Proverbs in Motion

Description

Co-published by the CIUS Press and the Kule Centre for Ukrainian and Canadian Folklore at the University of Alberta, Proverbs in Motion is a collection of academic essays and greetings in honour of Bohdan Medwidsky, academic, program builder, community activist, fundraiser and philanthropist. Contributors include North American and European colleagues as well as former students. The volume includes biographical information, a bibliography of works by Bohdan Medwidsky, as well as three previously unpublished studies by the honouree. The academic articles are written in English or Ukrainian, and encompass several disciplines; folklore, history, literary studies.

Bohdan Medwidsky is a graduate of the University of Ottawa and the University of Toronto (Ph.D. 1977). He taught Ukrainian for three decades at the University of Alberta (1972-2002). Responding to enthusiasm of his students during the 1970s ethnic revival and following his own fascination with the discipline, he became increasingly interested in Ukrainian folklore. He established and expanded the Ukrainian Folklore Program at the University of Alberta, developing it at the B.A., M.A., and Ph.D. levels. He established a series of endowments to support this program and its students, and collected materials into a major archive that now carries his name. Ukrainian folklore at the University of Alberta boasts two endowed professorships (the Huculak Chair of Ukrainian Culture and Ethnography, and the Kule Chair of Ukrainian Ethnography), over 40 successful graduate students, and a reputation as the main centre for Ukrainian folklore studies in North America. His long career of community activism has been devoted to many organizations and causes, including Ukrainian bilingual education in Alberta, the Ukrainian Catholic Brotherhood, the Ukrainian Cultural Heritage Village, as well as politics in Canada and Ukraine. His academic research has focused on Ukrainian proverbs, historiography of Ukrainian folklore studies, and Ukrainian Canadian oral traditions.

Proverbs in Motion is dedicated to the 35^th anniversary of the Bohdan Medwidsky Ukrainian Folklore Archives, in the Peter and Doris Kule Centre for Ukrainian and Canadian Folklore, at the University of Alberta.