Re: [Callers] Pre-existing dance?

As someone with an academic background in the field of Folklore, the way we talk about attribution and authorship bothers me. (NOTE: what I'm talking about here is distinct from trying to track down the source of a dance you collected somewhere, or according respect to the first person to dream up a sequence. Both of those goals are entirely legitimate.) The dance Luke described was created by him, not Mark Goodwin. The sequence happens to be the same as one dreamed up by Mark Goodwin at a previous place and time, which is very important to know, but Luke's creation was independent and should be attributed to Luke. If we attribute everything to the first person ever to dream up a sequence, we are grossly misrepresenting how dances are created and spread. When we attribute Luke's dance to Mark, we are saying that Luke (and everyone else) got the dance from Mark, or from a source tracked back to Mark. That is factually incorrect in this case; Luke can point to when and why he came up with the dance. Legally, it would also mean we are claiming that Mark holds the only legitimate copyright claim, which is again both incorrect and total nonsense (as copyright usually becomes when applied to folk genres). As both an academic and participant in our tradition, I want to know if many people independently came up with the same dance (making it a FOLK DANCE). Otherwise, I am falsely giving credit and responsibility to a single creative genius. The difference between those two is a significant matter in the question of how folklore is created and who owns it. Personally, I feel our cultural tendency to accord authorial rights has misled us. So please...if you came up with a dance put your name on it along with some of the details---and then tell me who else came up with it, too. Don't just stick their name on it. Just my 2 cents. Neal Neal Schlein Youth Services Librarian, Mahomet Public Library Currently reading: *The Different Girl* by Gordon Dahlquist Currently learning: How to set up an automated email system. On Tue, Oct 18, 2016 at 8:31 AM, Luke Donforth via Callers < callers(a)lists.sharedweight.net&gt; wrote: