Notes on The Fabrication of Fakelore (Overview Notes)

Fakelore: Definition, Distinctions, and Purpose

• Fakelore is the presentation of spurious and synthetic writings under the claim that they are genuine folklore.
  • Definition (Dorson): "Fakelore is the presentation of spurious and synthetic writings under the claim that they are genuine folklore. These productions are not collected in the field but are rewritten from earlier literary and journalistic sources in an endless chain of regurgitation, or they may even be made out of whole cloth…" (paraphrase of Dundes’ summary from the transcript).
  • Key distinction: fakelore is manufactured or rewritten material presented as authentic oral tradition, not genuine folklore collected in the field.
• Core dichotomy for Dundes: folklore (good) vs. fakelore (evil).
• Fakelore often involves:
  • Rewriting from earlier literary/journalistic sources rather than field collection.
  • Composite or manipulated texts presented as if they arose from oral tradition.
  • Motives of mass edification, commercialization, or nationalist propaganda.
• Not all canonical literary adaptations are fakelore; the issue is the presented claim of oral authenticity when it is manufactured or revised.
• Fakelore is not limited to verbal material; it also extends to non-verbal artifacts (e.g., kilts, clan tartans, open-air museums) that are assembled to look traditional but are products of modern invention or reconfiguration.
• Distinctions from related concepts:
  • Survival: continuity of tradition, even if altered in form.
  • Revival: conscious resuscitation of a tradition that flourished in the past.
  • Fakelore: does not represent an authentic, continuous oral tradition in the form presented.
• Historical importance: fakelore emerged alongside nationalism and the professionalization of folklore studies; its study helps illustrate how cultures construct national narratives.

The Fabrication of Fakelore: Key Concepts and Context

• Origins of the term fakelore (Dorson, 1950s–1970s):
  • In a 1950 issue of American Mercury, Richard M. Dorson coined fakelore and argued for scientific study of folklore while attacking fake folk-lore.
  • He revisited the term in later works (e.g., 1969 article “Fakelore,” and Folklore and Fakelore: Essays toward a Discipline of Folk Studies, 1976).
• Dorson’s definition emphasizes:
  • Non-field, synthetic generation of folklore.
  • Claims of authenticity as genuine folklore when there is none in the oral tradition.
  • The manipulation of texts for commercial, political, or ideological purposes.
• Dorson’s critique targeted:
  • The Bunyan cycle: claims of a body of Paul Bunyan legends when many stories originated in writers or advertising campaigns.
  • Benjamine Botkin’s Treasury of American Folklore: a popular series that relied on printed sources and sometimes rewrote materials for broad audiences; Dorson likened Botkin to a “dude fisherman who buys his catch at the market.”
• Despite his sharp attacks, Dorson did not condemn poets and authors who used genuine folklore as inspiration; his critique targeted fabrications that claimed oral provenance but were manufactured or heavily edited.
• Fakelore vs. literary adaptation:
  • The line between using folklore as inspiration and presenting a rewritten, allegedly authentic folk text is crucial.
• Survival and revival are distinct from fakelore:
  • Fakelore does not represent a tradition that truly existed in the form presented; it is an invention or rewriting presented as if it were natural folklore.
• The historical arc: fakelore has deep roots before the U.S. twentieth century, including Ossian, the Grimms, and Kalevala; often linked to romanticism, nationalism, and attempts to elevate a culture’s status.

