Jeffrey A Tolbert, Ph.D.

Jeff Tolbert
Assistant Professor of American Studies and Folklore, School of Humanities
Olmsted Building, W356M

Dr. Jeffrey A. Tolbert is a folklorist whose research focuses on vernacuar belief and the supernatural, popular and traditional cultures, and digital ethnography. He is particularly interested in understanding how contemporary people integrate supernatural belief and experience into their daily, technologically-mediated lives. He is co-editor (with Michael Dylan Foster) of The Folkloresque: Reframing Folklore in a Popular Culture World (2016).

  • Folklore
  • Religion/Belief
  • Vernacular Belief
  • Popular Culture
  • Fan Studies

“Local Cosmologies.” Submitted to Semiotic Review, March 31st, 2018.

(With Vanessa Stephens.) “Beyond Metaphorical Spectrality.” Submitted to New Directions in Folklore, August 18th, 2017.

“How to Make (and Possibly Un-Make) A Digital Monster.” Accepted for inclusion in How to Live With Monsters, edited by Ilana Gershon and Yasmine Musharbash. Submited to Cornell University Press, August 2018.

“Ostension.” Encyclopedia article, SAGE Research Methods. Submitted July 17th, 2018.

Ed. (with Michael Dylan Foster), The Folkloresque: Reframing Folklore in a Popular Culture World. Logan, Utah: Utah State University Press, 2016.

“Waiting for a Place: At Gravedigger's Pub.” New Hibernia Review, vol. 20, no. 2 (2016): 9-14.

“A Deadly Discipline: Folklore, Folklorists, and the Occult in Fatal Frame.” In The Folkloresque: Reframing Folklore in a Popular Culture World, edited by Michael Dylan Foster and Jeffrey A. Tolbert, 125–43. Logan, Utah: Utah State University Press.

With Carlea Holl-Jensen: “‘New-Minted from the Brothers Grimm’: Folklore’s Purpose and the Folkloresque in The Tales of Beedle the Bard.” In The Folkloresque: Reframing Folklore in a Popular Culture World, edited by Michael Dylan Foster and Jeffrey A. Tolbert, 163–72. Logan, Utah: Utah State University Press.

“‘Dark and Wicked Things’: Slender Man and the Implications of Belief.” Contemporary Legend series 3, vol. 5 (2015): 38-61.

“On Folklore’s Appeal: A Personal Essay.” New Directions in Folklore vol. 13, no. 1/2 (2015).

“‘The Sort of Story That Has You Covering Your Mirrors’: The Case of Slender Man.” Semiotic Review (2013).

Humble Theory: Folklore’s Grasp on Social Life, by Dorothy Noyes. [2016. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.] Journal of Folklore Research Reviews. Review published on June 21st, 2018. Putting the Supernatural in Its Place: Folklore, the Hypermodern, and the Ethereal, edited by Jeannie Banks Thomas. [2015. Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press.] Western Folklore. Review published on April 1st, 2017.

Hittin’ the Prayer Bones: Materiality of Spirit in the Pentecostal South, by Anderson Blanton. [2015. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press.] Journal of Folklore Research Reviews. Review published on January 27th, 2016.

Bright Star of the West: Joe Heaney, Irish Song Man, by Sean Williams and Lillis Ó Laoire. [2011. Oxford: Oxford University Press.] Journal of Folklore Research Reviews. Review published on September 28th, 2011.

Oral and Print Cultures in Ireland, 1600–1900, ed. Marc Caball and Andrew Carpenter. [2010. Dublin: Four Courts Press.] Journal of Folklore Research Reviews. Review published on June 16th, 2011.

Merlin: Knowledge and Power through the Ages, by Stephen Knight. [2009. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.] Journal of Folklore Research Reviews. Review published on September 15th, 2010.

War and Shadows: The Haunting of Vietnam, by Mai Lan Gustaffson. [2009. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.] Journal of Folklore Research Reviews. Review published on May 5th, 2010.

Haunted Halls: Ghostlore of American College Campuses, by Elizabeth Tucker. Folklore Forum, Indiana University. [2007. Jackson, MS: University Press of Mississippi.] Review published on April 12, 2010.

Ph.D. (Indiana University)

HIST 203: History of Monsters, Aliens, and the Supernatural
AMST 530: Folklore and New Media