Folkloristics of Educational Spaces: Material Lore in Classrooms with and without Walls

THISARTICLE FOCUSES ON THE RELATIONSHIP between people and the spaces that they inhabit on a college campus. A folkloristic approach to the study of space examines the way people shape space through their practices and the way space shapes people's practices. People shape space through the way they organize physical objects in their environment, the way they talk in spaces they inhabit, and the ritualized behaviors they perform in particular spaces. Understanding how people talk about, and interact within, a physical space is especially important as we move toward distance education models of learning. It raises questions about what is gained and what is lost as we move toward classrooms without walls and also suggests the importance of understanding the new practices that people develop to organize and make sense of their real, virtual, and hy-