Final Blog Post

       Folk knowledge is characterized as practical knowledge or survival skills for living within a society. Sharing folk knowledge is the least formal of all knowledge types, making it the easiest to break down learning or interpersonal barriers and form bonds through sharing it. Sharing folk knowledge is not the only way or even the best way to learn and work together, though. Despite claims that other forms of knowledge are less bonding, folk knowledge does not accommodate collaboration and building community more than other types of knowledge, it simply takes less effort to form a community around sharing folk knowledge because folk knowledge involves the lowest common denominator and thereby attracts the largest number of people.


       Dane's post on Universities and how they formed around one text provide evidence that yes, communities can be and are formed around written knowledge. My post on Ovid's Metamorphosis is further evidence because it proves that sharing oral knowledge is just as unifying: storytelling was a big part of Roman society and the people of Rome really gathered around this shared piece of poetry.  And, even though the printing press brought about silent reading and more individualized learning, knowledge became public domain--an intellectual community emerged, many people began to play a role in adding to knowledge. (Twihards are modern proof that the printing press accommodated community building.)

   Human interaction is what accommodates the community building and collaboration. Sharing knowledge in any form will always facilitate unity.  Universities (communities of their own) formed around a singular text because people got together and discussed with one another, they involved personal interaction. That interaction is not unique to folk knowledge. Had everyone simply read the same text separately, no collaboration would have happened or community formed, but that does not mean that leaving the realm of isolation means you entered the realm of folk knowledge.

     If you think of the communities formed around types of folk knowledge, they are no different from those formed around oral, written, or print knowledge. Yes, people get together to cook, sew, dance, shop, play games, etc. Is that type of gathering any different from attending book clubs, concerts, lectures, study groups, or General Conference together? There is a special bond when you go out of your comfort zone and learn a new skill with the help of someone else, I learned that when I did the learning/teaching folk knowledge activity in Unit 1. For teaching, I taught my roommate how to do a French Manicure. The truth of the matter is, however, that I didn't feel any more bonded with her than after teaching her to paint her nails than after we discussed the Lord of the Flies or talked about the Tuesday devotional together. We shared a common experience in painting nails, sharing that folk knowledge with her did help unify us. When we quiz each other on information or discuss texts together, that collaboration is no different, we are continuing to learn about each other and from each other.

     In our Salon discussion, we talked about how more people have experience with sharing/learning how to shower than people who have experience discussing Shakespeare. This does not mean that learning to shower builds community better than discussing Shakespeare does, though! Online communities, Renaissance fairs, even churches are examples of communities that form around sharing knowledge not always in the realm of folk knowledge.

        Because the realm of folk knowledge involves more people and less formality than sharing oral, written or print knowledge, there is reason to believe that Folk knowledge accommodates collaboration and building community more than other forms of knowledge. This is simply not the case. Sharing folk knowledge is not the only or even always the easiest way of forming communities or facilitating collaboration. It is the least formal, and there may be more people that share in a common folk knowledge than in a common written text, but in a time and place when our day-to-day survival is no longer our primary concern, many people join communities around common oral, written, and print knowledge--and they do it just as easily as those who join communities centered around a shared folk knowledge.