Welcome Home: Finding Myself at the 2025 AFS Conference
Welcome Home: Finding Myself at the 2025 AFS Conference
By Brittany Hazel Roberts
When I boarded the plane for my first-ever work conference—the 2025 Annual Meeting of the American Folklore Society—I thought I knew what to expect: four days of panels, conversations, and the long-awaited chance to meet my Texas Folklife coworkers in person. What I didn’t expect was to come home changed.
The energy shifted the moment people started to filter into the ballroom for the welcoming ceremony. The speaker took the stage, smiled out at the crowd, and said two simple words: “Welcome home.” There was this wave of energy amongst the crowd that felt almost like one big sigh of relief. I was struck with the sensation all the way down to my bones. This space was safe. This conference was sacred, and in an instant, I was connected to everyone around me—scholars, artists, storytellers, administrators, and tradition bearers from all over the world. We may not have known each other by name, but we knew each other in spirit. Every one of them had waited all year to come to this place of community, of peace and understanding, and at that moment, I knew why.
Over the next few days, I moved from session to session, conversation to conversation, soaking it all in. I spoke excitedly with AFS members about Handed Down, the youth folk and traditional arts education program I help lead at Texas Folklife. They shared ideas and similar programs, offered resources, and reminded me that this work—our work—is part of something much larger. I also met phenomenal people who opened the door to exciting new research collaborations I never imagined I’d be part of.
Outside of my professional life, I’m a soul-folk singer-songwriter who creates under the name Hazel. For years, I’ve kept my two worlds—my nonprofit work and my music—on opposite sides of a line I subconsciously drew myself. By day, I served the arts; by night, I created the art. That divide was frustrating, because when I step into my music role, introducing myself as Hazel feels natural—it’s who I am. But at a “work” conference, I was Brittany. It felt expected, but it didn’t feel whole.
Then I met a woman named Pamela, who introduced herself as a Songleader and Crafter. I’d never heard the title before. I listened on bated breath as she spoke about song as tradition, as shared labor, as inheritance. Her words cracked something open in me. For the first time, I saw my work as a performing artist not just as a dream or expression, but as a craft—one that lives within the same creative ecosystem as my work at Texas Folklife.
That realization has stayed with me. I no longer view Hazel and Brittany—or my music and my professional work—as separate. They feed one another. In truth, they are one and the same.
This divide may not make sense to everyone reading this, but it has been my reality for years. Putting on the “mask” of Hazel once felt like granting myself permission to be the most authentic version of me. She was everything Brittany wanted to be, but never fully believed she could become. Hazel was my escape from self-doubt.
Now, I see her not as an escape, but as an extension. While I may not be performing from nine to five, my work as a song crafter shapes how I teach, plan, and connect through TXF—and my work at TXF, in turn, gives deeper roots to my songwriting.
In realizing this, I began to understand that the conference wasn’t just about connecting with others—it was about reconnecting with myself. Surrounded by people who live and breathe creativity, I found permission to bring all of me into every space I occupy. I didn’t have to choose between Brittany and Hazel, between structure and spirit. For the first time, I felt seen in both.
I laughed. I cried. I communed with my people. By the time the conference ended, I carried home more than a notebook full of ideas and a bag full of business cards—I carried a new sense of wholeness. The AFS Conference reminded me that folklore isn’t just about documenting stories; it’s about living them.
And for me, that’s exactly what Texas Folklife makes possible.
