Western Folklore

Vol. 83 No. 3/4 – Summer/Fall, 2024

(Current Issue)

Contents

Articles

Reimagining Memory: A Gedenkschrift in Honor of Denise Ann Kozikowski and the UCLA Folklore and Mythology Program

Sandra Mizumoto Posey and Heather Joseph-Witham

ABSTRACT: This Gedenkschrift honors the passing of our good friend and colleague Denise Kozikowski and the loss of a program, UCLA Folklore and Mythology. Like folklore itself, the contents of this volume are also characterized by continuity and change. They span a range from traditional (though unusually innovative) scholarly research and theoretical articles to personal reflections, dreamwork, and even a graphic essay building on the influences of the academic Program and Denise herself. KEYWORDS: memory, mindfulness, creative action, temporality, legacy

MINDFULNESS

A Basket to Hold us: our Mother’s Life Woven from the Threads of Folklore, Meditation, and Art

Nathaniel and Sophia Simon

ABSTRACT: This work presents a unique opportunity for us, as Denise’s children, to develop a relationship with her academic past. Our mom lived her truth, expressing values of empathy, compassion, and mindfulness. KEYWORDS: Mindfulness, Compassion, Folklore, Creativity, Love

Wise Old Man, Wounded Healer, and a Dream of Wayland Hand

Shannon L Thornton

ABSTRACT: A graduate’s dream of Wayland Hand inspires both personal reflection and the hypothesis that Hand, the UCLA Folklore and Mythology Program, and this issue’s gedenkschrift honoree, Denise Kozikowski, constitute an archetypal triptych that symbolizes the life of the Program itself. KEYWORDS:: Psychology, Archetype, C. G. Jung, Wayland Hand, Denise Kozikowski

Following Alida into the Moment Through Time, Place, and Culture

JoAnn Staten

ABSTRACT: Many colleges have moved away from folklore studies and privileged theoretical perspectives believing that the study of folklore is no longer relevant. However, folklore is the study of what people do individually, communally, and societally and why they choose to do so. Understanding people’s thoughts and actions at all levels of society and through time cannot be outdated. Using embodied identity as a framework and oral-formulaic analysis as a process clears pathways for a new understanding of how folktales, social practices, and performances capture the lasting effects of imposed historical narratives and beliefs in social hierarchies. Reviewing these forms of communication and their role in creating societal cohesion or discord allows us to adopt a more egalitarian analytical lens that reveals a more accurate picture of ourselves and our societies. KEYWORDS: Colonialism, Suriname, Embodied Space, Liminality, Oral-Formulaic Theory

Richard Wolfram’s gestalthaftes Sehen. Clairvoyance, Second Sight, and Demonic Death Cults: Alternative Insight as Alternative Facts

James R. Dow

ABSTRACT: Richard Wolfram introduced the term gestalthaftes Sehen as an expression for concepts conceived of in the early 20th century by Wolfram and three student friends. Other new terms included second sight, and Ekstase as a means of communicating with Germanic ancestors. Some of their thinking implied “state-building.” Their way led, however, to treating alternate insights as alternate facts, always a questionable procedure. I have inserted a new term for understanding this period,“Depth Ideology,” and see this as one aspect of memory ethnology. KEYWORDS: Richard Wolfram, Gestalt, Clairvoyance, Second Sight, Ecstatic, memory ethnology, NS Ideology

CREATIVITY IN ACTION

A World More Beautiful: Recognizing Art All Around Us

Sandra Mizumoto Posey

ABSTRACT: [a pictorial essay]

Political Gnomes and Ice Cream Cones

Heather Joseph-Witham

ABSTRACT: Wroclaw, Poland, has gnomes! Visitors to the city may come on one of these metal pieces almost anywhere: on the street, a lamppost, or a windowsill, or next to an ATM machine. While they are kitschy, fun, and whimsical, their meaning, often ignored, has depth. It comments on the city’s rich and tumultuous history and addresses art, ownership, and political strife. KEYWORDS: Gnome, krasnale, Wroclaw, Major Fydrych, Tomasz Mocsen

