What binds us together in communities? Food? danger? the scientific method? jobs? songs? stories? age? language? sex? color? love? geography? Why the quest for community and the need for roots and multiple identities? This is an invitation for you to commune with us again--on the Mall and in the halls of the Smithsonian--to find some answers to these fascinating questions which affect all of our personal lives. With the 1978 Festival of American Folklife, the Smithsonian starts a five-year cycle of variations on the theme of "community." Our scholars and guests will be demonstrating folklore as the artistic expression of community life, and the pleasure and dignity found in that process.

If community means the sharing and passing on of certain cultural and ethnic traditions, the concept provides a nearly inexhaustible source of inspiration for research, symposia and festivals. "Community" gives a focus for examining and enjoying what modern civilization owes to the skills and values of folk not yet engulfed by mainstream media and the symbols of science and city.