About the project

Under the direction of Dr. Gerald L. Pocius, the Folklore 6020 field school will introduce beginning graduate students to ethnographic documentation methods related to landscape, buildings, narratives, and place. The school will focus on one Newfoundland community: Quidi Vidi, a small village within St. John’s.

Twenty years ago, a moratorium on cod fishing was imposed throughout the province, resulting in a massive upheaval of daily life in rural communities. Increasingly, outmigration, coupled with a gentrification of coastal communities such as Quidi Vidi, has altered traditional cultural landscapes.  Quidi Vidi has gone from a small fishing community to a gentrified romantic icon of Newfoundland culture—coping with increased tourism and changing land uses. 

This course will document evolving village spaces, focusing both on buildings and landscapes, and how the place has been imagined and used over recent generations. Working with long-time residents, students will learn how to conduct interviews, record buildings, and describe the places in the Quidi Vidi of both past and present.

The Quidi Vidi Field School is part of a partnership project to document the folklore and oral history of Quidi Vidi, organized by the Department of Folklore at Memorial, the Heritage Foundation of Newfoundland and Labrador, The City of St. John's, and the Quidi Vidi Village Foundation.