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Bruce Jackson (born May 21, 1936) is an American folklorist, documentary filmmaker, writer, photographer. He is SUNY Distinguished Professor and the James Agee Professor of American Culture at the
University at Buffalo The State University of New York at Buffalo (commonly referred to as UB, University at Buffalo, and sometimes SUNY Buffalo) is a public university, public research university in Buffalo, New York, Buffalo and Amherst, New York, United States. ...
. Jackson has edited or authored books published by major trade and university presses.World Cat author listing
/ref> He has also directed and produced five documentary films. He is an Associate Member of The Wooster Group (New York).


Biography

Jackson was born in
Brooklyn, New York Brooklyn is a Boroughs of New York City, borough of New York City located at the westernmost end of Long Island in the New York (state), State of New York. Formerly an independent city, the borough is coextensive with Kings County, one of twelv ...
in 1936. He served in the
United States Marine Corps The United States Marine Corps (USMC), also referred to as the United States Marines or simply the Marines, is the maritime land force service branch of the United States Department of Defense. It is responsible for conducting expeditionar ...
from 1953–1956, then attended Newark College of Engineering (now
New Jersey Institute of Technology New Jersey Institute of Technology (NJIT) is a Public university, public research university in Newark, New Jersey, United States, with a graduate-degree-granting satellite campus in Jersey City. Founded in 1881 with the support of local indust ...
) for three years. He received a B.A. from
Rutgers University Rutgers University ( ), officially Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, is a Public university, public land-grant research university consisting of three campuses in New Jersey. Chartered in 1766, Rutgers was originally called Queen's C ...
in 1960 and an M.A. from
Indiana University Indiana University (IU) is a state university system, system of Public university, public universities in the U.S. state of Indiana. The system has two core campuses, five regional campuses, and two regional centers under the administration o ...
's School of Letters in 1962. From 1963 through 1967 he was a Junior Fellow in
Harvard University Harvard University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the History of the Puritans in North America, Puritan clergyma ...
's Society of Fellows. He has been the recipient of a
Guggenheim Fellowship Guggenheim Fellowships are Grant (money), grants that have been awarded annually since by the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, endowed by the late Simon Guggenheim, Simon and Olga Hirsh Guggenheim. These awards are bestowed upon indiv ...
(1971), was nominated for a
Grammy Award The Grammy Awards, stylized as GRAMMY, and often referred to as The Grammys, are awards presented by The Recording Academy of the United States to recognize outstanding achievements in music. They are regarded by many as the most prestigious ...
(1974) for Best Ethnic Traditional Recording (Wake Up Dead Man: Black Convict Work Songs), named an Associate Member of the Folklore Fellows by the Finnish Academy of Science and Letters (1995), and Chevalier in l'
Ordre des Arts et des Lettres The Order of Arts and Letters () is an order of France established on 2 May 1957 by the Minister of Culture. Its supplementary status to the was confirmed by President Charles de Gaulle in 1963. Its purpose is the recognition of significant ...
by the French government (2002). In 2012, the president of France appointed him chevalier in the National Order of Merit. He was president of the American Folklore Society in 1984. He was also chairman of the
board of trustees A board of directors is a governing body that supervises the activities of a business, a nonprofit organization, or a government agency. The powers, duties, and responsibilities of a board of directors are determined by government regulatio ...
of the American Folklore Center in the
Library of Congress The Library of Congress (LOC) is a research library in Washington, D.C., serving as the library and research service for the United States Congress and the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It also administers Copyright law o ...
