filled with animals made of wood and cement that represent nontraditional folk art; the songs and sermon of a Primitive Baptist service flow together as one—“it tills you up all over”; Durham bluesman Willie Trice, one of a handful of Durham musicians who recorded in the 1930s and early 1940s, remembers when the active tobacco warehouses offered ready audiences—“They’d tip us a heap of change to play some music”; and Goldsboro tobacco auctioneer H. L. “Speed” Riggs chants 460 words per minute, five to six times faster than a normal conversational rate.

Topics

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	i
Contents Publicly Available Download PDF	vii
Acknowledgments Publicly Available Download PDF	ix
Introduction Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	1
Of the Past
1 The North Carolina Wildfowl Decoy Tradition Stephen Matchak Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	27
2 "I Never Could Play Alone": The Emergence of the New River Valley String Band, 1875-1915 Thomas Carter and Thomas Sauber Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	47
3 The Hugh Dixon Homestead: What to Make of Tradition? Rachel B. Osborn Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	75
4 Economic and Cultural Influences on German and Scotch-Irish Quilts in Antebellum Rowan County, North Carolina Laurel Horton Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	89
5 The Development of the Bright-Leaf Tobacco Auctioneer's Chant Bill Mansfield Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	102
Of Individuals
6 The Solitary Memory: A Greek-American's Recollections of the Folk Play Panaretos John A. Porter Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	117
7 The Banjo-Song Genre: A Study of "High Sheriff," Dink Roberts's Man-against-the-Law Song Cecelia Conway Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	135
8 The Narrative Style of Marshall Ward, Jack-Tale-Teller Charlotte Paige Gutierrez Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	147
9 Symbols from Ribbons: Afro-American Funeral-Ribbon Quilts in Chatham County, North Carolina Mary Anne McDonald Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	164
10 "Learnin', Though"; Environmental Art as a Creative Process Kathleen Condon Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	179
11 In the Good Old Way: Primitive Baptist Tradition in an Age of Change Brett Sutton Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	195
12 Banjos and Blues Kip Lornell Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	216
13 Why Do Duck Decoys Have Eyes? John Forrest Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	232
14 Tugging on Superman's Cape: The Making of a College Legend James Wise Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	241
15 The Dissembling Line: Industrial Pranks in a North Carolina Textile Mill Douglas DeNatale Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	254
Notes Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	277
Contributors Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	307
Index Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	313

Language: English
Publisher: Duke University Press
Pages
- Main content: 331

eBook

Published: October 31, 1989
ISBN: 9780822381617