Nice post there, Lizzie. It all makes good sense to me. If you were assuming that "we" think that all people who are into folk music must have a university degree or be intellectuals, you're mistaken. The traditional base of folk music was among the poorer, less educated people. It wasn't until the 1960's that the collegiate crowd, generally, latched onto folk music, due to its sudden boom in popularity. The fact that that collegiate crowd was mostly from fairly prosperous middle class homes determined the general makeup of the mass audience at that point.

This doesn't mean that folk music appreciation is confined to intellectuals by any means, but it takes a more thoughtful or introspective mind to pay attention to the sort of complex lyrics that arose through the influence of Bob Dylan and many other 60's songwriters than it does to pay attention to your standard partying rock n' roll or pop songs. Such thoughtful minds are found both among intellectuals and among non-intellectuals, I assure you.

They always were. They always will be. You are not the odd person out among folk fans that you may think you are. Not in my opinion.

Al Stewart was thought by many listeners and music critics to be an intellectual, because he wrote very erudite song lyrics on very serious subjects. He laughed at that notion, because he didn't consider himself to be an intellectual at all! He figured he was just an ordinary guy. I don't think he ever even went to college or anything like that.

You don't need a diploma to have a way with words.

By the way, I'm a big admirer of Crazy Horse too.