l What: The American Folklore Society's annual conference.

l Where: Little America Hotel in Salt Lake City.

l When: Today through Sunday.

l Admission: It is open to the public, but there is a $35 daily or $105 conference-long fee.

l Schedule: Log on to http://www.afsnet.org.

Ask longtime Utah folklorist Carol Edison to define folklore and she replies with a sigh, indicating that defining her life's work can be a bit elusive.

“Folklore is all around us,” said the Utah Folk Arts Council expert. “It is all the traditions and conventions we have learned from family and friends and communities that we pass along. It might be about songs and stories to making crafts. It is the context of our lives.”

More than 600 members of the venerable American Folklore Society (AFS) will offer further definitions on the subject today through Sunday when they meet at the Little America Hotel and Towers in Salt Lake City for the group's 116th annual meeting.

According to AFS executive director Tim Lloyd, the group was founded in 1888 by scholars, museum professionals and men and women of letters including President Hayes and writer Mark Twain.

“Folklore connects us with our past, but it is alive and well, here and now,” said AFS president Michael Owen Jones, who teaches at the University of California at Los Angeles. “The traditions we learn, develop and pass on make us who we are as individuals and as members of cultural groups.”

The meeting is open to the public, though there is a $35 daily charge or $105 conference-long registration fee. Sign up at the Little America registration desk.

The conference theme, “Folklore and the Cultural Landscape,” is appropriate to Utah, where Edison said some of the top folklorists in the country reside. While more than 100 of those attending the conference come from abroad, including Mexico, Kenya, Slovenia and Malaysia, the meeting will have a definite Utah emphasis.

Diane Call of Brigham Young University, for example, will speak on Mormon mothers' culture. BYU's Jacqueline Thursby will talk about the troubled image of hunting in Utah. The University of Utah's Tom Carter will talk about cowboy culture while BYU's Dennis Cutchins will offer a presentation on Utah's fly-fishing culture.

Meetings will examine the relationships of traditional occupations and practices such as architecture, hunting and fishing, food preparation, ranching and farming. In all, there will be more than 150 sessions on folklore, including music, art, narrative, dance, food, folk healing and the place of folklore in films, television and other media.

A half-day workshop for teachers called “Reading Culture and Landscapes: A Literacy and Learning Expedition,” is scheduled for Saturday and will give teachers a chance to help their students explore folklore.

According to Lloyd, the group has 2,200 members and is the world's largest organization of its kind. Members include students, teachers, scholars, consultants, libraries, community organizers and public agency professionals.