Aspects Of Folklore Research Articles

XXI. YUZYILDA TURKIYE KISI ADLARINA BIR BAKIS

Personal names include significant acquirements about cultural, social, political and folkloric aspects of a nation. in this study, it has been tried to evaluaie the personal names of Turkey in 2Jst century, as a rejlection of Turkish culture.

Poetic Negrism and the National Sentiment of Anti-West Indianism and Anti-Imperialism in Panamanian Literature

Poetic Negrism and the National Sentiment of Anti-West Indianism and Anti-Imperialism in Panamanian Literature Sonja Stephenson Watson (bio) While Panamanian negrista literature during the early-twentieth century protested North American imperialism and hegemony, another result of the presence of the United States in Panamá was a decided increase in anti-West Indian hatred that had its beginnings in the mid-nineteenth century. From 1850 to 1855, approximately 45,000 Jamaicans migrated to Panamá to construct the Trans-Isthmian Railroad. The attempted construction of the French Canal from 1880–1889 would bring 84,000 additional Jamaicans to Panamá. After France’s failure, the United States intervened in 1903 and imported as many as 19,900 West Indian workers from Barbados as well as a small number of workers from Martinique, Guadalupe, and Trinidad to complete the Panamá Canal (1904–1914). Thus, the thousands of English-speaking West Indian immigrants who migrated to Panamá during the nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries to help build the nation were now viewed as a threat to the nation-building project because of their blackness and unwillingness to assimilate. This essay argues that the discrimination against West Indians and the stereotypical portrayals of blacks during the negrista period (1920–1960)1 in Panamá was racially motivated and enhanced by a national hatred of United States imperialism. The negrista movement flourished during the 1920s and 1930s in the Hispanic Caribbean and was a pseudo-black poetry that focused on the black body, the supposed sexual prowess of people of African descent, and black people’s love of music and propensity for rhythm (Cartey 67). Negrista poets such as Luis Palés Matos (1898–1957), Emilio Ballagas (1910–1954), and Manuel del Cabral (1907–1999) portrayed African-derived cultures through appropriated poetic devices such as onomatopoeia, repetition, rhythm, and rhyme. Although this poetry focused on images of black life, it was primarily a movement of white intellectuals who objectified and portrayed them in stereotypical fashion. As a result, the movement has often been viewed as the “exploitation of black culture by white writers” (Cartey 41). These poets portrayed blacks and African-derived culture as wholly sensual, exotic, and sexual without any psychological or cultural depth. The black literary image that materialized during this period was often superficial, and rarely focused on the socio-historical and socioeconomic factors that plagued black America such as poverty, discrimination, and racism that burdened dark-skinned West Indians. In reading the literature of Panamanian writers Víctor Franceschi and Demetrio Korsi, which coincided with the aftermath of the construction of the Panamá Canal (post-1914), it is evident that their negrista poems served a purpose other than portraying Afro-Panamanian culture. Decades after the completion of the canal, which resided between the heavily black populated [End Page 459] cities of Panamá and Colón, Panamanians resented the “looming” United States presence in the canal zone. Negrista poetry responded to North American imperialism by vigorously denouncing United States presence and policy in the region and railing against Afro-Caribbean immigrants who comprised a majority of the canal zone workers.2 Although negrista writers argued that there were cultural and linguistic differences between Afro-Hispanics, blacks who were enslaved in Panamá, and Afro-Caribbeans, the literature makes clear that the hatred was inspired by racist assumptions about dark-skinned West Indians. Similar to other negrista writers, Franceschi and Korsi objectified blacks in their works and portrayed them uniformly with little regard for cultural or historical differences. However, the writers’ poems and essays confirm a particular racial prejudice towards West Indians. Many Panamanian critics acknowledge the anti-imperialistic tone of the works of this period, but none link anti-imperialism with anti-West Indianism.3 My analysis of the negrista movement in Panamá challenges other interpretations that primarily focus on the folkloric aspects of these poems by examining the role that racism played in the negrista writings of Franceschi and Korsi during the apex of the anti-imperialism crusade of the early-twentieth century. Moreover, the West Indian presence coupled with the anti-imperialism agenda contested the mestizaje (“race-mixing”) ideology that characterized Panamá during the nineteenth century. In turn, Panamanian nationalists conflated black...

