Intro to Folklore - masterdoc

folklife

material aspects of folk culture

ethnology

study of folklore

ethnography

folklore field work

oral literature

narrative/verbal form of storytelling

legends

localized, believable stories

folktales

stories of distant places with fantastical elements

performing folk arts

shared culture surrounding music/song, dance, drama, etc.

mumming

Irish folk drama involving elaborate costumes and masks

social folk custom

belief or rite of passage held by a group

folk belief

anything that is not under “official religion”

rag trees

trees where one leaves an offering to receive a blessing

folk

any group of people that share at least one common factor

beáloideas

Irish word for folklore

dictum

traditional sayings

Charlotte Brooke

wrote much folklore down in English

Edward Bunting

first collector of Irish music

Thomas Crofton Croker

liked by the Grimm Brothers who translated his work into German

Lady Jane Francesca Agnes ‘Speranza Wilde

recorded folk medicine with her husband

Lady Jane Francesca Agnes ‘Speranza Wilde

cared a lot about the health/safety of lower classes

Douglas Hyde

first president of Ireland

Douglas Hyde

loved the Irish language and recorded folklore in it

Lady Augusta Gregory

playwright who learned about folklore through Douglas Hyde

historic-geographic method

cataloging as many folktales as possible by location and time period

Vladimir Propp

folklorist who said that all folktales could be boiled down to a set of motifs

functionalism/contextualism

traditions are studied within a broader context

ringforts/ “fairy forts”

archeological remains that have developed lore

ringforts/ “fairy forts”

must remain untouched out of respect to the fairies

Winterage in the Burren

moving animals as necessary

Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm

wrote “Children and Household Tales”

Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm

inspired others to also record folklore

Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm

protested the king and were exiled

Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm

collected stories by listening to multiple accounts of them

Clemens Bretano

recorded folk songs

folklore collecting

provided a deeper historical understanding of Germany

booktale

a combination of various versions of a folktale

romanticism

against the Enlightenment

romanticism

involved a fascination with imagination

romanticism

involved a yearning for “simpler times”

Industrial Revolution

decline of people making material culture with the rise of machinery

biases

many stories from women were not prioritized for various reasons

biases

women often were not allowed/able to collect or record folklore

historical-reconstructional theory

using folklore to determine what a past culture must have been like

historical-reconstructional theory

peeling back the layers of a story’s different iterations to determine one location’s change overtime

ideological theory

using folklore to push an unrelated agenda

functional theory

folklore is analyzed purely by the role it plays in society

psychoanalytical theory

all folktales have an underlying, sexual meaning

psychoanalytical theory

arbitrarily associating different objects with male or female genitalia

structural theory

analyzing the plot of the folktales themselves

oral-formulaic theory

taking into consideration who is telling the story and how

cross-cultural theory

stories are indicative of basic human instincts and experiences

folk-cultural theory

folklore extends to nearly all areas of culture

folk-cultural theory

understanding all aspects surrounding a piece of material culture

mass-cultural theory

people lose their individual culture when they move to a place with a more homogenized one

hemispheric theory

analyzing the folklore of developed and developing societies separately

contextual theory

looking at the surrounding culture of folklore

fairy forts

seen as portals to an alternative world

iron

was seen as a new, almost magical material

fairy trees

trees that grow in the middle of a field away from other trees

numinous

supernatural, mysterious, holy, spiritual

midwives

often seen as magical figures because they aided in keeping babies safe

tailors

associated with fairies because they were often disabled and traveled from place to place

changelings

babies taken by fairies and replaced with a fairy baby or an enchanted object

changelings

reflection of a mother’s anxiety over the health of her child

motifs

building blocks of a narrative

Glas Gaibhneach

fantastical cow of abundance

hagiography

story of a saint’s life

memorate

firsthand experience that becomes a legend

myth

origin of a people/name/natural phenomenon

Balor of the Evil Eye

personification of thunder

the Book of Invasions

origin myth of the first Irish people

Second Battle of Moytura

details how those with blemishes are unfit to rule the Irish people

people of the goddess of Danu

later became the fairies

Travelers

distinctive ethnic group in Ireland that are traditionally nomadic but recently settled due to pressures

vernacular material culture

folklife

form

defining characteristic that determines how an object is categorized

signature quilts

quilts embroidered with names

Ernhaus

a small house with a hearth as the principal element

bed-outshot

a bay window but for a bed

“the room”

area typically behind the chimney, reserved for special things

pot-holes

holes dug into the ground for a pot to be placed when there are leftovers for the pigs to eat

herring griddle pan

slotted griddle for meat to cook on

guisers

disguising yourself to achieve something by going door-to-door

Halloween guisers

early trick-or-treating

All Souls’ Day

dead relatives return to their families and former homes

rites of purification

removing evilness/negativity by employing some natural element

rites of passage

marking transitionary points in one’s life

rites of reversal

changing things that are separated in a binary

rites of conspicuous display

objects or locations are the center of the celebration

rites of conspicuous consumption

rites involving food or drink

ritual dramas

rites that tell some sort of sacred story

rites of exchange

symbolic things are traded between people

rites of competition

rites involving games or challenges

rites of separation

distinguishing the person going through the passage in some way

transition rites

symbolically marking the change from one state to another

rites of incorporation

the person going through the rite is welcomed into their new state

Chalk Sunday

marking unmarried men with chalk

strawboys

people who wore straw over their heads to hide their identities would crash weddings for good luck

rite of devalorization

rite involving returning to how things normally are

Arnold van Gennep

French-educated polyglot who recorded and documented French folklore

Arnold van Gennep

studied different sets of rituals in conjunction with each other instead of completely separately as they had been before