Barre Toelken

Barre Toelken
Born	John Barre Toelken (1935-06-15)June 15, 1935 Enfield, Massachusetts
Died	November 9, 2018(2018-11-09) (aged 83) Logan, Utah
Spouse	Midori "Miiko"
Children	6

John Barre Toelken (/ˈbæri ˈtoʊlkən/; June 15, 1935 – November 9, 2018) was an American folklorist, noted for his study of Native American material and oral traditions.

Early life and education

Barre Toelken was born in Enfield, Massachusetts, to parents John and Sylvia Toelken. The family later moved to Springfield. He began to attend the Utah State University in 1953, where he graduated with a bachelor's degree in English. Toelken completed a master's degree in English literature from Washington State University, followed by a doctorate from the University of Oregon.

Career

Toelken began his teaching career at the University of Oregon in 1966. During nearly twenty years at the University, Toelken would serve as director for both Folklore and Ethnic Studies and also the Randall V. Mills Archives of Northwest Folklore. Toelken returned to Utah State in 1985: there he would serve as the director of the Folklore Program and co-director of the Fife Folklore Conference.

Toelken was known for his research into Navajo folklore, namely with the Yellowman family. Decades later, Toelken destroyed most of the physical records originating from his work with the Yellowman family, choosing to leave a set of cassette tapes with members of the family, not within an archive.

Recognition

Over the course of his career, Toelken was president of the American Folklore Society from 1977 to 1978, and edited the Journal of American Folklore and Western Folklore. The American Folklore Society granted Toelken fellowship in 1981. He received four of the association's major awards: the Américo Paredes Prize and the Chicago Folklore Prize, both in 2007, followed by the Kenneth Goldstein Award for Lifetime Academic Leadership and the Lifetime Scholarly Achievement Award, in 2011 and 2016, respectively.

Toelken also served on the boards of a number of organisations, including the American Folklife Center of the Library of Congress, the National Endowment for the Arts Folklife Program, the Western Folklife Center, Utah Arts Council, and the International Ballad Commission.

Later years

Toelken died in Logan, Utah, on November 9, 2018, aged 83.

Selected publications

• Toelken, Barre. (1979) Dynamics of Folklore. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co. OCLC 490869905.