The Recognizing Folk Arts and Culture Champions Initiative is a series of folk arts and culture fellowship programs initiated through partnerships established with organizations deeply immersed in communities of artistic practice. These fellowship programs intend to honor underrecognized tradition bearers through local award events that engage the community to celebrate culture and heritage, as well as through local, regional, and national publicity. Each fellowship includes a financial award that encourages recipients to continue their work passing on artistic skill and cultural knowledge to a younger generation.

The National Association of Black Storytellers’ Black Appalachian Storytellers Fellowship

Mid Atlantic Arts, in conjunction with South Arts, is thrilled to partner with the National Association of Black Storytellers (NABS) on the Black Appalachian Storytellers Fellowship program.

The Black Appalachian Storytellers Fellowships are intended to honor, celebrate, and support Black storytellers residing in the Appalachian counties (as designated by the Appalachian Regional Commission) of Kentucky, North Carolina, Ohio, Tennessee, Virginia, and West Virginia. The goals of the fellowship program are to preserve and advance the understanding of Black Appalachian storytelling that embodies the history, heritage, and culture of African Americans, and to build bridges through intergenerational opportunities.

The 2022-2023 Black Appalachian Storytellers Fellows are: 

Kentucky 

• Alicestyne Turley: Author, Professor, Advocate, Mentor; Powell County 

North Carolina 

• Raymond Christian: Performer, Podcast Producer; Teaching Artist, Mentor; Watauga County 

Ohio 

• David Butcher: Historian, Genealogist, Curator, Museum Founder; Athens County 

Tennessee 

• James “Sparky” Rucker: Performer, Recording Artist, Teaching Artist, Civil Rights Activist; Blount County 

West Virginia 

• Crystal Good: Publisher, Performer, Ted-Talker, Mentor, Author; Kanawha County 
• Ruby Daniels: Soil Conservationist, Therapeutic Herbalist, Workshop Presenter; Raleigh County 

Fellows receive a cash award of $4,000 to support their practice as a Black Appalachian storyteller and culture bearer with opportunities to examine, research, develop and perform and/or document the Black Appalachian storytelling tradition. Additionally, the fellows will receive $1,000 for travel to the Annual National Black Storytelling Festival and Conference to be held in Baltimore, MD, November 9-13th and a one-year membership in the organization. Fellows will present at the “In the Tradition…” Festival as well as develop and present a program in their home communities.

The mission of the National Association of Black Storytellers is to promote and perpetuate the art of Black storytelling—an art form which embodies the history, heritage, and culture of African Americans. Black storytellers educate and entertain through the oral tradition, which depicts and documents the African American experience. A nationally organized body with individual, affiliate, and organizational memberships, NABS preserves and passes on the folklore, legends, myths, fables, and mores of Africans and their descendants and ancestors – “In the Tradition…” .

Learn more about NABS and the Black Appalachian Storytellers Fellowship here.

Appalachian Foodways Practitioner Fellowship

2023 Program
Applications are now being accepted for the 2023 Appalachian Foodways Practitioners Fellowship. Applicants must be from an Appalachian Regional Commission (ARC) designated county and state and priority will be given to applicants from OH, VA, and WV. 

Fellows may include, but are not limited to home cooks and bakers, seed savers, farmers, community elders, keepers of recipes and traditional foodways knowledge, hunters, and foragers, who have made significant and long-term contributions to sustaining and supporting the foodways heritage of their respective communities. 

The 2023 Appalachian Foodways Practitioner Fellows will be honored at an awards ceremony and invited to present at a session at the 2023 Appalachian Studies Association Annual Conference in Athens, OH. In addition to the monetary award of $4,000 to support their ongoing community-based work, fellows will receive a unique physical award created by an Appalachian artist.

Potential applicants can learn more about the program and apply here. The deadline is February 1, 2023.

Grow Appalachia, the Appalachian Studies Association, and Mid Atlantic Arts’ Central Appalachia Living Traditions program are thrilled to partner to host the Appalachian Foodways Practitioner Fellowship to honor, celebrate, and support foodways tradition bearers and practitioners in the Appalachian region. 

