Author: Richard Mercer Dorson
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 9780674508552
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 292
Book Description
Most of Richard Dorson's thirty years as folklorist have been spent collecting tales and legends in the remote backcountry, far from the centers of population. For this book he extended his search for folk traditions to one of the most heavily industrialized sections of the United States. Can folklore be found, he wondered, in the Calumet Region of northwest Indiana? Does it exist among the steelworkers, ethnic groups, and blacks in Gary, Whiting, East Chicago, and Hammond? In his usual entertaining style, Dorson shows that a rich and varied folklore exists in the Region. Although it differs from that of rural people, it is equally vital. Much of this urban lore finds expression in conversational anecdotes and stories that deal with pressing issues: the flight from the inner city, crime in the streets, working conditions in the steel mills, the maintenance of ethnic identity, the place of blacks in a predominantly white society. The folklore reveals strongly held attitudes such as the loathing of industrial work, resistance to assimilation, and black adoption of middle-class-white values. Miliworkers and mill executives, housewives, ethnic performers, storekeepers, and preachers tell their stories about the Region. The concerns that occupy them affect city dwellers throughout the United States. Land of the Millrats, though it depicts a special place, speaks for much of America.
Land of the Millrats
Author: Richard Mercer Dorson
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 9780674508552
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 292
Book Description
Most of Richard Dorson's thirty years as folklorist have been spent collecting tales and legends in the remote backcountry, far from the centers of population. For this book he extended his search for folk traditions to one of the most heavily industrialized sections of the United States. Can folklore be found, he wondered, in the Calumet Region of northwest Indiana? Does it exist among the steelworkers, ethnic groups, and blacks in Gary, Whiting, East Chicago, and Hammond? In his usual entertaining style, Dorson shows that a rich and varied folklore exists in the Region. Although it differs from that of rural people, it is equally vital. Much of this urban lore finds expression in conversational anecdotes and stories that deal with pressing issues: the flight from the inner city, crime in the streets, working conditions in the steel mills, the maintenance of ethnic identity, the place of blacks in a predominantly white society. The folklore reveals strongly held attitudes such as the loathing of industrial work, resistance to assimilation, and black adoption of middle-class-white values. Miliworkers and mill executives, housewives, ethnic performers, storekeepers, and preachers tell their stories about the Region. The concerns that occupy them affect city dwellers throughout the United States. Land of the Millrats, though it depicts a special place, speaks for much of America.
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 9780674508552
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 292
Book Description
Most of Richard Dorson's thirty years as folklorist have been spent collecting tales and legends in the remote backcountry, far from the centers of population. For this book he extended his search for folk traditions to one of the most heavily industrialized sections of the United States. Can folklore be found, he wondered, in the Calumet Region of northwest Indiana? Does it exist among the steelworkers, ethnic groups, and blacks in Gary, Whiting, East Chicago, and Hammond? In his usual entertaining style, Dorson shows that a rich and varied folklore exists in the Region. Although it differs from that of rural people, it is equally vital. Much of this urban lore finds expression in conversational anecdotes and stories that deal with pressing issues: the flight from the inner city, crime in the streets, working conditions in the steel mills, the maintenance of ethnic identity, the place of blacks in a predominantly white society. The folklore reveals strongly held attitudes such as the loathing of industrial work, resistance to assimilation, and black adoption of middle-class-white values. Miliworkers and mill executives, housewives, ethnic performers, storekeepers, and preachers tell their stories about the Region. The concerns that occupy them affect city dwellers throughout the United States. Land of the Millrats, though it depicts a special place, speaks for much of America.
Crooked Politics in Northwest Indiana
Author: Jerry Davich
Publisher: Arcadia Publishing
ISBN: 1467136425
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 160
Book Description
For more than a century, Northwest Indiana's political culture has involved secret handshakes, tapped phone calls, backroom deals and murder. Davich explores the hidden political scandals and highly publicized court cases of public servants who once swore to serve and protect.
Publisher: Arcadia Publishing
ISBN: 1467136425
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 160
Book Description
For more than a century, Northwest Indiana's political culture has involved secret handshakes, tapped phone calls, backroom deals and murder. Davich explores the hidden political scandals and highly publicized court cases of public servants who once swore to serve and protect.