Ossian: Macpherson, Fakelore, and Romantic Nationalism

• Background of Ossian controversy:
  • James Macpherson published Fragments of Ancient Poetry Collected in the Highlands of Scotland and Translated from the Gaelic or Erse Language (1760).
  • Subsequent publications: Fingal (1762) and Temora (1763); collectively issued as Poems of Ossian (1765).
  • The same year saw Bishop Percy’s Reliques of Ancient English Poetry (1765).
  • Samuel Johnson and David Hume raised doubts about the authenticity of the Ossianic poems.
• Hume’s role and modern-sounding demand for oral testimony:
  • In a 1763 letter, Hume asked for proof, insisting that proofs must include oral tradition, and he emphasized verifiable oral sources.
• Macpherson’s method and its critique:
  • He drew on Gaelic fragments and other materials, then shaped them into a unified epic.
  • He used poetic license, mixed versions, and added/deleted material to create cohesive narratives.
  • The resulting texts often misrepresented Gaelic dialect and narrative flow; some scholars describe them as composites rather than faithful oral renditions.
  • It is difficult to determine which elements were truly oral fragments vs. manuscript materials; Macpherson did not publish the full originals of his field notes.
• Macpherson’s Ossian as fakelore, but with catalytic influence:
  • Ossian probably began with some oral source material but was reshaped into a unified, literary epic, not a direct transcription of authentic oral tradition.
  • Despite fakelore labeling, Ossian significantly influenced European romanticism, primitivism, and nationalism; it suggested that epics could arise from modern, uneducated peasants rather than classical antiquity.
• The broader significance:
  • Ossian spurred interest in “the poetry of the common man” across Europe.
  • A synthesis of romanticism, primitivism, and nationalism emerged, shaping 19th-century folkloristics and the modern study of folk traditions.
• Key takeaway: Ossian exemplifies early fakelore—textual revision and synthesis presented as ancient oral poetry—and also demonstrates the powerful cultural lure of “folk epics” in nation-building.

The Grimms: Collectors or Rewriters? fakelore in Kinder- und Hausmärchen

• Grimms’ claims vs. practice:
  • 1812: Kinder- und Hausmärchen (Children's and Household Tales) declared to present fairy tales as purely as possible, with no embellishment or change.
  • 1815: Circular laid out tall claims about faithful oral collection directly from narrators, with minimal or no make-up.
• The gap between claim and practice:
  • In reality, the Grimms combined multiple variants to create composite texts.
  • They edited tales to simplify or reshape them beyond the original forms.
• Source masking and field-note destruction:
  • Grimms allegedly masked the true sources and even destroyed original field notes to prevent exposure of their elaborations and rewriting.
  • The effect: the public could be persuaded that these tales were collected verbatim from peasant storytellers when much of the material had been materially edited.
• The Dorothea Viehmann example:
  • The Grimms presented Viehmann as an ideal simple Hessian peasant who told tales from memory, yet she was educated, literate, and French as her first language, contradicting the peasant image.
• Scholarly reception and moral:
  • Some scholars view the Grimms as exemplary folklorists who advanced the discipline; others see them as emblematic of fakelore because of extensive editing and presentation as authentic oral tradition.
• Conclusion about the Grimms:
  • While their reconstructions and editorial choices complicate the idea of “pure” field collection, their work also catalyzed a science of folklore and inspired countless collectors to gather local traditions.
• Overall takeaway: the Grimms illustrate how fakelore can emerge when collection, editing, and national romanticism intertwine, even as the Grimms remain foundational to folklore studies.

Kalevala and Lönnrot: Finnish National Epic or Fakelore?

