Editorial - Australian Folklore: A Yearly Journal of Folklore Studies - Journal Number 7, September 1992

Abstract

This is the first journal from your new editor who was elected by the outgoing editors and the executive of the Australian Folklore Association the members of which are concerned that the journal and thence its scholarly recording of Australia's traditional and largely unwritten culture should be assisted by an appropriate professional group. The Australian Folklore Association itself had become a member body of the Australian Folk Trust Inc. in early 1992, with their trustee, at least until the AGM later this year, the well known poet Keith McKenry. It has been particularly exciting to have Australia so prominent in many arts in 1992, the year of international Celtic activities. In the following pages there are recorded some consequences of the diaspora, the which was also treated to fresh scholarly scrutiny in Cardiff, Wales, in July 1992, at the First International Conference on Celtic Folklore, whose concerns were intended 'to cover all areas in which Celtic languages are spoken or have provided a significant empetus to cultural development.' Similar themes have recently been explored very excitingly in the American and Canadian gatherings, at St. John's, Newfoundland and elsewhere. And we note reports of the International Symposium on Migratory Legends of the Supernatural, held at University College Galway in March 1991, when it was clear that many identifiable folk beliefs had moved from eastern Europe to western, thence to North America, and beyond. This is no more than might have been expected from Indo-European and later migration - a point touched on in the present issue by J. F. Atchison.