2022 Program and Fellows
In 2022, Mid Atlantic Arts partnered with the Appalachian Food Summit (AFS) on the inaugural Appalachian Food Summit Foodways Practitioner Fellowship program.

The Appalachian Foodways Practitioner Fellowships are intended to honor, celebrate, and support foodways tradition bearers and practitioners in Central Appalachia who have made significant and long-term contributions to sustaining and supporting the foodways heritage of their respective communities.

The 2022 Appalachian Foodways Practitioner Fellows are:

• Yawah Awolowo of Knoxville, Tennessee
• Travis and Rebecka Fugate of Emmalena, Kentucky
• Wayne Riley of London, Kentucky

Learn more about this year’s fellows here. Watch the Foodways Practitioners Fellowship awards ceremony here.

The Appalachian Food Summit is a community of writers, scholars, advocates, restaurateurs, farmers, producers, chefs, and mountain foodways enthusiasts gathered around the table with a shared mission to honor the past, celebrate the present, and support a sustainable future for Appalachia, its food, and its people.

ABOUT

Mid Atlantic Arts’ Central Appalachia Living Traditions: Folk and Traditional Arts Experiences grants fund public-facing projects and events in ARC-designated Appalachian counties of Ohio, Virginia, and West Virginia that bring community members together around folk and traditional arts practice and cultural knowledge. Funded projects will encourage broad public awareness, understanding, and appreciation of living traditions and/or grow and disseminate artistic skill and cultural knowledge within the community. Because this program intends to diversify and expand the types of folk arts and cultural activities available in communities throughout the region, applications must be for new projects or projects that expand and/or diversify existing programming.

Non-profit organizations and folk and traditional artists/practitioners in the ARC-designated Appalachian counties of Ohio, Virginia, and West Virginia are eligible to apply for grant amounts from $1,000 to $10,000. No match is required. The majority of project activities must take place within the designated counties.

Eligible project activities include but are not limited to hands-on learning experiences, workshops where traditional artistic practices are taught or demonstrated to the public or a group of peer practitioners, public art projects, exhibitions of folk and traditional art, a performance project or series, film/video, podcast, or archival collection or fieldwork with a significant public-facing component.

Priority will be given to projects that engage multi-generational participants as well as projects occurring in communities identified as under-resourced or marginalized, including the most geographically remote counties in the region. A diverse group of folk and traditional arts specialists, including folklorists, cultural workers, artists, practitioners, and culture bearers in Central Appalachia will serve as panelists and provide program feedback informed by their role in application review.

Questions? Contact Emily Hilliard, Program Director, Folk and Traditional Arts, at emily@midatlanticarts.org

GUIDELINES AND FAQ

The 2022-2023 Central Appalachia Living Traditions Folk and Traditional Arts Experiences grants cycle is closed. Information about the 2023-2024 program will be announced in summer 2023.

The guidelines below are for information purposes only.

Guidelines

• Download the 2022-2023 Central Appalachia Living Traditions: Folk & Traditional Arts Experiences Guidelines as a PDF (link opens in a new window)
• Download the 2022-2023 Central Appalachia Living Traditions: Folk & Traditional Arts Experiences Guidelines as an accessible Word document (click link to download)

FAQ

• Download the 2022-2023 Central Appalachia Living Traditions: Folk & Traditional Arts Experiences FAQ as a PDF (link opens in a new window)
• Download the 2022-2023 Central Appalachia Living Traditions: Folk & Traditional Arts Experiences FAQ as an accessible Word document (click link to download) 

Sample Application Form

Organizations

• Download a preview copy of the 2022-2023 Central Appalachia Living Traditions: Folk & Traditional Arts Experiences Application as a PDF (link opens in a new window)
• Download a preview copy of the 2022-2023 Central Appalachia Living Traditions: Folk & Traditional Arts Experiences Application as a Word doc (click link to download)

Individuals

• Download a preview copy of the 2022-2023 Central Appalachia Living Traditions: Folk & Traditional Arts Experiences Application as a PDF (link opens in a new window)
• Download a preview copy of the 2022-2023 Central Appalachia Living Traditions: Folk & Traditional Arts Experiences Application as a Word doc (click link to download)

An informational webinar for the 2022-2023 CALT Folk and Traditional Arts Experiences grants was held on September 8, 2022 at 11am EST.