• Lönnrot’s project and the Kalevala:
  • 1831: Finnish Literature Society established to support folklore collection.
  • 1835: Kalevala first edition published; 32 poems, 5,052 lines.
  • 1849: Revised edition; ~50 poems, 22,795 lines.
  • It is not entirely clear how many Finns saw Kalevala as an authentic oral epic; some understood it as a composite of older songs compiled and organized by Lönnrot.
• The composite nature of Kalevala:
  • William Wilson notes that Kalevala is a composite epic; individual songs were not recited as a single, unaltered set by the people. The epic as presented is a constructed narration assembled from multiple sources.
• Finnish scholarly debate:
  • Kaarel Krohn, a leading Finnish folklorist, argued that Lönnrot could be considered a folk poet and Kalevala could serve as a national epic, even if not strictly folklore in scientific terms.
  • Martti Haavio argued that Kalevala is a clear counterfeit and not regular folklore, highlighting the tension between national sentiment and scientific validity.
• Nationalism vs. scientific folklore:
  • Finnish nationalism and romanticism often trump the scientific critique; many Finns preferred to believe Kalevala as authentic folk epic rather than as a sophisticated literary reconstruction.
  • The Estonian Kalevipoeg faced a similar dynamic in which nationalist fervor often outweighed critical scrutiny of its provenance.
• Implications for folkloristics:
  • The Kalevala demonstrates how a national epic can be built from fragmentary oral material and still function as a pillar of national identity, even if it is not a straightforward representation of authentic oral tradition.
• Key takeaway: Kalevala exemplifies fakelore in a national context, where cultural and political motivations shape the reception and legitimacy of a supposed “folk epic.”

Paul Bunyan: American Fakelore and National Identity

• Emergence and popularization:
  • First print appearance around the early 20th century: Detroit Tribune, July 25, 1910 ($1910$), and a 1914 thirty-page booklet Introducing Mr. Paul Bunyan of Westwood Cal. ($1914$).
  • Benjamin Botkin’s Treasury of American Folklore (1944) became a major mass-market compilation.
• Dorson’s critique and timing:
  • Dorson criticized both the Bunyan materials and Botkin’s Treasury as fakelore, while noting the importance of their influence on American folklore perception.
  • He emphasized the literary rehashing of oral materials and the invention of new details that fed into a national mythos.
• The national identity function:
  • Paul Bunyan serves as a symbol of America’s scale and resource exploitation (clearing land, profiting from natural resources).
  • Bunyan is portrayed more as a symbol of physical power than of intellectual sophistication; he embodies a robust, direct, non-diplomatic problem-solving style.
• Cultural impact and reception:
  • Dozens of Paul Bunyan statues dominate American landscapes in front of lodges and highway restaurants, underscoring the integration of the character into the national consciousness.
  • The dust jacket of Dorson’s American Folklore and the Historian features a picture of Paul Bunyan, illustrating the paradox of scholarly critique and popular culture coexistence.
• Is Bunyan fakelore?:
  • Dundes suggests that labeling Paul Bunyan as fakelore may be overly simplistic; instead, Bunyan represents a form of culturally manufactured epic that has become lore in practice.
• Conclusion about Bunyan:
  • Bunyan exemplifies how fakelore can satisfy a national need for identity, pride, and myth-making—even as it complicates the boundary between folklore and manufactured tradition.

Fakelore, Nationalism, and Inferiority Complexes

• A common thread across cases:
  • Nationalism and the desire to construct a powerful cultural self-image often drive fakelore production.
  • A sense of cultural inferiority can motivate intellectuals to reconstruct or embellish folklore to match or surpass perceived classical civilizations.
• Historical patterns by region and era:
  • Scotland (Ossian): Romanticism, nationalism, and a desire to place Highland culture on the European stage; Hume’s critical stance reflects tension between pride and authenticity.
  • Germany (18th century): Cultural backwardness prompted a national project to elevate German folklore and language; later used in nationalist ideologies (and Nazi propaganda) to promote anti-Semitic stereotypes.
  • Finland and Karelia (Kalevala): Finnish national awakening and resistance to Swedish cultural domination; Kalevala became a cornerstone of Finnish literature but was acknowledged by some scholars as not strictly folklore.
  • Belgium (Ulenspiegel): Reworking of Ulenspiegel by Charles De Coster to become a national symbol; celebrated as a national poet, though heavily revised.
  • Switzerland (Tell/folk contests): Nationalist fervor organized and institutionalized popular memory for nation-building.
  • Elsewhere: Similar patterns across other nations show how fakelore and invented traditions can serve political and cultural consolidation.
• The role of “inferiority” in motivation:
  • Dundes argues that widespread inferiority complexes can drive intellectuals to embellish or fabricate folk traditions to claim equality with dominant cultures, thereby producing fakelore as a form of cultural compensatory action.
• Open-ended question for folklorists:
  • If folklore is tied to nationalism, fakelore may be rooted in, or at least reinforced by, cultural insecurity and the urge to compete with “great” cultural heritage.
• Folklorismus and modern mass culture:
  • The trend of turning folklore into commodified and tourist-friendly artifacts (open-air museums, staged villages, tartans) is another form of fakelore—produced for profit and public consumption rather than as authentic tradition.
• Important nuance:
  • The boundary between fakelore and folklore can blur over time; composite texts may enter oral tradition, and discredited sources can still influence later folklore as cultural memory.