Ancient Sacred Places in Lithuania: Crossroads of Geography, Archaeology and Folklore

This article addresses the current stage of research on Lithuania’s ancient sacred places. Numerous examples and discussions prove that these are cases for cross-disciplinary investigation. Although they are different, all the geographical, archaeologi­cal, linguistic and folklore aspects are important, and urgently require careful consideration, both by analysis and synthesis. The article discusses the Lithuanian term senoji sventvietė (‘ancient sacred place’) and difficulties concerning the understand­ing of it. The division of sacred places into areas is presented from a geographical point of view; historical factors are men­tioned, as well. Attention is drawn to the local geographical features of sacred places, such as, for instance, their association with the points of the compass. The amount of archaeological stray finds with respect to sacred places is discussed. Finally, some important details are pointed out, while presenting research into place names and folklore associated with sacred places. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/ 10.15181/ab.v15i1.21

LEGENDARY PERFORMANCES folklore, Repertoire and Mapping

Maps can play an important role in understanding the close connection between individuals, their lived environment and their story repertoires. The legend genre is particularly related to local environment. Although the original historic-geographic method proposed by Kaarle and Julius Krohn has been largely abandoned by folklorists, the role the map can play in advancing our understanding of the important relationships between teller, told and the environment should not be dismissed. A new approach to folklore repertoire is presented here. This approach makes use of digital archival resources and geographic information systems that allow folklorists to visualize and interpret aspects of folklore closely linked to the environment. This paper presents several small experiments based on the legend collections of Evald Tang Kristensen as an illustration of the power of this new historic-geographic approach.<br>

A Study on the Aspects of Folklore in Korean Fantastic Children's Story

A Study on the Aspects of Folklore in Korean Fantastic Children's Story

Towards a Poetics, Rhetorics and Proxemics of Verbal Charms

This article is intended as a first attempt to assemble and, where necessary, to newly devise, a series of terms which can be used to indicate the poetical features 1 and rhetorical structures and devices typically present in the words of a charm, and also the proxemic manoeuvres employed in the “performance” of charms. 2 In the English-speaking world academic investigations into individual verbal charms and into whole charm traditions have tended to be undeveloped in approach and few in number, excepting, of course, the standard authorities on the Anglo-Saxon charms. 3 Such studies of English-language charms as have been carried out, most especially in the late- and post-medieval fields, have been limited, hampered by the lack of adequate critical terminology. This tendency for charmstudies to be undeveloped when compared with studies of other aspects of folklore is not just apparent in the English-speaking world: Rorbye (1992: 435) discussing “the first wave of folkloristic documentation 1880–1960” in the Nordic countries, comments that folk medicine (the general area which the majority of charms fall under) 4 “was chiefly studied [--- as] a means to the end in the programme of evolutionistic reconstruction” i.e. it was admitted into folkloristics as a theme and not as a free-standing phenomenon or genre. Similarly, Conrad (1989: 422) remarks: As if embarrassed by continuing popular faith in the efficacy of charms and incantations despite the availability of modern regional hospitals, Soviet folklorists until recently relegated newly collected examples to archives. Even the notable exceptions, major studies by Astaxova, Minkov, Petrov, Tokarev and Toporov, were published in books or journals with very small print runs. Thus while primarily written from and addressed to the English cultural tradition, the article may also prove of interest to students of charms in other cultural traditions. The gathering-together of these terms, and the concepts they embody, from a variety of chiefly European sources, should help open up debate of local and com

