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I got my internship at the Smithsonian Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage!
For those of you who don't know, I'm a social anthropology major. I don't dig up bones. It's more like ethnographies and oral histories and learning about cultures and societies and figuring out what makes them tick. I love my major.
One of the requirements for my major at American University in DC is that I need to do an internship. Now, there aren't too many internships out there for a social anthropologist, but I found one that was amazing at the Smithsonian Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage. I would be working on the Folklife Festival that's held the last weekend of June and the first weekend of July. I wanted it really bad. It was perfect for me. The Folklife Festival highlights different cultures and educates people about their way of life, rituals, and celebrations.
I sent in my application (on which I worked really hard) and waited for a month. Then, on Sunday, I got an email saying that my application was really impressive and that they want to talk to me. They called me up in Scotland (you know they must like me if they paid the charges) and after only about 5 minutes of talking, the guy offered me the job! I'm so excited.
I'm going to be working on the Folklife Festival on the section about NASA. Apparently it's 50 years of NASA, so they wanted to bring in professionals and tell about the culture of NASA, which is really interesting, because it's not a geographical culture, but an occupational culture. I'm going to be working on the section of the festival that deals with people's memories of NASA. We're going to have a booth where people can come in and be like "I remember when man first walked on the moon..." etc. It's perfect for me, because I love oral history. It makes me so happy. I just needed to share with you all. Whoever is in DC this summer should definitely come to the Folklife Festival and come find me. I'll show you around.
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The folklife of NASA - that seems a bit ironic Congratulations! I have a folklife festival T-shirt from 1989. Whew. I should send it in as a bit of Folklife of the Folklife festival! I love that shirt. My husband thinks it's hideous, though, so I just keep it in a box of preciouses.
Posts: 11017 | Registered: Apr 2003
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Thanks guys! Dagonee, you're right. Smithsonian internships are really hard to get. I'm still really surprised that I actually got it. I think it was because I talked so much in my essay about how much I loved oral history. My pseudo grandfather is actually one of the greatest storytellers in the world, so I've always had a love or oral history. It works perfectly for this project.
And pooka, I know you're near DC. You should definitely come and visit me when I'm working at the festival. I'd let you have the insider tour.
Posts: 1789 | Registered: Jul 2003
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Congratulations. The Folklife Festival is one of my favorite DC events. Unfortunately, I'll have to miss it this year. It sounds like you'll be having a lot of fun.
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Congratulations on getting the internship you wanted!
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