(1988–89, trustee 1984-89), and director, then trustee of the Newport Folk Foundation (1965—). With Diane Christian, he has directed and produced five documentary films: ''Death Row'' (1979), ''Creeley'' (1988), ''Out of Order'' (1983), ''Robert Creeley: Willy's Reading'' (1982), and ''William August May'' (1982). In 2017, The Wooster Group produced a play based on his 1964 recordings in Texas prisons: "The B-Side: 'Negro Folklore from Texas State Prisons' A Record Album Interpretation." The play has since been performed in Taipei, Gwanju (Korea(, Buffalo, Los Angeles and Brooklyn. In 2024, the Wooster Group produced a play based on his 1974 book and 1975 LP, "Get Your Ass in the Water and Swim Like Me." His photographs mainly focus on prison life. A photo collection from the Cummins Unit in Arkansas was exhibited at the Albright-Knox Art Gallery and at the Center for Documentary Studies at
Duke University Duke University is a Private university, private research university in Durham, North Carolina, United States. Founded by Methodists and Quakers in the present-day city of Trinity, North Carolina, Trinity in 1838, the school moved to Durham in 1 ...
.Speakeasy: Bruce Jackson on how he became the dean of prison folklore
''
The Wall Street Journal ''The Wall Street Journal'' (''WSJ''), also referred to simply as the ''Journal,'' is an American newspaper based in New York City. The newspaper provides extensive coverage of news, especially business and finance. It operates on a subscriptio ...
'', 2010-09-04.
Other recent exhibitions are Being There (Burchfield Penney Art Center, 2012), Portraits from a Prison (Arkansas Studies Institute, 2009), American Gulag (Lega di Cultura di Piadena and Circolo Gianni Bosio, Rome, 2007), Bridging Buffalo (Buffalo and Erie County Historical Society, 2006–2007), and Mirrors (Nina Freudenheim Gallery, 2004). His work has been funded by the
National Endowment for the Arts The National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) is an independent agency of the United States federal government that offers support and funding for projects exhibiting artistic excellence. It was created in 1965 as an independent agency of the feder ...
,
National Endowment for the Humanities The National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) is an independent federal agency of the U.S. government, established by thNational Foundation on the Arts and the Humanities Act of 1965(), dedicated to supporting research, education, preserv ...
, Fund for Investigative Journalism, Playboy Foundation, Levi Strauss Foundation, Polaroid Foundation, New York Council for the Humanities and the
American Philosophical Society The American Philosophical Society (APS) is an American scholarly organization and learned society founded in 1743 in Philadelphia that promotes knowledge in the humanities and natural sciences through research, professional meetings, publicat ...
. He has spent his academic career at the
University at Buffalo The State University of New York at Buffalo (commonly referred to as UB, University at Buffalo, and sometimes SUNY Buffalo) is a public university, public research university in Buffalo, New York, Buffalo and Amherst, New York, United States. ...
. He joined it as an
assistant professor Assistant professor is an academic rank just below the rank of an associate professor used in universities or colleges, mainly in the United States, Canada, Japan, and South Korea. Overview This position is generally taken after earning a doct ...
of English and
comparative literature Comparative literature studies is an academic field dealing with the study of literature and cultural expression across language, linguistic, national, geographic, and discipline, disciplinary boundaries. Comparative literature "performs a role ...
in 1967, was promoted to
associate professor Associate professor is an academic title with two principal meanings: in the North American system and that of the ''Commonwealth system''. In the ''North American system'', used in the United States and many other countries, it is a position ...
a year later and to
full professor Professor (commonly abbreviated as Prof.) is an academic rank at universities and other post-secondary education and research institutions in most countries. Literally, ''professor'' derives from Latin as a 'person who professes'. Professors ...
in 1971. He received the SUNY Distinguished Professor distinction in 1990 and was appointed Samuel P. Capen Professor of American Culture in 1997. In 2009, he was appointed
James Agee James Rufus Agee ( ; November 27, 1909 – May 16, 1955) was an American novelist, journalist, poet, screenwriter and film critic. In the 1940s, writing for ''Time'', he was one of the most influential film critics in the United States. His autob ...
Professor of American Culture. From 2015 to 2021, he was co-director of University at Buffalo's Creative Arts Initiative. From 1986 to 1990, Jackson was editor-in-chief of the ''
Journal of American Folklore The ''Journal of American Folklore'' is a peer-reviewed academic journal published by the American Folklore Society. The journal has been published since the society's founding in 1888. Since 2003, this has been published at the University of I ...
''.


