One of the ways City Lore found out about Mary Louise was through a folklorist named Troyd Geist. Folklorists study and think a lot about the skills and knowledge of different communities of people in the United States who pass on their values, attitudes, and beliefs through crafts, stories, music, dance and celebrations. These communities pass on these skills and knowledge traditionally, that is, through word of mouth, imitation, and observation. Folklorists document these traditions to preserve and share them with people both inside and outside the community.

We interviewed Troyd to find out more about what he does as a folklorist with the North Dakota Council on the Arts. Below is a transcription of the interview. A transcription is usually the written copy of a recorded conversation. Folklorists keep both audio-taped and written documentation.

Troyd is a public sector folklorist. That means he conducts fieldwork research that becomes part of public programs sponsored by his agency. Academic folklorists teach and conduct fieldwork research in universities. Public sector folklorists work in many different types of organizations, from arts councils to hospitals to social service organizations to historical societies and environmental organizations. Troyd sees the beauty of folklore in its ability to have so many applications to so many different areas of life.

Interview with Troyd Geist, Folklorist

MF: Can you describe a typical day or your favorite day at work?

TG: Well, there's never a typical day! But I do have favorite days. My favorite day is getting out into the community and interacting with different people who are involved in traditional arts or crafts or who have different traditional knowledge. I like to get out in the back road and go to out-of-the-way places and meet with people of all backgrounds. I like to discover what it is they do and what it is they know that contributes in a positive way to their community and to the larger community.

I think it's that sense of discovery that is exciting. I really enjoy that.

MF: You say your work contributes to the community you're studying and to the larger community. How do you give cultural information back to the community in a way that is useful to them and how do you disseminate it to a larger community so they see the relevance in it to their lives?

TG: It's an interesting process. A lot of traditional people may not see what they do as unique or special, it's just something they grew up with and something they do. It's like breathing. They say, "It's just what we do." And so sometimes the community takes it for granted.

A folklorist can help the community see the value in the things they do. A folklorist can go into a community and visit with an individual, ask questions, and tie different traditions together in a way that may make the person think more consciously about their every day activities. Sometimes its only when people outside the traditional community recognize what that person is doing that it becomes special. A folklorist can fill that role of the outsider. The folklorist then shares his knowledge with others. Then other people outside the community start to talk about it and think about it and highlight it. And then the original community starts to think, "Yeah, what we do is special and what we do is important and we should share this with others." At least in North Dakota this is one of the primary things that happens.

MF: Are you from North Dakota?

TG: Yes.

MF: What part of North Dakota did you grow up in?

TG: My family originally came from a small town in south central North Dakota called Steele, a town of about 600 or 700 people; a small town! But I grew up a good part of my life in Devil's Lake, in the north central part of the state bordering the Spirit Lake Indian Reservation.

MF: And I guess that leads to how you got interested in folklore…

TG: Yes, I think what interested me was the diversity in the state. In North Dakota you have different towns that are relatively homogenous, but the state as a whole is very diverse. So for example, you might find a German-Russian town like Steele and then twenty miles away you'll find a town that's primarily Polish and beyond that another town that's primarily Bosnian and Ukrainian.

Even though there are many different cultures living next to each other, when you grow up in a small town the whole world is your town and your family is your whole world. All my friends were my cousins! So when you get out of your town even just over to a neighboring small town, you start to really see differences even between say Polish and Ukrainian communities.

My family eventually moved from Steele to Devil's Lake and when I got older and traveled with my parents, I would see the differences in the Polish people and the Native Americans, and again, that sense of discovery was exciting!

MF: So as a North Dakota state folklorist you have a real range of cultures and communities to look at!

TG: I work with many different cultures, everything from German-Russian to Dakotah Sioux to Kurdish and Vietnamese…there are quite a few different groups and traditions.

MF: What diversity! Is that diversity statewide or just in certain cities?

TG: My job is dealing with traditional art and traditional people statewide. I've worked with at least 60-70 cultural groups. A lot of what I do is work with apprenticeship programs and education programs. I also do documentation and fieldwork and work on exhibits and CDs like the one of Mary Louise. I've also explored the connection between traditional knowledge and health.

MF: What did you study in college?

TG: I got a master's in anthropology and what I focused on primarily was medical anthropology. So I would look at, for example, the influence of tradition on the medical condition of Bell's palsy. I looked at how Mandan Indian healers, Colorado Indians, and Jivaro Indians (sometimes referred to as 'Shuar') dealt with the disease.