Click here to view the video recording.
Click here to view the slide deck from the presentation.

CURRENT GRANTEES

2023 Grants

Maryland

Rebecca Hill 
Gender-Free Square Dance Calling Zine 
Brentwood, MD  

Ohio

Hippodrome Colony Historical Theatre Association 
Stage Door Appalachian Music Showcase 
Marietta, OH 

Quinn (Talcon Quinn) Fuller 
Rooted Traditions 
The Plains, OH 

Southern Ohio Folklife 
Las Culturas del Sur de Ohio 
Friendship, OH 

Underground Railroad Museum 
Cultural Festival /Fundraising Event for the Underground Railroad Museum 
Flushing, OH  

Virginia 

Floyd Community Center for the Arts 
Living Traditions – A Celebration of Floyd County’s Folk and Traditional Arts 
Floyd, VA 

Live Work Eat Grow 
Common Ground: 4 Seasons of Cross-Cultural Foodways in an Appalachian Community Garden 
Blacksburg, VA 

Second Stage Amherst 
“Live From Rose Ridge” Live Radio Broadcast 
Amherst, VA 

Southwest Virginia Community College Educational Foundation 
An Appalachian Awakening 
Cedar Bluff, VA  

West Virginia 

Arthurdale Heritage 
Handing Down our Heritage: Fiber Arts in Arthurdale, WV 
Arthurdale, WV  

Dakota Karper 
Community Square Dance/Contra Dance Series with Calling Workshops 
Capon Bridge, WV  

Davis & Elkins College 
Cooking in Community: Foodways Traditions from Appalachia and Beyond 
Elkins, WV  

Doris Fields 
Those Who Came Before 
Beckley, WV  

Eleanor Marshall 
Honoring an Authentic Appalachian Invention by Pioneer Women: An Intergenerational Apprenticeship for Learning and Teaching Salt-rising Bread 
Wheeling, WV  

Kanawha Valley Friends of Old-Time Music and Dance 
Old-Time Winter Breakdown Weekend 
Charleston, WV  

Step by Step 
West Virginia Dreamers Appalachian Folk and Blues Sessions 
Charleston, WV  

PANELISTS

2023 Program Panelists  

Dr. Sophia M. Enriquez 
Assistant Professor of music and Latino/a studies at Duke University, folk musician, native of Appalachian Ohio 
Durham, NC 

Dr. Luke Eric Lassiter  
Professor of humanities and anthropology and director of the Graduate Humanities Program at Marshall University 
South Charleston, WV 

MANAGE YOUR GRANT 

COVID-19 Coronavirus 

As you know, this is a rapidly evolving situation, and we recognize the need to be flexible.  We recognize that out of an abundance of caution, grantees may need to cancel grant-supported engagements or activities. Please don’t hesitate to reach out to our Director of Operations, Phillip Harmon, or the Mid Atlantic Arts program director handling your specific grant program or activity to discuss your concerns or options. You can find staff contact information here.  Please be assured we will not penalize grantees for canceling grants due to COVID-19 coronavirus considerations and will be as flexible as we can within the limits of our own funder limitations. 

Virtual Engagement Guidance

As arts organizations evolve in response to a changing landscape, Mid Atlantic Arts will continue to take a flexible approach to our program policies during this time. While we believe that live, in-person performances are hard to replace, we are also open to adaptive approaches that will ensure continued access to these arts experiences. Therefore, we are glad to announce the following policy for virtual engagements as an option for our grantees to fulfill their public performance and community engagement activity requirements. Please read the full guidance document to understand the requirements of presenting your funded engagement as a virtual presentation. We have also included links to a few resources that may help you guide your decisions around virtual presentation.