Filmography

*''Death Row'' (1979) *''Creeley'' (1988) *''Out of Order'' (1983) *''Robert Creeley: Willy's Reading'' (1982) *''William August May'' (1982)


Published works

*''Folklore and Society'' (ed., Folklore Associates, 1966) *''The Negro and his Folklore in 19th Century Periodicals'' (ed., American Folklore Society and
University of Texas Press The University of Texas Press (or UT Press) is the university press of the University of Texas at Austin. Established in 1950, the Press publishes scholarly and trade books in several areas, including Latin American studies, Caribbean, Caribbea ...
, 1967) *''A Thief's Primer'' (Macmillan, 1969) *''In the Life: Versions of the Criminal Experience'' (Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1972) *'' Wake Up Dead Man: Afro-American Worksongs from Texas Prisons'' (Harvard University Press, 1972) *''"Get Your Ass in the Water and Swim Like Me": Narrative Poetry from Black Oral Tradition'' (Harvard University Press, 1974) *''Killing Time: Life in the Arkansas Penitentiary'' (photographs.
Cornell University Press The Cornell University Press is the university press of Cornell University, an Ivy League university in Ithaca, New York. It is currently housed in Sage House, the former residence of Henry William Sage. It was first established in 1869, maki ...
, 1977) *''The Programmer'' (novel, Doubleday, 1979) *''Death Row'' (with Diane Christian,
Beacon Press Beacon Press is an American left-wing non-profit book publisher. Founded in 1854 by the American Unitarian Association, it is currently a department of the Unitarian Universalist Association. It is known for publishing authors such as Jame ...
, 1980) *''Get the Money and Shoot: The DRI Guide to Funding Documentary Films'' (Documentary Research, 1981) *''Your Father's Not Coming Home Any More'' (ed., Richard Marek/ Putnam's, 1981) *''Doing Drugs'' (with Michael Jackson, St. Martin's, 1983) *''Teaching Folklore'' (ed., American Folklore Society and Documentary Research, 1984) *''Law and Disorder: Criminal Justice in America'' (University of Illinois Press, 1985) *''Rainbow Freeware'' (New South Moulton Press, 1986) *''Fieldwork'' (University of Illinois Press, 1987) *''A User's Guide: Freeware, Shareware, and Public Domain Software'' (New South Moulton Press, 1988) *''Disorderly Conduct'' (political and social essays), 1992,
University of Illinois Press The University of Illinois Press (UIP) is an American university press and is part of the University of Illinois System. Founded in 1918, the press publishes some 120 new books each year, thirty-three scholarly journals, and several electroni ...
) *''The World Observed: Reflections on the Fieldwork Process'' (co-editor, with Edward D. Ives, University of Illinois Press, 1996) *''The Story is True: The Art and Meaning of Telling Stories'' (Temple University Press, 2007) *''Pictures from a Drawer: Prison and the Art of Portraiture'' (Temple University Press, 2009) *'' In This Timeless Time: Living and Dying on Death Row in America'' (University of North Carolina Press, 2012, with Diane Christian) *"Inside the Wire: Photographs from Texas and Arkansas Prisons" (University of Texas Press, 2013) *"Being There: Bruce Jackson, Photographs, 1962-2012" (Burchfield-Penney Art Center, 2013) *"Inside the Wire: Photographs from Texas and Arkansas Prisons" (University of Texas Press, 2013) *"American Chartres: Buffalo's Waterfront Grain Elevators" (SUNY Press, 2016) *"Terlingua Necropolis" (Synergistic Press 2017) *"I Look at Diane Christian/Diane Christian looks at Me. Photographs 1971-2017" (Synergistic Press) *"Babel: The First Ten Years," (Just Buffalo, 2018, ed. by Barbara Cole) *"Places: Things heard, things seen" (BlazeVox 2019) *Yevtushenko in Buffalo (with Tanya Shalina-Conte), (Center Working Papers, 2020) *Deux jours à La Ribaute: A Celebration at Atelier Anselm Kiefer (Room With a View Press, 2020) *Robert Creeley on the Poet's Work. In Conversation with Bruce Jackson (BlazeVox, 2020) *Changing Tense: Thirty memento mori (BlazeVox, 2021) *Voices from Death Row, second edition (with Diane Christian) (Sony Press, 2022) *Ways of the Hand: A Photographer's Memoir (SUNY Press, 2022) *The Story is True. Expanded edition (SUNY Press, 2022) *Ephemera 1995-2022: On people, politics, art, justice, torture and war (BlazeVox, 2023) *Get Your Ass in the Water and Swim Like Me, revised ed. (SUNY Press, 2024) *Folklore Matters: Incursions in the Field 1965-2021 (SUNY Press, 2024) *The Life and Death of Buffalo's Great Northern Grain Elevator: 1897-2023 (SUNY Press, 2024)


References


External links


Bruce Jackson's Website at the University of Buffalo (SUNY/Buffalo)

Aperture article by Brian Wallace on Bruce Jackson's prison photography

Bruce Jackson
at the Stagger Lee Project {{DEFAULTSORT:Jackson, Bruce 1936 births Living people American folklorists American photographers American tax resisters Chevaliers of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres Rutgers University alumni University at Buffalo faculty Academics from Brooklyn New Jersey Institute of Technology alumni Activists from New York (state) Presidents of the American Folklore Society