MF: How did you meet Mary Louise?

TG: I don't remember the first time I met Mary Louise. She's one of those people whose name kept coming up in the community. I was working with the real traditional people, the ones who really know a lot but will defer questions they don't have the answers to to those that do and well, a lot of people referred me to Mary Louise.

When I visited her and I got to know more about what she knows, I learned that Mary Louise is one of those people who you can talk to for years and years and years and always find something new that she knows. But that's the nature of what we as folklorists do as well. We have to develop a relationship with people over time. Then they will become comfortable enough with you to open up and explain things. Mary Louise is one of those people who I think is a gem for folklorists and anthropologists; she just has so much knowledge. She's one of those people too who you have to listen to a lot. At first you may not quite figure out what she's getting at, but if you're patient and you sit and listen you do, you put it together.

MF: What do you want children or teachers who see this site to know about the relationship between a folklorist and a traditional person like Mary Louise?

TG: That the main thing about the relationship is that you (the folklorist) need to have patience. And you need to listen. If you go in and visit with people and show a true heart and show that you're open and wanting to learn and you're persistent in that request for information AND you come back again and again and again, they will open up to you. And it often feels like they give more to you as a folklorist than you can ever offer them as a traditional person.

People who want to be folklorists need to go into communities and people's homes with open minds and open hearts and communicate. And communication isn't only verbal. Communication is listening and thinking. When you're talking to somebody, like Mary Louise, who is really the epitome of that culture, they know that culture. Well you need to sit and listen. You can ask certain questions to get the answers that you want or that you're looking for, but when you ask the question, you have to be patient enough to let them finish what they're saying even if they go in a direction that you may think doesn't relate because it may eventually. You've got to show respect.

MF: Do you work with people of all ages?

TG: I've worked with people of all ages, younger people, pre-teens, all the way to the elders. But my preference is working with elders because they have a whole lifetime of wisdom, experience, and knowledge. And you know, just based on nature, they're not going to be with us forever. So helping to get the knowledge they have and helping to pass that knowledge on to the younger generation is the priority, at least in my mind.

MF: Why do you think it's important to do this type of work? Who does it benefit and how does it benefit them?

TG: I think there are many, many reasons this work is important, but how I would sum it up is that we deal with traditional knowledge that is passed on in an informal way, it's not learned in a school setting, it's not learned from books. And as a culture, we are missing out on a vast array of information if we're only learning from books. Informal education and informal knowledge, the stuff that has been passed down from generation to generation, well, if it's not recorded, it's going to be lost.

And we have to understand that there are different kinds of education and both types are very important. Our culture seems to stress formal education so much that we are neglecting the informal education, which is where folklore and folk arts and folk tradition come into play. Traditional people have a whole range of knowledge that is important to who we are now and what we do today.

For example, the stories that Mary Louise tells. These stories are told over and over because they have a relevance to what's going on today. There is knowledge in her stories, environmental knowledge, historical knowledge, cultural knowledge, psychological knowledge, biological knowledge. It all bears up to formal education. These stories deal with things human beings have had to deal with in the past and that we continue to deal with now. There's violence now and there has been violence in the past. In Mary Louise's next CD she tells a story about why the world never ends. She tells these stories in the tradition of making people more high-minded and more respectful. We learn that from the generations before us so that we may be helpful to others in the future.

MF: I'm really glad you agreed to talk about the work you do and share information about yourself. I think it's a really important component of this project. Thank you.

TG: Well, I was hesitant because as often as I work with people and take pictures of them and ask lots of questions…when the tables are turned on me, you know I'm a little reserved about opening up. I would prefer the spotlight to be on them. But Mary Louise said, "Troyd, you should do this." And when an elder tells you a bunch of times you should do something, you do it. Especially someone you have a tremendous amount of respect for! You're very welcome.

Devil's Lake, where Troyd grew up
Photo Courtesy of North Dakota Council on the Arts. Photographer: Dennis Gad

Canoeing in the Saniun River
Photo Courtesy of North Dakota Tourism Department
Mary Louise's ancestors lived in the level farmlands near the Saniun River until they were forced to move to Standing Rock Reservation.

North Dakota landscape
Photo Courtesy of Mary Louise Defender Wilson

Pyramid Hill at Fort Ransom, ND
Photo Courtesy of Mary Louise Defender Wilson