Living Without Technology: Growing up Female in Southwest Virginia

Creator: Hill, Joslyn

: Flanary, Ruth

This project, by Joslyn Hill focused on her grandmother, Ruth Flanary, and how her life had been lived and has changed over time. Topics covered in this interview include canning, making buttermilk, making clothes, raising children, and how technology makes things different today. Not necessarily better, but different. This interview is among projects created by students enrolled in English 446 (initially English 452), “Appalachian Folklore,” 1981-2019, and in graduate level counterparts English 548 and 648 “Appalachian Folk Culture(s)” offered 17 fall semesters between 1987 and 2009. Minimally contain collector’s introduction and analysis, transcribed informant interviews, and excerpted and labeled examples of oral, customary, and/or material folklore/folklife collected primarily within the Appalachian region. Most include also tables of contents, informant information, indexes (outlines) of interviews, photographs, miscellaneous paper items, and indexes of informants, genres, and geographic locations. Accompanying audio recordings (several minutes to 2+ hours). Transferred to McConnell Library Archives & Special Collections from Appalachian Regional and Rural Studies Center, Fall 2013.