Folklore Studies: Implications, Limits, and Methodology

• Theoretical implications:
  • Fakelore challenges simple dichotomies between authentic folklore and fabrication; it invites scholars to study how communities respond to, reinterpret, and sometimes legitimize manufactured traditions.
  • The idea of invented tradition (Hobsbawm and Ranger) provides a framework to understand why fakelore arises and persists in various cultures.
• Practical implications for folklorists:
  • Treat fakelore as data: analyze its social functions, audiences, and purposes (nationalism, identity formation, propaganda, tourism, cultural capital).
  • Recognize that fakelore can influence authentic traditions and shape public perception of a culture’s heritage.
  • Distinguish clearly between source materials and the narrativized form presented to the public; be aware of editorial processes, composite texts, and the selection of narrators.
• The question of legitimacy:
  • Some fakelore may eventually influence or be incorporated into folk memory; however, in most cases it remains a product of modern literary or political construction rather than a living oral tradition.
• Broader cultural relevance:
  • Fakelore is not unique to twentieth-century America; it appears across centuries and geographies (Ossian, Kalevala, Grimm Tales, Ulenspiegel, etc.).
• Final stance: a productive approach is to study fakelore with the same rigor as folklore, using folkloristic tools to understand how cultures negotiate memory, identity, and power.

Fakelore Across Cultures and Time

• Parallel cases beyond the American context include:
  • Ossian (Scotland): 18th-century nationalism and literary invention influencing Romanticism.
  • Kalevala (Finland) and the Kalevipoeg (Estonia): national epics with contested provenance, embraced for national identity despite questions of oral authenticity.
  • The Grimm brothers (Germany): carefully curated claims of oral collection contrasted with deliberate editorial recomposition.
  • Ulenspiegel (Belgium) and De Coster: national myth-making through revision and embellishment.
  • Switzerland and other nations: folklorismus and staged cultural heritage as symbols of national unity.
  • Nazi Germany: the deliberate use of folklore to bolster anti-Semitic propaganda and propaganda-driven myth-making.
• Takeaway:
  • Fakelore is a transhistorical and transnational phenomenon; nationalism and self-image often motivate the production of “folk” narratives that are, in fact, engineered or heavily edited.

Conclusions: The Value of Studying Fakelore

• It is not productive to categorically condemn fakelore as merely inauthentic; its existence sheds light on:
  • How cultures construct and project identity.
  • The interplay between power, memory, and culture in nation-building.
  • The mechanisms by which open-air museums, national epics, and popular legends are produced and disseminated.
• A constructive stance for folklorists:
  • Embrace fakelore as a legitimate subject of study, applying folkloristic methods to understand its social functions, reception, and long-term cultural impact.
  • Acknowledge that fakelore may occasionally influence or merge with genuine folklore over time, even if it remains a manufactured artifact.
• Paul Bunyan as a case study:
  • The Bunyan saga is not simply “fake” folklore; it has become a durable element of American culture and identity, illustrating how fakelore can be integrated into a national consciousness.

