a photo from the physical exhibit

Notable Folklorists of Color

panels on display at the 2019 exhibit

All Notable Folklorists of Color

The combined Notable Folklorists of Color exhibitions, Remembering Our Ancestral Legacies (2019) and Expanding the Frames (2022) introduce the viewers to over 160 folklorists of color who have contributed to folklore studies scholarship from the 19th century to 2021.  You may access their brief biographies and contributions to folklore with their extensive bibliographies here, by name, culture group or area of interest. 

How many of these BIPOC ancestor scholars do you know?

Frederick Douglass

King Kalākahua (David La‘amea Kamanakapu‘u Mahinulani
Nalaiaehuokalani Lumialani)

Charlotte Forten Grimke

Maxidiwiac (Buffalo Bird Woman)

Zanea Panea (Z.P.) Kalokuokamaile

Frances La Flesche (Minxa’ska)

Charles Alexander Eastman, MD (Ohíye S’a)

Anna Julia Haywood Cooper

Yan Phou Lee

William Edward Burghardt Du Bois

Thomas Washington Talley

James Weldon Johnson and John Rosamond Johnson

William Jones (Megasiáwa / Black Eagle)

Cleofas Martínez Jaramillo

Portrait of Aurelio Macedonio Espinosa, Sr.

Aurelio Macedonio Espinosa, Sr.

Portrait of María Elena Zamora O’Shea

María Elena Zamora O’Shea

María Adelina Isabel Emilia (Nina) Otero-Warren

Arthur Caswell Parker (Gawaso Wanneh)

Louis Shotridge (Stoowukháa)

Mourning Dove (Hum-ishu-ma / Christine Quintasket)

Samuel Shinkle Taylor

Ella C. Deloria (Anpetu Wastéwin)

Lorenzo Dow Turner

Zora Neale Hurston

Fabiola Cabeza de Baca Gilbert

Andrew Polk Watson

John Brother Cade

Mary Abigail Kawenaʻulaokalaniohiʻiakaikapoliopelekawahineʻaihonua Pukui

John Mason Brewer

Viola B. Muse

Pura Belpré

Arthur Huff Fauset

Lydia Cabrera

Gladys Iola Tantaquidgeon

Marcus Bruce Christian

Willis Laurence James

Juan Bautista Rael

Langston Hughes

John Wesley Work III

Sterling Allen Brown

Arnaud (Arna) Bontemps

Mary Elizabeth (Bessie) Jones

Ophelia Settle Egypt

Portrait of Jovita González Mireles

Jovita González Mireles

Lesley (Esley) Riddle

Arthur L. Campa, Sr.

Cover of the book The Chinese Laundryman: A Study of Social Isolation by Paul C. P. Siu

Paul Chan Pang Siu

Rosebud Yellow Robe Frantz (Lacotawin)

John Lovell, Jr.

Richard Nathaniel Wright

Katherine Dunham

Francis L. K. Hsu (Xu Hongguang)

Lewis Wade Jones

Rubén Cobos

Gordon Parks

Edith Kanaka‘ole

Ralph Ellison

Samuel C. Adams, Jr., Ulysses S. Young

Margaret Walker Alexander

Lee-hsia Hsu Ting and Nai-tung Ting

Grace Lee Boggs

Jon Y. Lee

Américo Paredes

Albert Murray

Frank Yerby

Edward Pasqual Dozier

Violet Kazue de Cristoforo

Robert H. McNeill

Harry Minoru Urata

Pearl Eileen Primus

Alixa Naff

Kathryn Lawson Morgan

Yuri Kochiyama

Portrait of

Ricardo Alegría

Walter Murray Chiesa

James Baldwin

Frank Bonilla

Stephen E. Henderson

Chang-Su Houchins

James Hirabayashi, Lane Ryo Hirabayashi

Nora Marks Dauenhauer (Keixwnéi)

John Gwaltney

George Na‘ope

Roberto Martínez, Sr.

Gladys-Marie Fry

P. Sterling Stuckey

Audre Lorde

Vine Deloria

Ernest J. Gaines seated in a wheel chair

Ernest James Gaines

Roy Simon Bryce-Laporte

Clydia Dotson Nahwooksy

Doreen Gamboa Fernandez

William Hawthorne Wiggins, Jr.

Horace Clarence Boyer, PhD (1935-2009)

Head shot of Samuel A Floyd

Samuel A. Floyd

Vertamae Smart-Grosvenor

Ronald Takaki

Alfonso Ortiz

Julius Lester

John Blassingame

Gerald L. Davis

Manuel Heriberto Peña

Gloria Anzaldúa

J. Nash Porter

Alan Jabbour

Juan Flores

Albert Jordy Raboteau II

Pang Xiong Sirirathasuk Sikoun

VèVè Amasasa Clark

Cornelia Walker Bailey

Beverly J. Robinson

Edward J. Cabbell

Joaquín Rivera

Patricia Jones-Jackson

Young Kwok (Corky) Lee

Mary Siisip Geniusz

Dorothy Sara Lee

bell hooks (Gloria Jean Watkins)

John Napoleon Brinton Hewitt

Linda Mabalot

Dawn Mabalon

Liyna Anwar

A.K. Ramanujan

Zitkala-Ṡa (Red Bird / Gertrude Simmons Bonnin)