Newman Ivey White (February 3, 1892 – December 6, 1948) was an American professor of

English English usually refers to: * English language * English people English may also refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England ** English national ide ...

Duke University Duke University is a private research university in Durham, North Carolina. Founded by Methodists and Quakers in the present-day city of Trinity in 1838, the school moved to Durham in 1892. In 1924, tobacco and electric power industrialist James ...

. He was born in

Statesville, North Carolina Statesville is a city in and the county seat of Iredell County, North Carolina, United States, and it is part of the Charlotte metropolitan area. Statesville was established in 1789 by an act of the North Carolina Legislature. The population was r ...

, United States. He was a noted Shelley scholar, as well as a collector of American

folklore Folklore is shared by a particular group of people; it encompasses the traditions common to that culture, subculture or group. This includes oral traditions such as tales, legends, proverbs and jokes. They include material culture, ranging ...

, including

folk song Folk music is a music genre that includes #Traditional folk music, traditional folk music and the Contemporary folk music, contemporary genre that evolved from the former during the 20th-century folk revival. Some types of folk music may be c ...

s and Duke

limericks A limerick ( ) is a form of verse, usually humorous and frequently rude, in five-line, predominantly trimeter with a strict rhyme scheme of AABBA, in which the first, second and fifth line rhyme, while the third and fourth lines are shorter and ...

. He served as Professor of English at Trinity College and Duke University from 1919 to 1948. He wrote ''American Negro Folk Songs'' (1928) and in it he quoted a

work song A work song is a piece of music closely connected to a form of work, either sung while conducting a task (usually to coordinate timing) or a song linked to a task which might be a connected narrative, description, or protest song. Definitions and ...

, sung by laborers in

Augusta, Georgia Augusta ( ), officially Augusta–Richmond County, is a consolidated city-county on the central eastern border of the U.S. state of Georgia (U.S. state), Georgia. The city lies across the Savannah River from South Carolina at the head of its navig ...

, which mentioned the notorious Judge Fogarty. White also recalled hearing a version in Statesville, North Carolina in 1903. A professorship at Duke has been named in his honor.

Publications

* ''

An Anthology of Verse by American Negroes ''An Anthology of Verse by American Negroes'' is a 1924 poetry anthology compiled by Newman Ivey White and Walter Clinton Jackson. The anthology is considered one of the major anthologies of black poetry to be published during the Harlem Renaissanc ...

'' 1924 * ''American Negro Folk Songs'' 1928 * ''Shelley'' 1940 * ''Portrait of Shelley'' 1945

References

Preliminary Inventory of the Newman Ivey White Papers
University Archives,

. 1892 births 1948 deaths People from Statesville, North Carolina American folklorists Duke University Trinity College of Arts and Sciences alumni Duke University faculty Harvard University alumni American academics of English literature {{US-English-academic-bio-stub