Notes (Selected References from the Transcript)

• 1. Richard M. Dorson, "Fakelore," Zeitschrift für Volkskunde 65 (1969): 60.
• 2. Richard M. Dorson, Folklore and Fakelore: Essays toward a Discipline of Folk Studies (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1976), p. 5.
• 3. Ibid., p. 7.
• 4. Daniel Hoffman, Paul Bunyan: Last of the Frontier Demigods (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1952), p. 74; Richard M. Dorson, American Folklore (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1959), pp. 217–18.
• 5. Edith Fowke, "In Defense of Paul Bunyan," New York Folklore 5 (1979): 43–51.
• 6. Richard M. Dorson, "Folklore and Fakelore," American Mercury 70 (1950): 338.
• 7. Phyllis A. Harrison, "Samuel Johnson's Folkloristics," Folklore 94 (1983): 57–65.
• 8. David Hume, Essays: Moral, Political and Literary (London: Longmans, 1898), Vol. 2, pp. 415–24.
• 9. Neil R. Grobman, "David Hume and the Earliest Scientific Methodology for Collecting Balladry," Western Folklore 34 (1975): 29.
• 10. David Hume, The Letters of David Hume, ed. J. Y. T. Greig (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1932), Vol. 1, p. 399.
• 11. Neil R. Grobman, “Eighteenth-Century Scottish Philosophers on Oral Tradition," Journal of the Folklore Institute 10 (1973): 193; idem, "David Hume and the Earliest Scientific Methodology," p. 29.
• 12. Derick S. Thomson, The Gaelic Sources of Macpherson's Ossian (Folcroft, PA: Folcroft Press, 1969).
• 13. Ibid., pp. 29, 55.
• 14. Ibid., p. 71.
• 15. Bailey Saunders, The Life and Letters of James Macpherson (New York: Haskell House, 1968), pp. 9, 140.
• 16. Ibid., p. 252.
• 17. Ibid., p. 174.
• 18. Ibid., pp. 180, 190, 249.
• 19. John M. Ellis, One Fairy Story Too Many: The Brothers Grimm and Their Tales (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1983).
• 20. Ibid., p. 32. See also Heinz Rölleke, "The 'Utterly Hessian' Fairy Tales by 'Old Marie': The End of a Myth," in Ruth B. Bottigheimer, ed., Fairy Tales and Society: Illusion, Allusion, and Paradigm (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1986), pp. 287–300.
• 21. Ibid., p. 96.
• 22. Ibid., p. 100.
• 23. William A. Wilson, Folklore and Nationalism in Modern Finland (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1976), p. 40.
• 24. Jouko Hautala, Finnish Folklore Research 1828-1918 (Helsinki: Societas Scientarum Fennica, 1968), p. 104; Wilson, Folklore and Nationalism, pp. 74–75.
• 25. Hautala, Finnish Folklore Research, p. 120; Wilson, Folklore and Nationalism, p. 75; cf. Hans Fromm. "Elias Lönnrot als Schöpfer des finnischen Epos Kalevala," in Volksepen der uralischen und altaischen Völker, ed. Wolfgang Veenker, Ural-Altaischen Bibliothek 16 (Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowitz, 1968), pp. 1–12.
• 26. Wilson, Folklore and Nationalism, p. 75.
• 27. Ibid., p. 123.
• 28. Olli Alho, "On Nationalism in a National Science," Acta Sociologica 20 (1977): 293–99; Aimo Turunen, "Folk Epic to National Epic: Kalevala and Kalevipoeg," in Folklorica: Festschrift for Felix J. Oinas, ed. Egle Victoria Žygas and Peter Voorheis, Indiana University Uralic and Altaic Series 141 (Bloomington: Research Institute for Inner Asian Studies, 1982), pp. 277–89.
• 29. Otto A. Webermann, "Kreutzwalds 'Kalevipoeg': Zur Problematik des estnischen Epos," in Volksepen der uralischen und altaischen Völker, pp. 13–35; Aimo Turunen, "Folk Epic to National Epic."
