Abstract
The AA. explore why communication between the disciplines of Folklore Studies (Volkskunde), Cultural Studies, and Social History - each concerned with the cultural - has been so uneven and incomplete in (and outside) Dutch and British academe. Folklore Studies in the Netherlands and England stood outside the politically engaged discussions that were involved in the emergence of popular history and Cultural Studies. As far as communication took place, it seems mainly to have been limited to the history of the early modern period. The AA. argue that this disjunction has to do with the Marxist orientation of both Social History and Cultural Studies, neither of which focused on the rural in the way that Folklore Studies did. This silence was deepened by the marginal and conservative image of Folklore Studies, as well as by some folklorists' fears of blurring the border between the political and the scientific. By investigating the reasons for silences across these disciplines, the AA. hope to stimulate transdisciplinary work, since today productive differences and obvious complementarities of theme, theory, method, and political formation and engagement exist among the three fields.
Highlights
IN THIS ESSAY, which is based upon a paper we gave at the Seventh SIEF Conference in Budapest in April 2001, we present some results of an ongoing dialogue between the two of us over the past years
A recent focus of our discussions has been the relations between Folklore Studies, Social History, and Cultural Studies
At the time a group of us regularly crossed the English Channel in order to visit History Workshop gatherings, where in 1979 I was present during a heated public debate between Stuart Hall, Edward Thompson, and RichardJohnson about history and theory.! Mter finishing my studies, I worked for ten years as a freelance journalist/historian more or less outside the academy, though I was an active member of the board of the Dutch Oral History Society and the history group of the Communist Party
Summary
IN THIS ESSAY, which is based upon a paper we gave at the Seventh SIEF Conference in Budapest in April 2001, we present some results of an ongoing dialogue between the two of us over the past years. It is important to remember that neither Social History nor Cultural Studies has been exempt from the historical connection with ethnicized nationalism that has so often haunted Folklore Studies.
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