4. Processing, ordering, storing and making accessible records of examples of folklore

Historically, the task of documenting examples of folklore has been undertaken for one of two reasons: first, to enable a researcher to test hypotheses or to answer questions integral to a specific inquiry or particular research project or, secondly, to develop data-banks or archives as repositories of information about, and examples of, traditional communicative processes and forms. Examples of folklore recorded to enable investigators to accomplish the objectives of their own individual inquiries or research projects are usually described or analyzed in presentations which have as their principal purposes to characterize the nature and to present the results of the inquiry or project. These presentations may be performance or product-oriented, with the former being exemplified by lecture-demonstrations or papers delivered orally at scholarly or popular meetings and with the latter being illustrated by phonograph recordings, photographic exhibitions, ethnographic films, or, most commonly, published essays, monographs, and books. Data presented during such performances or through such products are always 'processed' in advance, since their gatherers, describers, or analysts always select for presentation the information and examples which are most relevant to the objectives of, and conclusions drawn from, their inquiries or research projects. The actual documents from which the data are abstracted are seldom available for examination by anyone other than the investigator who conducted the inquiry or research project, unless, of course, that individual contributes those documents to a folklore archive, in which case they may be made available to other researchers for their perusal and possible use.

Examples of folklore gathered specifically to develop databanks are usually contributed to folklore archives in whatever form or format the archivist specifies or requests. Most folklore archives throughout the world are housed in colleges, universities, or headquarters of such organizations as national, state, or local historical societies; and most archives accept written, tape recorded, and filmed records which contain information about, or examples of, traditional communicative processes and forms. The folklore data contained in such documents are usually 'unprocessed', in that those who contribute them to archives seldom abstract the data from the resource documents or order or analyze these data in any particular way, leaving such tasks to archive personnel and users.

Data ordering and storage vary considerably from archive to archive, making it difficult to describe any 'typical' organizational plan or to prescribe anyone set of archiving procedures. Since the inception of folkloristics, most archives have ordered data according to process and form, with all information about storytelling or singing and all examples of stories or songs being kept together, for instance. Such an arrangement can be said to be 'genre-oriented', and archives so organized can facilitate best the research of those interested in obtaining information about some specific traditional communicative process (such as riddling or dancing) and examples of some particular traditional communicative form (such as proverbs or music). Genre-oriented archives tend to favour verbally-dominated processes and forms (such as singing and songs or storytelling and tales) over object-oriented processes and forms (such as basket-making and baskets or housebuilding and housetypes) and to prefer written records or representations of the information or examples they store. Hence, archive contributors or personnel usually transcribe from tape recordings information about, or examples of, the process or form in question or describe in writing the kinds of phenomena documented in photographs, slides, and motion picture films. The transcribed segments of magnetic tapes or written descriptions of filmed phenomena then become the principal archival research documents and are ordered according to process or form headings and subheadings, with the written records constituting the main data-bank for the archive and with the audible and visual documents being stored in less accessible parts of the archive, but being made available to any investigator who wishes to hear a tape of which a written record is a partial transcription or to see the filmed record of which the written description is a characterization.

Though genre-oriented archives remain the most popular and prevalent, there are other alternative organizational schemes. Some archives order data according to geographical or political divisions, with examples of folklore of all kinds being filed under national, regional, provincial, state, county, village, town, and city designations. These 'locale-oriented' archives enable users to determine the full range of traditional processes and forms reported from particular places and provide bases for researchers to compare and contrast such things as the traditional tale repertoires or ways of celebrating specific holidays in different locales.

Another mode of archival organization is 'group-oriented', with ethnicity, religious preference, occupation, native language, or other sub-group affiliation constituting the identifying 'labels' for categorization. Folklore examples of all kinds reported from members of such collectivities are stored together, facilitating investigations of archive users interested in obtaining information about the selected group's traditions and in determining such things as frequency of occurrence of particular customs or musical selections, correlations between or among examples of expressive forms, and implications of the group's traditional behaviours and their manifestations for comprehending its members' shared values or biases.

A fourth and final means of organizing folklore archives makes the names of the individuals who are the sources of information about, and examples of, folklore the basis for data storage and retrieval. Such 'informant oriented' archives keep together data of all kinds obtained from individual research subjects, enabling users to determine the nature and extent of selected subjects' knowledge of traditional processes and forms, to conduct studies which explore correlations among examples of either the same or different expressive forms known to particular informants, or to compare and contrast the folklore repertoires of different persons.

All of these ways of ordering data in folklore archives as well as others that might be described or proposed are arbitrarily determined; and each has advantages as well as limitations. Their advantages can be exploited and their limitations overcome in one of two ways.

First, an archive might order data according to a combination of principles - primarily by locale and secondarily by form, for example, or principally by group, with subdivisions based on informant or form. Second, the archive can organize data on the basis of a single criterion, such as form or informant, but provide in addition cross-indices that would enable users to locate data recorded in particular locales or from members of specific social subgroups. The larger the number of criteria employed and the greater the amount of cross-indexing provided in an archive, the greater the likelihood that the needs of different researchers can be satisfied.

Just as there is no typical or best means of organizing a folklore archive, so is there no one set of instructions that can be prescribed for selecting, storing, caring for, and making available archival documents. What kinds of records an archive includes and how it is maintained and operated are decisions which must ultimately be made on the basis of practical considerations rather than in terms of some ideal model. Ideally, every folklore archive should accept all kinds of records - written, tape recorded, and photographic or filmed - together with selected samples of traditional material objects; practically, the kinds and numbers of records or objects an archive can accept will have to be determined by such matters as funding, space and personnel availability, donor contributions, and user interests. Ideally, every folklore archive should have climate-controlled quarters in which to store magnetic tapes and photographic records, technical equipment to play, view, and reproduce taped and filmed records, and a full-time technician to operate and maintain the sound and photographic equipment; practically, few archives have the resources to provide such facilities, equipment, or personnel. Ideally, every folklore archive should have a full-time archivist and several assistants to process and index incoming records and to help archive users locate data they need to carry out their investigations; practically, most archives are single-person staffed, with that sole individual having to assume the responsibilities of ordering and indexing the data-bank. Ideally, every folklore archive should have specific long-range goals and a systematic plan to insure comprehensive data gathering and a constantly growing data-base; practically, most archives are mere repositories for whatever kinds and quantities of data researchers are willing or able to contribute.

Anyone who wishes to establish, or who is currently operating, a folklore archive should, of course, attempt to obtain a maximum amount of space and budgetary support to create an archive with diverse kinds of record storage facilities, a large and well-trained staff, the most sophisticated technical equipment, ample work and user space, and optimal indexing and data-retrieval capabilities. Aspiring to such ends is the first step toward achieving them; Yet even an archive which is operated with minimal space and financial support can be potentially usable and useful as long as the extent and limitations of its holdings are known, the documents and data are stored and ordered in some systematic way, and the holdings are sufficiently indexed to enable both operator and user to know what information is available and how it can be located.