Folklore and Oral History within Heritage Studies: Fieldwork Opportunities, Digital Technology, and IRB Compliance in Public/Academic Collaborations

Abstract

Arkansas State University offers a doctoral program in Heritage Studies. The university takes an interdisciplinary approach to prepare graduates for careers in a range of professions, including work in archives, museums, historical societies, and arts organizations. The faculty uses multiple approaches from various disciplines to explore relationships between history, folklore, literature, geography, culture, and the environment in distinctive regions. The academic program is connected with the university’s “Arkansas Heritage Sites.” This organization develops and interprets historic properties in the Arkansas Delta. These include the Hemingway-Pfeiffer Museum and Educational Center in Piggott, the Southern Tenant Farmers Museum in Tyronza, the Historic Dyess Colony/Boyhood Home of Johnny Cash in Dyess, and Lakeport Plantation. Additional support from Heritage Studies is provided to the Arkansas State university Museum, Rohwer: Japanese-American Relocation Center in Rohwer, and Arkansas Delta Byways. Doctoral students work with faculty and staff to conduct research through these programs and at these sites, where they also complete internships to enhance their professional education. These sites not only serve as educational resources within the Heritage Studies program, but they also provide educational opportunities within eastern Arkansas’ diverse communities as they serve fifteen counties in the Arkansas Delta. ASTATE’s Heritage Studies is complicit with international interests in Heritage Studies. The Heritage movement has coalesced from interdisciplinary interests in museum studies, historic preservation, archaeology, public folklore, and other related disciplines. The university’s approach includes a substantial emphasis of fieldwork, and students complete a range of fieldwork-based documentation techniques as they complete their course of study. They also may use fieldwork in various internships within the region’s Heritage Sites. In this respect, the graduate program integrates aspects of public folklore with academic research in an academic setting. The American Folklore Society provided support for professional development activities during September, 2013. AFS support provided opportunities to enhance projects at the Heritage Sites, update participants’ knowledge of digital technology in fieldwork, and answer questions about fulfilling requirements for Institutional Research Board (IRB) policy, practice, and protocol.