Folklore Program course catalog

All 40 recorded UW–Madison courses in this department, including courses not offered this term. Open a course for prerequisites, historical grades and instructors.

  • AFRICAN/FOLKLORE 210: The African Storyteller

    3 credits

    The oral tradition and the written word; the composition of stories, relationship between performer and audience, and transmission of tradition in various African societies.

  • AFROAMER/ASIANAM/DANCE/FOLKLORE 319: Afro Asian Improv: From Hip Hop to Martial Arts Fusion

    3 credits

    An Afro Asian perspective provides a lens through which intersections between Asian American and African American dance and martial arts are studied and practiced. Asian American and African American movement genres provide tools to explore dance fusion, choreography, and improvisation, to create dances informed by African American and Asian American legacies of struggle, innovation and transformation, while cognizant of historical forces of oppression and racism. Building connections through respectful communication with others are learned through dance practice, discussion and writing about concepts learned through readings, videos, and guest artist visits. Engagement with dance as a cultural vehicle for creative problem-solving and risk-taking occurs through guided class or smaller group activities.

  • AMERIND/ANTHRO/FOLKLORE/GEN&WS 437: American Indian Women

    Credits unavailable

    Examines and interprets the roles of American Indian women in traditional societies, and in contemporary North America.

  • ANTHRO/FOLKLORE/INTLST/LINGUIS 211: Global Language Issues

    Credits unavailable

    Focuses on language and its culture, example topics include: extinction and revival, language and nationhood, how widely and deeply languages differ, language and worldview, writing systems and literacy, language discrimination and inequality.

  • COMARTS/FOLKLORE 522: Digital Storytelling for Social Media

    Credits unavailable

    Explore everyday communication in social media. Learn digital recording technologies for documenting everyday communication and the use of digital content in social media.

  • FOLKLORE 100: Introduction to Folklore

    3 credits

    Surveys folklore in the United States and around the world, with a comparative emphasis on ways in which individuals and groups use beliefs, songs, stories, sayings, dances, festivals, and artifacts to address issues of identity, authenticity, and authority, in complex societies.

  • FOLKLORE 215: Elementary Topics in Folklore

    1–3 credits

    Exploration of various topics in the study of folklore, folklife, myth, foodways, or music.

  • FOLKLORE 220: The Folk Tale

    Credits unavailable

    Types of heroes, social functions, and tellers; tales from four cultures.

  • FOLKLORE 225: Horror as Expressions of National Angst

    Credits unavailable

    Explore horror as cultural phenomenon and how it represents various forms of cultural/national angst.

  • FOLKLORE 230: Introduction to American Folklore

    Credits unavailable

    Folklore of ethnic, regional, religious, and occupational cultures, emphasizing how diverse peoples (African Americans, American Indians, Appalachians, Chicanos, Germans, Irish, Jews, Mormons, miners, service workers, etc.) use traditional festivals, artifacts, songs and stories to express their experiences within American life.

  • FOLKLORE 315: Intermediate Topics in Folklore

    1–3 credits

    Exploration of various topics in the study of folklore, folklife, myth, foodways, or music.

  • FOLKLORE 317: The Irish Tradition

    Credits unavailable

    Survey of Irish folklore and folklife, including narrative, music, dance, customs, material culture, and foodways, in both Ireland and beyond.

  • FOLKLORE 320: Folklore of Wisconsin

    Credits unavailable

    Introduction to folk cultural groups and folklore forms of Wisconsin.

  • FOLKLORE 399: Directed Study in Folklore for Undergraduates

    Credits unavailable

    Directed study as arranged with a faculty member.

  • FOLKLORE 415: Advanced Topics in Folklore

    Credits unavailable

    Exploration of various topics in the study of folklore, folklife, myth, foodways, or music.

  • FOLKLORE 430: Topics in American Folklore: Ethnic Studies

    3–6 credits

    Topics in historical or contemporary folklore and folklife pertaining to persistently marginalized racial or ethnic groups in the United States.

  • FOLKLORE 439: Foodways

    Credits unavailable

    Explores artistic, social, sensory, and spiritual expressions through food that convey personal, group, and place-based identities, ethnicity, gender, and class in work and play. Reviews range of food writing and scholarly perspectives including culinary historical, structural-functional, and performance.

  • FOLKLORE 442: Immigration and Indigeneity in the Upper Midwest

    Credits unavailable

    Examines the folklore of the Upper Midwest through the complicated intersections of immigration and indigeneity, in order to better understand the history and vernacular expressions of the people who call the Upper Midwest home.

  • FOLKLORE 460: Folk Epics

    Credits unavailable

    Oral nature, structure, performance traditions, and epic ideology, from various world areas.

  • FOLKLORE 530: Topics in Folklore

    1–3 credits

    Topics in Folklore in various cultures and time periods.

  • FOLKLORE 540: Local Culture and Identity in the Upper Midwest

    Credits unavailable

    Addresses different aspects of community life and culture in the Upper Midwest; topics include ethnic groups, religious life, cultural landscapes, oral narrative, music, and material culture.