American Folklore: A Guide to Reference Sources

Libraries have long played an important role in the preservation, appreciation, and perpetuation of American traditions. As early as 1928, the Archive of American Folk‐Song was established in the Library of Congress to maintain a national collection of manuscripts and recordings of American folk songs. The archive's mission broadened to include all aspects of folklore and folklife, prompting a name change in 1981 to the Archive of Folk Culture. Today, the archive serves as a national repository for primary source material on American folklore, spoken word as well as music, and provides reference and reader services for the fields of folklore and ethnomusicology. In 1976, the American Folklife Center was established at the Library of Congress, and the archive was placed under its auspices. Charged with developing, promoting, and implementing programs that support American folklife, the center sponsors an active research and publications program. Archives are not the only connection, however, between libraries and folklore. With collections and performances of folktales in children's departments, folklore in school programs, family and local history collections in public libraries, and academic research collections, folklore engages a broad spectrum of library users.

The Skeleton Army and the Bonfire Boys, Worthing, 1884

The picture that emerged from my subsequent researches' was as unexpected as it was fascinating. Unexpected, first, becasuse the cause for the violent reaction was the arrival of the Salvation Army in Worthing in the Autumn of 1883; and secondly, because the focal point for the opposition to their presence came from the local Bonfire Club, whose dedication to the traditions of the November 5 celebrations far surpassed even the most fervent manifestations likely to be found today. Since many other towns of southern England experienced similar disurbances, with Sussex being especially prominent,2 it became clear that a major episode in folk history has been neglected.3 I hope in this short study to at least try and remedy this neglect. As most of my research has been confined to events in Worthing, I shall here be concentrating upon that town; it must be stressed, however, that 'Skeleton Armies' appeared elsewhere too, and that the turbulent history of Guy Fawkes Night and its Bonfire Clubs was of special significance to the working classes throughout Sussex. What happened in Worthing was but one part of a much larger story. Before examining the specifically folkloric aspects of the Worthing disturbances, I think it essential to give a short introductory historical narrative. Without an understanding of the historical context, these events could seem little more than religious bigotry and mindless violence. William Booth founded the Salvation Army in 1878. Its aim was to rekindle the popular evangelism of early Methodism, but in the process it launched a vigorous propaganda campaign against drink, tobacco, gambling, boxing, music halls, and other 'social evils'-which were much enjoyed pleasures for the working classes. The military aspect of Booth's organization undoubtedly owed much to the jingoistic climate of the time; late Vicorian psychology was closely wedded.to the ideals of military glory and its accompanying pomp. Yet Booth was no friend of the Victorian Establishment; his Army was to be an army of the poor and luckless, the same 'dangerous classes' that respectable opinion so feared. Many Conservatives were worried by an attempt to organize the working classes into a movement, let alone an 'Army.' Social change was regarded as dangerously subversive (the first edition of the Conservative Worthing Gazette promised its readers that it would '...discourage the morbid craving for change'); yet throughout the 1880s political and social changes were increasingly urged, whether by the newly formed Social Democratic Federation, the Irish Land League, or the Liberals with their demands that male franchise be extended to such an extent that, for the first time, the potential for real power lay with the working classes.

Inquiry into Folklife in Australia

AbstractBecause I had trained myself to fill every possible spare minute writing at my desk after my normal working hours as a school principal, when I retired I just went on busily writing books in the daytime rather than late at night, taking a small part in the organization of Australian writers, and travelling regularly overseas to China, and, if anything, was far more relaxed although perhaps less productive than before. My simple aim, I thought, was to complete as many of the unfinished works on my shelves as possible, including several concerning aspects of folklore.