Encyclopedia of American Folklore
Author: Linda Watts
Publisher: Infobase Holdings, Inc
ISBN: 1646930002
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 462
Book Description
Folklore has been described as the unwritten literature of a culture: its songs, stories, sayings, games, rituals, beliefs, and ways of life. Encyclopedia of American Folklore helps readers explore topics, terms, themes, figures, and issues related to this popular subject. This comprehensive reference guide addresses the needs of multiple audiences, including high school, college, and public libraries, archive and museum collections, storytellers, and independent researchers. Its content and organization correspond to the ways educators integrate folklore within literacy and wider learning objectives for language arts and cultural studies at the secondary level. This well-rounded resource connects United States folk forms with their cultural origin, historical context, and social function. Appendixes include a bibliography, a category index, and a discussion of starting points for researching American folklore. References and bibliographic material throughout the text highlight recently published and commonly available materials for further study. Coverage includes: Folk heroes and legendary figures, including Paul Bunyan and Yankee Doodle Fables, fairy tales, and myths often featured in American folklore, including "Little Red Riding Hood" and "The Princess and the Pea" American authors who have added to or modified folklore traditions, including Washington Irving Historical events that gave rise to folklore, including the civil rights movement and the Revolutionary War Terms in folklore studies, such as fieldwork and the folklife movement Holidays and observances, such as Christmas and Kwanzaa Topics related to folklore in everyday life, such as sports folklore and courtship/dating folklore Folklore related to cultural groups, such as Appalachian folklore and African-American folklore and more.
Publisher: Infobase Holdings, Inc
ISBN: 1646930002
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 462
Book Description
Folklore has been described as the unwritten literature of a culture: its songs, stories, sayings, games, rituals, beliefs, and ways of life. Encyclopedia of American Folklore helps readers explore topics, terms, themes, figures, and issues related to this popular subject. This comprehensive reference guide addresses the needs of multiple audiences, including high school, college, and public libraries, archive and museum collections, storytellers, and independent researchers. Its content and organization correspond to the ways educators integrate folklore within literacy and wider learning objectives for language arts and cultural studies at the secondary level. This well-rounded resource connects United States folk forms with their cultural origin, historical context, and social function. Appendixes include a bibliography, a category index, and a discussion of starting points for researching American folklore. References and bibliographic material throughout the text highlight recently published and commonly available materials for further study. Coverage includes: Folk heroes and legendary figures, including Paul Bunyan and Yankee Doodle Fables, fairy tales, and myths often featured in American folklore, including "Little Red Riding Hood" and "The Princess and the Pea" American authors who have added to or modified folklore traditions, including Washington Irving Historical events that gave rise to folklore, including the civil rights movement and the Revolutionary War Terms in folklore studies, such as fieldwork and the folklife movement Holidays and observances, such as Christmas and Kwanzaa Topics related to folklore in everyday life, such as sports folklore and courtship/dating folklore Folklore related to cultural groups, such as Appalachian folklore and African-American folklore and more.
Folk Art and Aging
Author: Jon Kay
Publisher: Indiana University Press
ISBN: 0253022207
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 148
Book Description
Growing old doesn't have to be seen as an eventual failure but rather as an important developmental stage of creativity. Offering an absorbing and fresh perspective on aging and crafts, Jon Kay explores how elders choose to tap into their creative and personal potential through making life-story objects. Carving, painting, and rug hooking not only help seniors to cope with the ailments of aging and loneliness but also to achieve greater satisfaction with their lives. Whether revived from childhood memories or inspired by their capacity to connect to others, meaningful memory projects serve as a lens for focusing on, remaking, and sharing the long-ago. These activities often help elders productively fill the hours after they have raised their children, retired from their jobs, and/or lost a loved one. These individuals forge new identities for themselves that do not erase their earlier lives but build on them and new lives that include sharing scenes and stories from their memories.
Publisher: Indiana University Press
ISBN: 0253022207
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 148
Book Description
Growing old doesn't have to be seen as an eventual failure but rather as an important developmental stage of creativity. Offering an absorbing and fresh perspective on aging and crafts, Jon Kay explores how elders choose to tap into their creative and personal potential through making life-story objects. Carving, painting, and rug hooking not only help seniors to cope with the ailments of aging and loneliness but also to achieve greater satisfaction with their lives. Whether revived from childhood memories or inspired by their capacity to connect to others, meaningful memory projects serve as a lens for focusing on, remaking, and sharing the long-ago. These activities often help elders productively fill the hours after they have raised their children, retired from their jobs, and/or lost a loved one. These individuals forge new identities for themselves that do not erase their earlier lives but build on them and new lives that include sharing scenes and stories from their memories.
