An Engaging Collection: Folkstreams.net
Etta Baker from Step It Up & Go by Glen Hinson, Susan Massengale
An Engaging Collection: Folkstreams.net
Essay and Educational Resource Materials by Sarah Carter
From footage of hollering contests to oral histories of civil rights activists, Folkstreams.net is one of the most dynamic collections of independent films on the internet. It contains over 100 documentaries, biopics, and performances available for free, alongside enrichment guides, transcripts, and an easily accessible list of rights information.
Founders Tom & Mimi Davenport intended Folkstreams to be: a “national park of intellectual property.” The Davenports, both filmmakers, recognized that distribution and revenue have always been challenges to independent filmmakers. They described the #1 challenge, visibility, in this way, “Much good independent film work was like the tree falling in the wilderness with no one to hear.” When Tom Davenport struggled to make a living from his documentaries alone, he turned to more commercial films, and in 1999, he and Mimi created a website for Davenport’s documentary films. They thought “with the Internet and video streaming, we will be able to make a 'national park' from this wilderness where everyone can come and freely hear and see what we, and others, have labored on for so long and with such enjoyment. The idea of a 'cultural preserve as a kind of national park of intellectual property is an important one for our times.” The public response to this new platform was overwhelming and the vision for Folkstreams was born.
But this new idea was a hard sell at the time as many filmmakers were unable to imagine how they might benefit from having their films on a free streaming service. The Davenports reiterated that Folkstreams would would widen filmakers’ platforms. They established clear best practices (including filmmakers retaining the rights to their work), and developed curricular tools so that educators could use films in the classrooms. In this way, they brought Folkstreams’ mission “to find, preserve, contextualize, and stream documentary films on American folklife,” to life.
Remember the single-legged tap dancer in the film Amélie? That was a Folkstreams-featured artist from the film Born For Hard Luck about the life of musician, buck dancer, and medicine show performer, Arthur “Peg Leg Sam” Jackson of South Carolina (1972).
Need to write a paper about how female blues players influenced the North Carolina country blues style? Consult Etta Baker in Step It Up and Go and she’ll demo it for you.
These films aren’t your stodgy, old school, PSA-style documentaries, either. We’re talking insider interviews with culture-makers throughout the US, across many decades, preserving traditions (some of which have already died out). Folkstreams best practice guide explains, “These documentaries focus on the culture, struggles, and arts of unnoticed Americans from many different kinds of communities.”
Opening sequence from Welcome to Spivey’s Corner by Keir Cline
Users can search by region, category, filmmaker, or keyword to find some of the most delightful niche films in existence. And you’ll recognize some of the filmmakers, too—Folkstreams features films by Les Blank (Dry Wood), Alan Lomax (The Land Where Blues Began), & Henry Chalfant/Tony Silver (Style Wars).
They are subjected to a strict vetting process ensuring that, “1) the film is generally regarded as a high-quality film, and 2) the committee's folklore scholars consider them to be valuable or significant films in the folklore genre.”
These films are some of the wildest, most surprising, most memorable documentaries I’ve ever seen, “They come from the same intellectual movements that gave rise to American studies, regional and ethnic studies, the ‘new history,’ ‘performance theory,’ and investigations of tenacious cultural styles in phenomena like song, dance, storytelling, visual arts, worship, and ceremonies. They also respond to the intense political and social ferment of the last century and this one.”
Folkstreams is not only focused on making these resources available today, but also preserving these films (which exist in many formats) for future generations. A grant from the Institute for Museum and Library Services (IMLS) gave the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill’s School of Information and Library Science (SILS) the funding to “digitize, archive, and create web streams of 35 films that document ‘traditional’ culture in the United States by preserving 35 films through digitization in 2005.” Read more about the project here.
Folkstreams has become a trusted voice to filmmakers, researchers, film preservationists, and lay practitioners. It is a living and constantly evolving body of work that strives to embody the changing face of America by widening its scope of representation to better reflect diverse perspectives.
Quotations in this essay were excerpted from:
Barnes, Heather. “Folkstreams Guide to Best Practices in Film Digitization,”2007, http://www.folkstreams.net/bpg/. Accessed 1 May, 2020.
The Landis Brother’s Gospel Group from A Singing Stream by Tom Davenport
Opening sequence from A Singing Stream by Tom Davenport
What Folkstreams Offers Educators:
I used Folkstreams frequently in my eleven years as a high school English teacher:
I showed People’s Stuff while teaching interview and transcription techniques in preparation for our research paper requirement.
I showed Mountain Talk when we learned basic linguistic techniques to prep students to read dialect in Their Eyes Were Watching God.
I showed Quilts in Women’s Lives as a pre-reading activity before teaching Alice Walker’s “Everyday Use.”
The possibilities for English, music, history, language, and geography teachers is endless. Each film in this collection offers subject tags which categorize films topically to supplement your unit instruction. Here are some tips for making Folkstreams work in your classroom:
Try a keyword search first. For example, a literature teacher starting To Kill A Mockingbird might search “Great Depression,” “Women,” or “African American Culture.” A variety of films will come up and you can decide what will best supplement your classroom instruction.
When you find a relevant film, scroll down to the bottom of the page and see what resources are already available. Why make up one more original study guide when you DON’T HAVE TO? Many films have already-typed transcripts, further reading, or background on the artist or geography of a region featured in the film.
If you’re working on textual analysis, close reading, diction, you might have your students do a cold read or annotation on some of these supplemental readings before viewing the film. Talk about how to “read” film as text. What conscious decisions did the filmmaker make when presenting a personal narrative? Is it chronological? Does the film start with a personal story or a historical recap? How does this affect the viewer’s frame as the plot of the documentary rolls on.
Check the volume levels on your school device. Although extensive efforts to preserve these films in their finest forms have been taken, sometimes the field footage quality varies. Also, watching, or at least listening to the whole film is a good idea. While these films are for education/preservation purposes, occasionally, someone does say a cuss word.
Enjoy! It does help to preface older films with, “What we’re looking for here is _____________ . . . please enjoy the wild 1970s outfits and styles, but what I want you to focus on is ________ . . .”
Click the button below to view a guide to excellent Folkways films with their corresponding North Carolina English Language Arts Learning Standards for grades 11-12, as well as a list of favorite niche finds for individuals, researchers, and lay-practitioners.
Sarah Carter is a writer and musician living in Nashville, TN. After ten years in education, she earned an MFA in Creative Writing from The University of the South. She is committed to sharing people's stories through creative nonfiction, photo, and music. Her writing and fieldwork can be found at www.dailyfieldwork.com, IG @dailyfieldwork.