Folklore

I have decided to take English 391 "Introduction to Folklore" while in the field. I will be working with Professor Jacqueline Thursby. She has mentored many students on this course while out in the field and she is very enthusiastic and excited about the subject of folklore. I adore passionate teachers!

After our first meeting she had me read an article on the basics of folklore. I absolutely ate this article up. It was so fascinating. It talked about the differences between myths, legends, marchen, folktales, memorate, urban legends and all sorts of other folk narratives.

Folklore can be a number of things it can be stories, handicrafts, dances, traditions, as long as they are something that shed greater light on the society it effects or harbors in. In folklore they refer to a story or artifact as an "item". So for ENGLISH 391 I will be collecting as many items as I feel are pertinent for my subject and then creating a finished paper synthesizing the similarities and such between them. Clifford Gertz is quoted in the article as saying that "analaysis is guessing at meanings." That is just what I will be doing with the items I collect in my interviews and conversations.

So to finish this post I will specifically point out what types of stories I will collect.

Genres of Oral Narrative

Myth- a sacred narrative that people tell about the beginnings of things. Often related to religion, ritual and ceremony.

Folktales- completely fictional tales where characters are not real people.

Legends- Stores people tell about events that purportedly really happened. Specifically supernatural legends that include stories of ghost, spirits, witches, dead, and other supernatural creatures and events.

Memorate- an expression of a personal experience with the supernatural

Urban legends- sotres of horror or erriness that involve weird events, close calls or horrible deaths. Local legends would deal with the local location.

Personal Narrative- a unique story about an event that has occurred in the narrator's life (Probably the majority of my items will be personal narrative).