Programs

Feel free to reach out to the email address above if you’re interested in making an appointment to visit the archive. We look forward to meeting you.  

UC Berkeley's Folklore Archive contains more than 600,000 items of folklore from around the world, organized in alphabetical order by country or geographical area, and then catalogued according to genre. The Archive houses items from almost two hundred countries, though the bulk of material is Anglo-American. Genres include blason populaire, counting-out rhymes, jokes, folk beliefs, dance, drama, folk speech, games, legends, mnemonic devices, songs and song parodies. Special classifications include religious lore, family lore, and scout lore.

For each item of folklore, the name, age, occupation, and ethnic background of the informant are listed with a brief exegesis including the context in which the item is used, the circumstances of collection, the informant's explanation of the item and its meaning, and interpretation and analysis by the collector.