The Image of Stalin in Soviet Russian Folklore

as the Golden era of folklore scholarship in the Soviet Union, for during these years, folklore, like literature, was a field of scholarly endeavor relatively free from direct government interference.1 The 1925 edict by the Central Committee of the Party allowed the free competition of various groups and currents, and in this atmosphere Formalist scholars as well as followers of the historical and Finnish schools made valuable contributions to the study of Russian folklore.2 But at the beginning of the first five-year plan in 1929, when the publication of literature was put under the control of RAPP (Russian Association of Proletarian Writers), folklore became the subject of much debate and criticism. Both RAPP and its predecessor PROLETKULT (Proletarian Cultural and Educational Organizations) maintained that folklore was harmful to the Soviet people.3 Adherents of the PROLETKULT called for the eradication of all aspects of folklore and even created a children's PROLETKULT which sought to abolish folktales.4 In criticizing the ideological backwardness of folklore, RAPP branded it a harmful survival of the past which should not be cultivated as art.5 Other groups such as LEF (Left Front of Art), KOMFUT (Communist Futurists), and the followers of Pereversev felt that folklore was the mediocre re-

Zacharie, ou le père évincé. Les rites nuptiaux toscans entre Giotto et le concile de Trente

Zacchariah, or the father driven forth. Tuscan nuptials between Giotto and the Council of Trent Christiane Klapisch-Zuber "The Marriage of the Virgin" was an important theme in Italian iconography in the 14th and 15th centuries. This predilection inspired by the Church, seems to have been particularly marked in a period when nuptial rites were undergoing profound changes, and it is evidence of the clergy's efforts to control the crucial phases of these changes. This essay reconstructs the process of the marriage ritual in Florence, mainly from Florentine family books. It highlights the marginal role played by the clergy in this process and the tendency to concentrate the theologically and juridically most significant episodes (for both laity and clergy) around the presentation of the wedding ring This attraction is expressed, in representations of the "Marriage of the Virgin", by focusing on the wedding ring. The church setting and the role accorded to the priest are expressions of the Church's ambition to attract folk rituals to it, even at the cost of introducing certain aspects of folklore which it was later to abhor and which it eliminated in the 16th century.

Popular Music in Finland: A Preliminary Survey

thoroughly studied, but little is known about the relative influence of these traditions. As to popular (commercial) music, no scholarly attention has ever been paid to it, even down to the present day (Seeger 1965:10). The aim of this paper is to present a preliminary survey of Finnish popular music. The orientation is more sociological than musicological. Detailed musicological analysis will not be found in this study, and the approach is macroscopic and generalizing. There are no general works on Finnish social history of the past hundred years. Despite the fact that Finnish folklore scholarship is fairly well known internationally, it has concentrated on the verbal aspects of folklore, and very little has been written about Finnish folk music. Comparative studies of popular music in other countries are not available. Thus it is not surprising that the present paper leaves many questions unanswered and many details too vague, but I have preferred to leave it that way rather than wait a few more decades until sufficient background information is available. In short, I shall try to follow the major changes which have occurred in social behavior related to music in Finland during the past hundred years, and correlate these changes with the new musical forms that have appeared. Such a historical approach stresses innovation and change, while in fact old musical forms usually remain alive for a long time along with new forms. Therefore I shall also discuss musical taste and musico-social groups in today's Finland.

Some Scandinavian Sacrifices

ONE of the most fascinating aspects of folklore is the possibility that pre-Christian beliefs and rituals may occasionally survive, their meaning forgotten, in curious traditional customs of more recent centuries. But this line of inquiry is beset with pitfalls, since in all but a few cases we unfortunately have only the most meagre scraps of information about the many varieties of heathen religion in pre-Christian Europe. The student of English folklore feels particularly hampered by the gaps in our knowledge of AngloSaxon heathenism, and is soon forced to turn to the far fuller records of Scandinavia in search of illuminating parallels. It would, of course, be very foolish to assume that every religious belief recorded in the North must also have been known in England; however, the two cultures have enough in common to justify a cautious use of this approach. One reason why Scandinavian heathenism is comparatively well documented is that conversion to Christianity took place there much later than elsewhere in Europe. Moreover, the preservation of heathen poetry in Icelandic oral tradition, and the antiquarian interests of thirteenth-century Icelandic authors, notably Snorri Sturluson, combine to give us a remarkably full picture of the mythology of the North. But myths are only part of a religion; the folklorist will also want to know something of the rites with which the gods were honoured, and here our Icelandic sources are far less helpful. Eyrbyggja saga describes a temple; The Saga of Hakon the Good in Snorri's Heimskringla gives a few details of the ritual at the midwinter feasts of Norway; a few other sagas preserve small but precious details. But all too often a saga tells us vaguely that some character (usually an unpleasant one) was 'a great man for sacrifices', but keeps complete silence as to how these sacrifices were carried out, and for what purpose. Very likely many of the writers

