Linda Goss

Linda Yvonne Goss ( McNear, born 1947), sometimes known professionally as Mama Linda, was born in Alcoa, Tennessee to Willie and Junior McNear. Her mother was a teacher and her father worked at the Aluminum Company of America (Alcoa). She grew up in a large storytelling family, and often cites tales heard from her Granddaddy Murphy and Uncle Buster as her earliest influences. Her mother was a frequent public speaker at Blount County churches and civic events, and Goss learned speaking techniques from her mother's example. From her father, she learned a love of music, particularly jazz, and an appreciation for the way stories can be told through music. In grade school, her teachers wrote on her report cards that she "talks too much".

Goss's interest in the oral tradition began when she was in high school, working on an assignment to interview the oldest person she knew. After interviewing her grandfather, she realized that old stories like the folklore and personal history he shared with her would be lost if they weren't passed on and collected. While at Howard, she acted in a play opposite Ruby Dee and Ossie Davis, and participated in the experimental Theater Black troupe, performing the works of Leroi Jones and Norman Jordan. For her senior project, she told stories that had been derived from her childhood in Alcoa. She later earned a master's degree in education from Antioch University. She is a member of Zeta Phi Beta sorority. She also appeared on The Today Show and was profiled in several major newspapers including The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Philadelphia Inquirer, as well as in Essence magazine.

She is the author or editor of six books, has recorded several albums, and her stories have been collected in several anthologies She and Mary Carter Smith co-founded the "In The Tradition..." Annual National Black Storytelling Festival and Conference in 1982, followed in 1984 by the creation of the National Association of Black Storytellers. Goss served as the Association's first president, from 1984–1991. Talk That Talk: an Anthology of African-American Storytelling edited by Linda Goss and Marian E. Barnes (1989) Jump Up and Say! A Collection of Black Storytelling edited by Linda Goss and Clay Goss (1995) It's Kwanzaa Time! by Linda Goss and Clay Goss (1995) The Frog Who Wanted to Be a Singer by Linda Goss (1995) Sayin' Somethin': Stories from the National Association of Black Storytellers edited by Linda Goss, Dylan Pritchett and Caroliese Frink Reed (2006)

Anthologies "The Traveling Storyteller" is featured in On the Horizon (1989), a third-grade reader. Her most well-known story, "The Frog Who Wanted to Be a Singer" appears in Elements of Literature (1989), an eighth grade reader. Her adaptation of "The Ghost Hunt" is included in The Ghost & I: Scary Stories for Participatory Telling (1992). Her "Storytelling Rap" is included in the audio anthology A Storytelling Treasury (1993). Her story "The Tree of Love" is included in I Hear a Symphony: African Americans Celebrate Love (1994). "Rabbit at the Waterhole" is included in Joining In: An Anthology of Audience Participation Stories & How to Tell Them (1995).

Sound recordings Afro-American Folktales and Playsongs by Linda Goss (1980), (re-released 2003) It's Story Telling Time by Linda Goss (1983), (re-released 2001) The Baby Leopard by Linda Goss and Clay Goss (1989) African Tales and Games by Linda Goss (1993)

Awards and honors Goss is a recipient of a 2019 National Heritage Fellowship awarded by the National Endowment for the Arts, which is the United States government's highest honor in the folk and traditional arts. She is the first African-American fellow honored for storytelling. She is also the storyteller-ambassador for the National Great Blacks in Wax Museum, and has been a storyteller-in-residence at the Rosenbach Museum and Library in Philadelphia. In 2013, she received the Kathryn Morgan Award for Folk Arts & Social Justice from the Philadelphia Folklore Project. Morgan was a mentor to Goss. In 2006, she was honored with the Benjamin A. Botkin Scholar Lecturer Award from the American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress. She received the 2006 Leeway Transformation Award for women artists. She earned the 2005 Fellowship in Folk and Traditional Art from the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts. In 2003, Goss received the National Storytelling Network's Oracle lifetime achievement award. In 1995, her book Jump Up and Say! was named as a Literary Guild selection. In 1990, her book Talk That Talk was named as a Book-of-the-Month Club Quality Paperback selection. She became the official storyteller for the city of Philadelphia in 1984, and her image is featured on a mural in that city as "The Traveling Storyteller". Both Alcoa, Tennessee and Washington, D.C. have celebrated "Linda Goss Day" (dates unknown).