published a bi-lingual catalogue and a 1995 wall calendar with 

 Universe Publishing Co. (a division of Rizzoli). The calendars 

 were mailed as holiday gifts from Secretary Heyman ro mem- 

 bers of the Smithsonian's Latino Task Force and the Congres- 

 sional Hispanic Caucus. 



SITES is a high-visibility outreach arm of the Smithsonian. 

 In FY 1995, 182 exhibitions traveled across the country. SITES 

 hopes that its expanded visitor base in the coming year will 

 enable more Americans than ever before to experience the rich 

 variety of exhibition programs available from the Smithsonian. 



Educational and 

 Cultural Ptograms 



Center for Folklife Programs & 

 Cultural Studies 



Richard Kurin, Director 



The Center for Folklife Programs & Cultural Studies )oins 

 high quality scholarship with strong community service and 

 educational outreach to promote the understanding and conti- 

 nuity of diverse contemporary grassroots cultures in the 

 United States and throughout the world. A primary goal is to 

 foster greater appreciation and participation of community 

 culture in civil society. This became very apparent in the plan- 

 ning and production of the annual Festival of American 

 Folklife. 



The more than one million visitors to the 29th annual Festi- 

 val of American Folklife, which took place June 23-July 4, 

 were witness to the strength in community in the four pro- 

 grams that were presented. "The Cape Verdean Connection" 

 built upon and articulated the contemporary transnational 

 chatacter of that culture. It not only occasioned a visit by the 

 President of Cape Verde, Antonio Mascarenhas Monteiro, but 

 also prompted thousands of Cape Verdean Americans to orga- 

 nize tours, reunions, and celebrations around the Festival. Co- 

 sponsored by the government of Cape Verde, a host ot Cape 

 Verdean-American community fundraising committees, the 

 Gulbenkian Foundation of Portugal, the Smithsonian, and 

 many other benefactors, the program featured performances 

 and demonstrations of crafts, cooking, music, dance, and occu- 

 pational traditions. Discussions included many topics in 

 which participants reflected upon the culture and historical ex- 

 perience of this transnational people. A significant part of the 

 program was a large "Cachupa Connection" tent — named for 

 the hominy stew that is the (trans)national dish of Cape Ver- 

 deans everywhere. The tent contained information about a 

 dozen Cape Verdean-American communities, presentations on 



seafarers and longshoremen, and a connection to the unofficial 

 Cape Verdean home page on the Internet. From social com- 

 mentary in ox-driving songs to conversations across the Inter- 

 net, the program presented varieties of exchange that Cape 

 Verdeans engage in to maintain their local and transnational 

 communities. Chartered busloads of Cape Verdean Americans 

 came from New England, where the Festival generated strong 

 media coverage. Bana, the most popular male vocalist in the 

 Islands for decades who lives and owns a nightclub in Lisbon, 

 performed at the July 5 Independence Day celebration on the 

 Mall as part of the program to mark the 20th anniversary of 

 Cape Verde's independence from Portugal. Anna Maria Cab- 

 ral, wife of the slain independence leader Amilcar Cabral, lec- 

 tured on culture and national development at the 

 International Center during the Festival. And a photography 

 exhibit on Cape Verdean life by Ron Barboza was mounted in 

 the International Center. 



"The Czech Republic: Tradition and Transformation" suc- 

 cessfully reflected the range of music, crafts, and foodways 

 that characterize grassroots, popular, and official genres today. 

 The participants from the three major regions of the Czech Re- 

 public — Bohemia, Moravia, and Silesia — brought not only 

 their cultural traditions but the fresh impacts of independence 

 and changed borders on these traditions. Czech-American mu- 

 sicians and cooks demonstrated survivals and transformations 

 in foodways and soundscapes across the ocean. This extended 

 community on the National Mall was broadened even more as 

 Czech Americans drove the belfry — an example of a substitute 

 church that serves small communities in mountainous 

 Wallachia — to Texas after the Festival, where it is traveling 

 among families of Wallachian descent. Czech officials also ob- 

 served the Festival, and a Czech television documentary 

 reached millions of viewers in that country. 



"Heartbeat: Voices of First Nations Women" was produced 

 in collaboration with the Division of Cultural History at the 

 National Museum of American History, as was a recently re- 

 leased Smithsonian/Folkways recording of the same name. 

 The program brought women from 20 different groups from 

 the United States and Canada to the 1995 Festival, and visitors 

 had the opportunity to see the important contributions that 

 contemporary Native women axe making to the preservation 

 and perpetuation of their culture, especially in the area of lan- 

 guage. The sense of community among participants was rein- 

 forced during spontaneous demonstrations of intertribal song 

 sharing that culminated in a memotable finale on July 4, with 

 all the singers uniting in song on the main stage. Sales of the 

 recording and critical reviews were very strong. 



Identities and community were key issues in the program, 

 "Russian Roots, American Branches: Music in Two Worlds." 

 After several years of fieldwork, this program presented partic- 

 ipants from four communities — Molokans and Old Believers, 

 two religious minority communities both still active in Rus- 

 sia and the United States — who joined together to discuss the 

 changes that have affected their faith and, most importantly, 

 to sing the choral music that provides the focus for their reli- 



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