The Mawwal in Egyptian Folklore

THE LARGEST BODY of Arabic literature has been preserved in formal Classical Arabic. Until recently, however, folklore has not been included in literature, because it represents traditions of Arabs as they appear in popular fiction, custom and belief, magic and ritual, and because these traditions, even when recorded, are expressed in colloquial Arabic-a language which has not been recognized by traditional Arab writers and grammarians as a tool for writing literature. With few exceptions, Arabic literature throughout its history has also failed to describe or express many aspects of Egyptian life which colloquial Egyptian Arabic has treated and is continuing to describe at present time. The life in Egyptian prisons, spontaneous songs of misahharati (the man who walks in streets after midnight calling Moslems to take their last meal during fasting month of Ramadan), stories of superstitions which are narrated among people from generation to generation, and many other folklore aspects are found only in colloquial Arabic. For example, songs of Egyptian farmer sitting in shadow of a tree in front of a waterwheel; melodic exchange of spontaneous poems by workers who till land or carry on their backs heavy bricks for construction; poetic meditations of niti, the sailor who rows his boat on Nile; Bedouin's chant in desert; songs and dances of wedding celebrations; or lamentation poems for dead in funerals-all these and many others are models of Egyptian folklore whose only source is oral narration and transmission. An analysis of old as well as current Egyptian folksongs reveals various functions: some songs are designed to relieve people from personal sufferings, hardships, and persecution, all of which are caused mainly by community surrounding them; others are designed for recreation, amusement, and self-expression. The most expressive means of people's feelings is well-known Arabic mawwal. The mawwal in Egypt as well as in all other Arab countries was, and still is, an indispensable part of daily life. The Egyptian mawwal is not a novelty; it has deep roots in Egyptian culture. It goes back as far as Fatimide dynasty (tenth century A.D.) when folksingers sang mawawzl (plural of mawwal) on occasions

A Communication from Panama

Since 1947, Luis Felipe Ram6n y Rivera, Director of the Instituto de Folklore, has published a number of studies and transcriptions of indigenous music, beginning with Consideraciones sobre un instrumento y mtusica de los Indios Guajiros (Acta venezolana, II, 1-4, 1946-47, pp. 104-115). His principal publications, as well as those of his wife, Isabel Aretz de Ramdn y Rivera, are listed in the Guide to the Music of Latin America (Pan American Union, 1962, pp. 378-382). An interesting comparative study is that by Isabel Aretz, Correlation between the Venezuelan Pan-pipes and those of the Andean High Cultures (Boletfn Indigenista Venezolano, VI, 1-4, Caracas, 1958). In 1947, Isabel Aretz began work on a complete study of the musical instruments of the Venezuelan aborigines--including the historical and archaeological aspects as well as present-day usage-which at this writing (January 1965) was in process of publication by the Universidad de Oriente of Venezuela. This work, however, is not limited to musical instruments of the Indian tribes; its title is Musical Instruments of Venezuela. With the creation, in 1953, of the Instituto de Folklore as a dependency of the Ministry of Education, under the direction of Luis Felipe Ramdn y Rivera, ably seconded by Isabel Aretz and a staff of trained specialists, the whole range of traditional music in Venezuela, from the primitive to the popular, has been systematically covered in recordings, transcriptions, analyses, monographs, and books. Since the Institute deals with all aspects of folklore, music is always seen in its socio-cultural context, and its study is elucidated by a wealth of ancillary documentation. As of January 1965, the Institute's archives contained more than 3,000 items recorded either on disc (up to No. 1161) or on tape. The recordings are made under the strictest norms of ethnomusicological practice.