  • FOLKLORE 699: Independent Study in Folklore (graduate)

    Credits unavailable

    Advanced directed study projects as arranged with a faculty member.

  • FOLKLORE/GEN&WS 428: Gender and Expressive Culture

    Credits unavailable

    Examines the relationship between dominant images of gender representation as they emerge in expressive culture in various societies.

  • FOLKLORE/GNS 200: Folklore of Central, Eastern and Northern Europe

    Credits unavailable

    Folklore of Central, Eastern and Northern Europe and among emigrants from these regions in North America. A survey of genres of folklore, history of research, and modes of interpretation, past and present.

  • FOLKLORE/LIS 490: Field Methods and the Public Presentation of Folklore

    3 credits

    Combines a fieldwork practicum with scrutiny of the cultural, political, and ethical dimensions underlying the documentation and public presentation of folklore through festivals, exhibitions, publications, audio-visual productions, and digital archival collections.

  • FOLKLORE/LITTRANS 327: Vampires

    Credits unavailable

    Explores the development of the vampire legend in folklore, rumor, literature, cinema, television, and popular culture and in relation to topics such as colonization, race, gender, sexuality, and class.

  • FOLKLORE/LITTRANS 347: In Translation: Kalevala and Finnish Folk-lore

    Credits unavailable

    A look at the Kalevala, the Finnish creation myth and national epic of Finland, and how it affected Finnish national identity and the eventual Finnish independence from Russia.

  • FOLKLORE/LITTRANS/MEDIEVAL/SCANDST 345: The Nordic Storyteller

    Credits unavailable

    Exploring the oral nature and performance traditions of folklore, ethnography, tales and ballads, literature and culture from Nordic areas and Scandinavia.

  • FOLKLORE/MEDIEVAL/RELIGST/SCANDST 342: Nordic Mythology

    Credits unavailable

    Mythology, literature, ritual, traditions, medieval folklore, and religion from Nordic areas and Scandinavia.

  • FOLKLORE/MEDIEVAL/SCANDST 235: The World of Sagas

    3 credits

    The Icelandic sagas viewed in their social, cultural, and literary contexts. An introduction to one of the greatest bodies of vernacular literature of the early Middle Ages.

  • FOLKLORE/MEDIEVAL/SCANDST 446: Celtic-scandinavian Cultural Interrelations

    Credits unavailable

    Examination of shared traditions and historical connections between the North and Northwest of Europe. Readings of medieval and pre-modern Scandinavian, Scottish, Welsh and Irish sagas, histories, talkes. Discussion of the role of folklore in modern Celtic and Scandinavian societies.

  • FOLKLORE/MUSIC 103: Introduction to Music Cultures of the World

    Credits unavailable

    An introductory ethnomusicology course providing a variety of ways to approach musics typically not covered in music history courses. Active engagement with these musics within their larger world contexts.

  • FOLKLORE/MUSIC 515: Proseminar in Ethnomusicology

    3 credits

    Introduction to ethnomusicology, including historical survey of major works in the field, classification of musical instruments, measurement of tuning systems and concepts of scale, mode and rhythm in non-Western music.

  • FOLKLORE/MUSIC 516: Ethnographic Methods for Music and Sound

    Credits unavailable

    Focuses on the tools (material, methodological, and ethical) for doing ethnographic fieldwork in musical contexts.

  • FOLKLORE/MUSIC 915: Seminar in Ethnomusicology

    Credits unavailable

    Topics in ethnomusicology within a cross-cultural framework; melodic typology, scale and tuning systems, mode, rhythm, ornamentation, improvisation techniques, oral and written traditions of composition, notation systems, and function of music society.

  • FOLKLORE/RELIGST 104: Sacred Places and Journeys

    Credits unavailable

    An introduction to the study of religion through the lens of sacred places and journeys, including pilgrimage.

  • FOLKLORE/RELIGST 326: The Supernatural in the Modern World

    3 credits

    Explores evidence of belief in the supernatural in the modern world as it appears in the context of folk religion, folk medicine, legends, folk drama, ritual and custom, and media accounts and presentations. Surveys scholarly approaches to the topic. Course not available to students with credits for Folklore 415 before Fall 2023.

  • FOLKLORE/RELIGST 352: Shamanism

    Credits unavailable

    Survey of shamanism as a religious tradition and sociocultural force in Siberian, Asian, and Native American societies. Exploration of shamanic rituals, roles, cosmology. Cultural and political uses of shamanism in traditional and modern contexts.

  • FOLKLORE/SCANDST 440: Scandinavian American Folklore

    Credits unavailable

    Examines the verbal, musical, customary, and material folklore of Scandinavian Americans, with emphasis on the upper Midwest.

  • FOLKLORE/SCANDST 443: Sami Culture, Yesterday and Today

    4 credits

    Interdisciplinary study of Sami (Lapp) people of Scandinavia past and present. Indigenous modes of expression and worldview, contemporary cultural and political activism. Extensive discussion of connections to Native American and Inuit experiences; rise of U.S. and other indigenous peoples' movements.