Confluence, Collision, and Connection: Creativity and Denise Kozikowski

Dr. Kimberly Miller

ABSTRACT: The SARS-COV-2 [coronavirus] pandemic created anxiety in most of us and left many feeling traumatized and uncertain about the future. Following closely on this has been the emergence of artificial intelligence (AI) in daily life, something that will certainly bring great change. Creativity and the creative process have the power to help us cope, to restore equilibrium, and bring us back to center. This paper explores the restorative nature of creation, the impact of human connection on inspiration and creativity, and the generative and destructive nature of creating. KEYWORDS:: Creativity, Circle of Life, Art, Denise Kozikowski, Connectivity, Folk Art

Applied Folklore, Account-Ability, and Social Responsibility

Claudia J. Hernández Romero

ABSTRACT: My exploration begins with a personal narrative, followed by a discussion of how decolonizing methodologies reframed my understanding of applied folklore ethics and methods. I describe ways I am collaborating with a documentary filmmaker and curanderas (women healers) in Los Angeles who supported the Latinx community during the COVID-19 pandemic. I use critical frameworks to build on applied folklore in ways that can advance the field as well as support the goals of community researchers I engage with. KEYWORDS: Applied folklore, ethics, decolonizing methodologies, account-ability, social responsibility

Divine Transformations: Gender Issues in Lucumí Oral Narrative

Dr. Ysamur Flores Peña

ABSTRACT: This paper explores the concepts of gender, gender fluidity, gender roles, and gender identity in Lucumí cultural traditions through their sacred narrative or Patakí. KEYWORDS: Patakí, transformation, gender fluidity, Oricha, Odu

MEMORY

“Are You Looking for the Seam-Straightening Room?”

Norine Dresser

ABSTRACT: The UCLA Folklore and Mythology Program inspired the author plus a fellow alumna to plan daunting media projects. As older students, they were totally accepted and empowered by faculty and classmates involved with innovative projects. The two women contacted mothers of Steven Spielberg and Vidal Sassoon; they conducted interviews in a department store window at Hollywood and Vine; the NEH and NEA funded them. They demonstrated how formal training in folklore can lead to myriad and unexpected career trajectories. KEYWORDS: Hollywood, memory, folklorist, nontraditional students, telephone pranks

Storytelling: A Family Tradition

Jon G. Georges

ABSTRACT: Robert A. Georges, who broke new ground in the analysis of narrating events during his long career at UCLA, passed along his insight into storytelling to the author, his son, who applies those lessons to his work as a designer of immersive ride experiences at the Disney amusement parks, taking the family tradition and understanding of storytelling events to a new level of expression. KEYWORDS: Storytelling, Narrative, Imagineering, Event Analysis, Disney

Ethnography is a Cat that Listens

Montana Miller

ABSTRACT: Memories of Denise’s approach to ethnography and life inform this meditation on the lessons we learned together in the “fields ” of folklore and friendship. Risk and fear, humility and courage, acceptance of how much we don’t understand and openness to alternative explanations as well as new opportunities for love and pain.... Denise and I studied the fieldwork handbook of our mentor, Michael Owen Jones, but we were also writing our own as we forged our ethnographic and emotional paths. KEYWORDS: Ethnography, methodology, fieldwork, fear, risk

Teaching, Learning, and Doing Folklore at UCLA, and Remembering Denise Kozikowski and Robert Georges

Michael Owen Jones

ABSTRACT: This essay concerns the role of key faculty in developing folklore research and teaching programs at UCLA, particularly Robert A. Georges. It also deals with students learning about folklore and mythology through performances, conferences, and other sources, some of which they initiated and directed. Further, this article surveys how students engaged in folkloristic practices in the sense of initiating and perpetuating social traditions, putting their developing knowledge and skills about others’ traditions into professional practice, and finding employment after graduation in academe, the entertainment industry, the public sector, and other venues. Last, I focus on Denise Ann Kozikowski, a former student of mine to whose memory this issue of the journal is dedicated. KEYWORDS: folklore, research, teaching, students, public sector

Denise Kozikowski, A Folklorist at Heart, Making the World a Better Place

Jakub Simon

ABSTRACT: Denise Kozikowski was always a Folklorist at heart. She loved people, and the Folklore and Mythology Program at UCLA with Mike Jones was the highlight of her academic career. It was at UCLA that Denise learned many of the skills that she later applied to academic advising, teaching mindfulness, and life coaching. She left us too early at 52 years of age due to aggressive lung cancer, but left behind a better world. KEYWORDS: Denise Kozikowski, Folklore, Mindfulness, Active Listening, Cancer

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