Mid Atlantic Arts Virtual Engagement Guide as a PDF (link opens in a new window) 
Mid Atlantic Arts Virtual Engagement Guide as an accessible Word document (Click link to download) 

Changes in Project Proposal

Any changes in the content, schedule, or budget of your project as proposed must be submitted in writing for approval prior to being implemented. Requested changes must be submitted to Phillip Harmon, Director of Operations, at phillip@midatlanticarts.org. 

Funding Acknowledgement and Crediting

Acknowledgement and Crediting requirements were included as Exhibit A of the Grant Award Agreement. 

Grantees must clearly acknowledge support from Mid Atlantic Arts through use of both the credit language and logo as outlined below. Use of the Mid Atlantic Arts logo does not replace the credit language. Copies of the required crediting materials must be submitted as part of the final report. 

Credit and Logo Usage Details 

The following statement and the Mid Atlantic Arts logo MUST appear in all programs, websites and press releases produced by the funded organization or its agents in relation to the funded project. In addition, the following statement and the Mid Atlantic Arts logo and Central Appalachia Living Traditions logo should be included whenever possible, either jointly or separately as necessary, in all flyers and postcards, email communications, season brochures, social media posts and calendars, and any other print or electronic promotional and publicity materials produced by the funded organization or its agents in relation to the funded project. 

• This statement must be used in its entirety and cannot be altered in any way. 

This project is made possible through the Central Appalachia Living Traditions Folk & Traditional Arts Experiences program of Mid Atlantic Arts. 

• Download Mid Atlantic Arts Logo 
• Download Central Appalachia Living Traditions Logo 

Website Link 

Grantees are required to include a link to the Mid Atlantic Arts website at www.midatlanticarts.org when crediting Mid Atlantic Arts on their website. This link MUST remain active during the entire length of your grant period with Mid Atlantic Arts. You are requested, but not required, to embed the link in Mid Atlantic Arts’ logo. 

Final Reports 

Final report requirements and instructions were included as Exhibit B of the Grant Award Agreement. 

Grantees are required to submit a final report which is due thirty (30) days after the end of the grant period on record as listed in the Grant Award Agreement. 

Final reports are to be completed online at https://midatlanticarts.smartsimple.com/  

For questions about your grant and the crediting or final reporting requirements, contact Phillip Harmon, Director of Operations, at phillip@midatlanticarts.org or 410.539. 6656 x109. 

Photo: Performers and attendees at the Annual Warren Greek Festival of the St. Demetrios Orthodox Church near downtown Warren in Trumbull County, Ohio. Credit: Jess Lamar Reece Holler. 

This comprehensive program provides targeted resources and support to select community anchors of folk arts and culture in the region with the goal of dramatically impacting the sustainability of traditional practice and cultural knowledge. Participant communities will be identified in consultation with our State Folklife Program partners and other constituents. 

To ensure long-lasting impact at the community-level, each selected community anchor site will develop a Community Folk Art and Culture Team to represent their community. With the support of Mid Atlantic Arts’ Folk and Traditional Arts Program Director, the team will collectively lead the planning and implementation of the project, including the creation of a Community Folk Arts and Culture Plan that details strategies and activities to increase the sustainability of folk arts and culture in their community, specifically through the intergenerational transmission of artistic skill and cultural knowledge. The Team will then be invited to apply, in collaboration with local organizations and artist/practitioners, for up to $75,000 in support of approved project activities that align with their plan. Members of the Team may include community scholars, community leaders, advocates, folk and traditional arts practitioners, and affiliated business owners. 

• In Virginia, we are working in the community of Bristol, with the Birthplace of Country Music Museum as our key partner. To learn more about our work in Bristol, visit the Virginia Folklife Program’s website. 
• In West Virginia, we are working in the community of Scotts Run, with the Scotts Run Museum and The Shack Neighborhood House as our key partners. 
• In Ohio, we are working in the community of Athens, with the Mt. Zion Baptist Church Preservation Society as our key partner, with coordination assistance from media producer Brian Koscho.