Archival Negotiations: Samaritan Narratives and the Israel Folktale Archives

Abstract

In 1965, the Israel Folktale Archives (IFA) published a small anthology of Samaritan folktales. The article addresses a letter (found at the archive) concerning the publication as well as the poetic aspects of the anthology itself and explores the cultural-political negotiations they entail. I argue that the same-other relationship that characterizes Zionist Jews and Samaritans is staged and embodied in these archival negotiations, manifested in a variety of sources. I suggest that despite their unique characteristics, these archival dynamics may be an intensified example of, rather than an exception to IFA practices.