• 30. Richard M. Dorson, "The American Folk Scene, 1963," Folklore 74 (1963): 439; cf. William S. Fox, "Folklore and Fakelore: Some Sociological Considerations," Journal of the Folklore Institute 17 (1980): 251.
• 31. Hoffman, Paul Bunyan, p. 97; Edith Fowke, "In Defense of Paul Bunyan," p. 45.
• 32. Saunders, The Life and Letters of James Macpherson, pp. 183–87, 196.
• 33. Hume, Letters, Vol. 2, p. 310.
• 34. Hume, Essays, Vol. 2, p. 416.
• 35. Grobman, “David Hume and the Earliest Scientific Methodology," p. 18.
• 36. Hugh Trevor-Roper, "The Invention of Tradition; The Highland Tradition of Scotland," in The Invention of Tradition, ed. Eric Hobsbawm and Terence Ranger (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983), p. 18.
• 37. Ellis, One Fairy Story Too Many, p. 3.
• 38. Wilson, Folklore and Nationalism, p. 5.
• 39. Ibid., pp. 19–20.
• 40. Fowke, “In Defense of Paul Bunyan," pp. 43–51.
• 41. Dorson, American Folklore, pp. 216–17.
• 42. Hobsbawm and Ranger, eds., The Invention of Tradition, p. 8.
• 43. Trevor-Roper, "The Invention of Tradition; The Highland Tradition of Scotland."
• 44. Cf. Edward Shils, Tradition (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1981), p. 62.
• 45. For example, on Finland, see Wilson, Folklore and Nationalism and W. R. Mead, "Kalevala and the Rise of Finnish Nationality," Folklore 73 (1962): 217–29; on Greece, see Michael Herzfeld, Ours Once More: Folklore, Ideology and the Making of Modern Greece (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1982); on Russia, see Felix J. Oinas, "The Political Uses and Themes of Folklore in the Soviet Union," Journal of the Folklore Institute 12 (1975): 157–75.
• 46. Cf. Hermann Bausinger, "Volksideologie und Volksforschung: Zur national-sozialistischen Volkskunde," Zeitschrift für Volkskunde 61 (1965): 1–8; Wolfgang Emmerich, Zur Kritik der Volkstumsideologie (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1971); Christa Kamanetsky, "Folklore as a Political Tool in Nazi Germany," Journal of American Folklore 85 (1972): 221–35; idem, "Folktale and Ideology in the Third Reich," Journal of American Folklore 90 (1977): 168–78.
• 47. Wolfgang Mieder, "Proverbs in Nazi Germany: The Promulgation of Anti-Semitism and Stereotypes through Folklore," Journal of American Folklore 95 (1982): 458.
• 48. Dorson, "Fakelore," p. 64.
• 49. Fox, "Folklore and Fakelore," p. 251.
• 50. Joseph Hanse, “Le centenaire de 'La Légende d'Ulenspiegel,'" Bulletin de l'Académie Royale de Langue et le Littérature Françaises 45 (1967): 85–86; Alois Gerlo, “La Légende d'Ulenspiegel van Charles De Coster en Vlaanderen," Revue de l'Université de Bruxelles 21 (1968–1969): 47.
• 51. Rudolf Braun, Socialer und kultureller Wandel in einem ländlichen Industriegebiet im 19. und 20. Jahrhundert (Erlenbach-Zürich: E. Rentsch, 1965), pp. 327–36.
• 52. Alsace C. Yen, "Red China's Use of Folklore," Literature East and West 8 (1964): 72–87; Chung-chiang Yen, "Folklore Research in Communist China," Asian Folklore Studies 26 (1967): 1–62.
• 53. Oinas, "The Political Uses."
• 54. Cf. Hermann Bausinger, "Folklorismus in Europa: Eine Umfrage," Zeitschrift für Volkskunde 65 (1969): 1–8.
• 55. Dorson, "Fakelore," p. 60.
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