Returning Folklore to the People:On the Paradox of PublicizingFolklore in Post- Communist Slovakia
Joseph Grim Feinberg
This paper follows a contemporary Slovak movementto" return folklore to the people," since people haveallegedly forgotten what authentic folklore is like dueto the popularity of" stylized" folklore- inspired specta-cles under Communist rule. The paper argues that fol-klore revival movements can be understood as attemptsto bring something intimate( belonging to a localized" folk") into public( where it risks being perceived asinauthentic), and the paper follows a fundamental trans-formation in the way this intimacy- publicity tension hasbeen addressed, between the Communist era and today.
Bringing Folklore Down Off the Stage
On April 30, 2012, toward the end of my period of fieldwork,an argument took place on the Facebook page of Košice's Club ofAuthentic Folklore Lovers( Klub milovníkov autentického folklóru, orKMAF). At issue was a poster which had been proposed for publiciz-ing an upcoming“ dance house”( tanečný dom) organized by the KMAF.On the poster were two dancers, ornately dressed in immaculatelyclean folk dress( or what generally passes for folk dress), spinning onan otherwise- empty stage. The young man was looking down, thusshowing off two dandy feathers in an unwrinkled felt hat; the youngwoman was looking out at an invisible audience, her heavy makeuphighlighting the paleness of her face and the redness of her lips, whichwere curled in an evidently well- rehearsed smile.(" Figure 1") A mis-take had been made.
For a day after the poster was proposed, discussion about the eventcontinued without any objections raised regarding the poster. But thenVlado Michalko, a leading organizer of the KMAF and an influential