Alabama Folk

For thirty years, Ester de Aguiar made thousands of brigadeiro, the iconic sweet of her native Brazil, for the Mobile International Festival. Ester explains how brigadeiro emerged from rural life, touching on her own family history of dairy farming, midwifery, herbal healing, and interreligious faith. She takes us step by step through making brigadeiro, which she insists anyone can do!

Roy Cooley describes life on a tenant farm in Northeast Alabama in the 1940's. Though we set out to talk about chair caning, Roy reveals a whole world of traditions, from beekeeping to canning to corncob battles. And he shares visceral memories like pulling a newborn puppy through a floor plank and lighting a ragball on fire for a night game.

Gena Barragan grew up in Laos and spent her adulthood running Lao and Thai restaurants in South Alabama. She guides us through local Lao life, including foodways, temple traditions, New Year celebrations, beauty pageants, and sports. Grounded in Buddhism, Gena reflects on her father’s power as a healer and her son’s training as a monk.

Maria Williams has taught traditional Mexican dances to generations of children in Mobile. She explains how music, dance, and colorful dresses are an intrinsic part of life and culture in Mexico. She also reflects on the unifying power of dance, as well as its ability to instill confidence, identity, pride, freedom, and generosity in her students.

Betty Anderson grew up watching the women of Gee’s Bend move through the seasons of rural life: quilting, canning, healing with herbs, hog killing, and making jelly, lye soap, and stick dolls. In reflecting on their expertise, Betty pays homage to the local voodoo doctor, the power of communal work, and to a most intimate moment of the lifecycle: its very end.

Indigenous finger weaver Jonathan Davis leads us through traditional finger weaving, including how he learned from an "old school generation," makers protocols, sourcing materials, and Indigenous textile history. He explains how finger weaving reflects Creek cosmology and connects to the Green Corn Ceremony, and he looks ahead to the tradition's future.