Sense Of Place
Author: Barbara Allen
Publisher: University Press of Kentucky
ISBN: 0813185092
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 290
Book Description
Despite the homogenization of American life, areas of strong regional consciousness still persist in the United States, and there is a growing interest in regionalism among the public and among academics. In response to that interest ten folklorists here describe and interpret a variety of American regional cultures in the twentieth century. Their book is the first to deal specifically with regional culture and the first to employ the perspective of folklore in the study of regional identity and consciousness. The authors range widely over the United States, from the Eastern Shore to the Pacific Northwest, from the Southern Mountains to the Great Plains. They look at a variety of cultural expressions and practices—legends, anecdotes, songs, foodways, architecture, and crafts. Tying their work together is a common consideration of how regional culture shapes and is shaped by the consciousness of living in a special place. In exploring this dimension of regional culture the authors consider the influence of natural environment and historical experience on the development of regional culture, the role of ethnicity in regional consciousness, the tensions between insiders and outsiders that stem from a sense of regional identity, and the changes in culture in response to social and economic change. With its focus on cultural manifestations and its folkloristic perspective this book provides a fresh and needed contribution to regional studies. Written in a clear, readable style, it will appeal to general readers interested in American regions and their cultures. At the same time the research and analytical approach make it useful not only to folklorists but to cultural geographers, anthropologists, and other scholars of regional studies.
Publisher: University Press of Kentucky
ISBN: 0813185092
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 290
Book Description
Despite the homogenization of American life, areas of strong regional consciousness still persist in the United States, and there is a growing interest in regionalism among the public and among academics. In response to that interest ten folklorists here describe and interpret a variety of American regional cultures in the twentieth century. Their book is the first to deal specifically with regional culture and the first to employ the perspective of folklore in the study of regional identity and consciousness. The authors range widely over the United States, from the Eastern Shore to the Pacific Northwest, from the Southern Mountains to the Great Plains. They look at a variety of cultural expressions and practices—legends, anecdotes, songs, foodways, architecture, and crafts. Tying their work together is a common consideration of how regional culture shapes and is shaped by the consciousness of living in a special place. In exploring this dimension of regional culture the authors consider the influence of natural environment and historical experience on the development of regional culture, the role of ethnicity in regional consciousness, the tensions between insiders and outsiders that stem from a sense of regional identity, and the changes in culture in response to social and economic change. With its focus on cultural manifestations and its folkloristic perspective this book provides a fresh and needed contribution to regional studies. Written in a clear, readable style, it will appeal to general readers interested in American regions and their cultures. At the same time the research and analytical approach make it useful not only to folklorists but to cultural geographers, anthropologists, and other scholars of regional studies.
Haunted Gary
Author: Ursula Bielski
Publisher: Arcadia Publishing
ISBN: 1625850956
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 108
Book Description
“Highlights the most infamous and spine-tingling haunted places scattered throughout Northwest Indiana” (The Times of Northwest Indiana). In 2014, the story of Gary’s “Demon House” shocked the world, drawing millions into the terrifying tale of a contemporary exorcism. For many residents, however, ghosts are just part of the community. From the haunting of the Jackson Five to the ghost ship Flying Cloud, local legends abound. Ghostly echoes may linger from a fiery 1918 train wreck that claimed the lives of eighty-six circus performers. A young murderess, said to have drowned her children in the Little Calumet River, reportedly haunts the Cline Avenue freeway. And the spirit of Alice Gray, the most famous of myriad recluses, is said to remain in Duneland. Meet these and other eternal inhabitants of “America’s Ghost Town” with author Ursula Bielski. Includes photos!
Publisher: Arcadia Publishing
ISBN: 1625850956
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 108
Book Description
“Highlights the most infamous and spine-tingling haunted places scattered throughout Northwest Indiana” (The Times of Northwest Indiana). In 2014, the story of Gary’s “Demon House” shocked the world, drawing millions into the terrifying tale of a contemporary exorcism. For many residents, however, ghosts are just part of the community. From the haunting of the Jackson Five to the ghost ship Flying Cloud, local legends abound. Ghostly echoes may linger from a fiery 1918 train wreck that claimed the lives of eighty-six circus performers. A young murderess, said to have drowned her children in the Little Calumet River, reportedly haunts the Cline Avenue freeway. And the spirit of Alice Gray, the most famous of myriad recluses, is said to remain in Duneland. Meet these and other eternal inhabitants of “America’s Ghost Town” with author Ursula Bielski. Includes photos!
Be Afraid, Be Very Afraid: The Book of Scary Urban Legends
Author: Jan Harold Brunvand
Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
ISBN: 0393350401
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 262
Book Description
An anthology of the most chilling urban legends of all time collected by the maestro himself. Urban legends are those strange, but seemingly credible tales that always happen to a friend of a friend. For the first time, Professor Jan Harold Brunvand, "who has achieved almost legendary status" (Choice), has collected the creepiest, most terrifying urban legends, many that have spooked you since your childhood and others that you believe really did occur—even if it was one town over to some poor hapless coed who left a party early only to be followed by a man who just got loose from a mental hospital. From the classic hook-man story told around many a campfire to "Saved by a Cell Phone," these spine-tingling urban legends will give you goose bumps, even when you know they can't be true. Still, you'll continue to check the backseat of your car at gas stations and look under your bed at night before praying for sleep.
Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
ISBN: 0393350401
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 262
Book Description
An anthology of the most chilling urban legends of all time collected by the maestro himself. Urban legends are those strange, but seemingly credible tales that always happen to a friend of a friend. For the first time, Professor Jan Harold Brunvand, "who has achieved almost legendary status" (Choice), has collected the creepiest, most terrifying urban legends, many that have spooked you since your childhood and others that you believe really did occur—even if it was one town over to some poor hapless coed who left a party early only to be followed by a man who just got loose from a mental hospital. From the classic hook-man story told around many a campfire to "Saved by a Cell Phone," these spine-tingling urban legends will give you goose bumps, even when you know they can't be true. Still, you'll continue to check the backseat of your car at gas stations and look under your bed at night before praying for sleep.
A Town Without Steel
Author: Judith Modell
Publisher: University of Pittsburgh Press
ISBN: 082298086X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 369
Book Description
Photographs by Charlee Brodsky In 1986, with little warning, the USX Homestead Works closed. Thousands of workers who depended on steel to survive were left without work. A Town Without Steel looks at the people of Homestead as they reinvent their views of household and work and place in this world. The book details the modifications and revisions of domestic strategies in a public crisis. In some ways unique, and in some ways typical of American industrial towns, the plight of Homestead sheds light on social, cultural, and political developments of the late twentieth century. In this anthropological and photographic account of a town facing the crisis of deindustrialization, A Town Without Steel focuses on families. Reminiscent of Margaret Byington and Lewis Hine's approach in Homestead, Charlee Brodsky's photographs document the visual dimension of change in Homestead. The mill that dominated the landscape transformed to a vast, empty lot; a crowded commercial street turns into a ghost town; and an abundance of well-kept homes become an abandoned street of houses for sale. The individual narratives and family snapshots, Modell's interpretations, and Brodsky's photographs all evoke the tragedy and the resilience of a town whose primary source of self-identification no longer exists.
Publisher: University of Pittsburgh Press
ISBN: 082298086X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 369
Book Description
Photographs by Charlee Brodsky In 1986, with little warning, the USX Homestead Works closed. Thousands of workers who depended on steel to survive were left without work. A Town Without Steel looks at the people of Homestead as they reinvent their views of household and work and place in this world. The book details the modifications and revisions of domestic strategies in a public crisis. In some ways unique, and in some ways typical of American industrial towns, the plight of Homestead sheds light on social, cultural, and political developments of the late twentieth century. In this anthropological and photographic account of a town facing the crisis of deindustrialization, A Town Without Steel focuses on families. Reminiscent of Margaret Byington and Lewis Hine's approach in Homestead, Charlee Brodsky's photographs document the visual dimension of change in Homestead. The mill that dominated the landscape transformed to a vast, empty lot; a crowded commercial street turns into a ghost town; and an abundance of well-kept homes become an abandoned street of houses for sale. The individual narratives and family snapshots, Modell's interpretations, and Brodsky's photographs all evoke the tragedy and the resilience of a town whose primary source of self-identification no longer exists.
Beyond the Ruins
Author: Jefferson Cowie
Publisher: Cornell University Press
ISBN: 9780801488719
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 396
Book Description
Table of contents
Publisher: Cornell University Press
ISBN: 9780801488719
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 396
Book Description
Table of contents
Gary, the Most American of All American Cities
Author: S. Paul O'Hara
Publisher: Indiana University Press
ISBN: 0253004993
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 209
Book Description
U.S. Steel created Gary, Indiana. The new steel plant and town built on the site in 1906 were at once a triumph of industrial capitalism and a bold experiment in urban planning. Gary became the canvas onto which the American public projected its hopes and fears about modern, industrial society. In its prime, Gary was known as "the magic city," "steel's greatest achievement," and "an industrial utopia"; later it would be called "the very model of urban decay." S. Paul O'Hara traces this stark reversal of fortune and reveals America's changing expectations. He delivers a riveting account of the boom or bust mentality of American industrialism from the turn of the 20th century to the present day.
Publisher: Indiana University Press
ISBN: 0253004993
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 209
Book Description
U.S. Steel created Gary, Indiana. The new steel plant and town built on the site in 1906 were at once a triumph of industrial capitalism and a bold experiment in urban planning. Gary became the canvas onto which the American public projected its hopes and fears about modern, industrial society. In its prime, Gary was known as "the magic city," "steel's greatest achievement," and "an industrial utopia"; later it would be called "the very model of urban decay." S. Paul O'Hara traces this stark reversal of fortune and reveals America's changing expectations. He delivers a riveting account of the boom or bust mentality of American industrialism from the turn of the 20th century to the present day.