Washington Irving and the Conservative Imagination

A S LONG AGo as I93I, Henry S. Canby characterized Washington tE Irving as arch-Federalist American literature.'l Henry A. Pochmann, repeating Canby's phrase, agreed that Irving was more Federalist than the Federalists.2 Stanley T. Williams's twovolume Life Washington Irving (1935) provided much information on young Irving's predominantly Federalist environment and much evidence to substantiate earlier judgments the anti-Jeffersonian satire in Salmagundi and in Knickerbocker's History. More recent opinion, concentrated on the mythic and folkloric aspects Irving, has contributed little to a reassessment Irving's politics. No one has taken up Williams's hint that Irving was made of the very stuff Tories. The fact is that Irving's Federalism was always faute de mieux. The egalitarianism Jefferson was fair game for Diedrich Knickerbocker, but Irving's persona was also a ruthless hunter the stolid bourgeoisie mercantile New Amsterdam. And the bourgeoisie was very much at home within the Federalist Party. Hamilton believed in strong government to check the democratic impulses the people, but even Hamilton was in his economic policies an agent change, the prophet the transformation property into the stocks, bonds, and certificates the modern corporation. Hamilton, Adams, and the literati Boston's Monthly Anthology might have snorted at Jeffersonian tendencies, but they themselves were far closer intellectually to Jefferson than to Edmund Burke and the tradition English Conservatism. If Irving lost interest in the quarrels Hamilton and Jefferson, it was at least in part because he discovered an aristocratic society based on continuity rather than on

From History to Myth: A Comparative Study

HEN in the context of an organization calling itself an association of biblical instructors the topic of mythology is brought up, the name of the Marburg giant, Rudolf Bultmann, dominates our thinking, as indeed it should. But New Testament scholars have impoverished their studies by a kind of myopia resulting from a neglect of the problem of myth in the wider demands of Religionswissenschaft. Bultmann's well-known three story universe accompanied by divine intervention is not, strictly speaking, a mythology; it is a Weltanschauung. Of course, sophisticated modem man, for whom E = mc2, cannot accept biblical cosmology, but neither could Copernicus. The real question of mythology runs much deeper. About a quarter of a century ago, the subject of myth began to be restudied seriously after a long period of neglect. Malinowski, following Frazer and Lang, considered the anthropological aspects of folklore. Cassirer, Langer, Tillich and Urban directly explored the meaning of myth, and the researches of C. G. Jung gave added dimensions to our studies.'

An analysis of folktales of the lenge, Portuguese East Africa*

A collection of Lenge folktales reminds one of relics to be found in an ancient mound or ash-heap used by successive tribes, containing potsherds, bones, shells, with more modern tools on the surface. It may not be an easy matter to determine the age of the objects. Likewise the psychological fossils in folktales often reappear in a new guise under the influence of social contacts, personal object-relations, and evolution in the daily life and thought. Folktales may include myths, pseudo-myths and saga, but they can also record individual reactions and emotional drives in the common round of daily tasks and associations. I am not competent to deal with the connexion between animal tales and ancient ritual. This and other aspects of folklore have been studied by eminent anthropologists. I can only summarize for the use of comparative folklorists the material to be found in Lenge tales. The Lenge dwell along the coast between the Limpopo and Chopiland. I have described the origin of their sibs in my book Valenge Women. The folklore of tales, proverbs, riddles, consists of Thonga, Chopi, Ngoni and Ndau elements. The Lenge have a hoe culture but modern hoes are of comparatively recent date, digging sticks having been used formerly by the women, the agriculturists. The Lebomho Mission has latterly introduced a tractor at Maciene, with excellent results.

Folklore Aspects in Mormon Culture

Folklore Aspects in Mormon Culture