Smart phones, tablets, Facebook, Twitter, and wireless Internet connections are the latest technologies to have become entrenched in our culture. Although traditionalists have argued that ...computer-mediated communication and cyberspace are incongruent with the study of folklore, Trevor J. Blank sees the digital world as fully capable of generating, transmitting, performing, and archiving vernacular culture. Folklore in the Digital Age documents the emergent cultural scenes and expressive folkloric communications made possible by digital "new media" technologies.New media is changing the ways in which people learn, share, participate, and engage with others as they adopt technologies to complement and supplement traditional means of vernacular expression. But behavioral and structural overlap in many folkloric forms exists between on- and offline, and emerging patterns in digital rhetoric mimic the dynamics of previously documented folkloric forms, invoking familiar social or behavior customs, linguistic inflections, and symbolic gestures.Folklore in the Digital Ageprovides insights and perspectives on the myriad ways in which folk culture manifests in the digital age and contributes to our greater understanding of vernacular expression in our ever-changing technological world.
This article deals with Greek animal fables, traditionally attributed to a former slave, Aesop, who lived during the sixth century BCE. As a genre, the Aesopic fables, or the Aesopica, has had a ...significant impact on the Western fable tradition and modern Western children’s literature. The Aesopica owes much to the Mesopotamian fables and has parallels in other Near Eastern cultures. Modern research has concentrated on tracing the oriental roots of the fable tradition and the dating of the different parts of the Aesopica, as well as defining the fable as a genre. The traditional reading of fables has, however, excluded animals qua animals, supposing that fables are mainly allegories of the human condition. The moral of the story (included in the epimythia or promythia) certainly guides one to read the stories anthropocentrically, but the original fables did not necessarily include this positioning element. Many fables address the situation when a prey animal, like a lamb, negotiates with a predator animal, like a wolf, by giving reasons why she should not be killed. In this article, I will concentrate on these fables and analyse them from the point of view of their structure and content. Comparing these fables with some animal similes in Homer’s Iliad, I suggest that these fables deal not only with the ethical problem of ‘might makes right’ as a human condition, but also the broader philosophical question of killing other living creatures and the problem of cruelty.
Culture Work Frandy, Tim; Cederström, B. Marcus
07/2022
eBook
How do culture workers construct public arts and culture projects
that are effective and transformative? How do we create public
humanities projects of the community, for the community, and with
the ...community? How can culture work make a concrete difference in
the quality of life for communities, and lead to the creation of a
more just world? Why do the public humanities matter? Culture
Work explores these questions through real-world examples of
cultural and public humanities projects. The innovative case
studies analyzed in the book demonstrate the vast numbers of
creative possibilities in culture work today-in all their
complexities, challenges, and potentialities. Thematically arranged
chapters embody the interconnected aspects of culture work, from
amplifying local voices to galvanizing community from within, from
preservation of cultural knowledge to its creative repurposing for
a desired future. These inventive projects provide concrete
examples and accessible theory grounded in practice, encourage
readers to embark on their own public culture work, and create new
forward-looking inspiration for community leaders and scholars in
the field.
Folklorun 19. yüzyıl serüveni ulusların köken arayışları ile halk anlatılarının metinsel yayılımlarını belirlemeyle sınırlı kalmış olsa da 20. yüzyılda ortaya çıkan birtakım yaklaşımlar, halkı ...anlamaya yönelik analizlerin kapılarını aralamış görünmektedir. Halkı ve onun ürettiği kültürü parçalardan hareketle bir bütün olarak ele almak, hem folklor disiplininin ontolojik sorunlarına çözüm üretmede bize yardımcı olacağı gibi halkı anlama ve yorumlamada mevcut sorunlara pragmatik çözümler üretecek hem de olası dönüşüm ve katmanlaşmalar bu teorik perspektifle daha doğru okunabilecektir. Bu yazı, şimdiye kadar folklorda kullanılan işlevsel ve yapısal işlevsel teorilerin yöntem ve yaklaşımlarının bazı durumlarda tersine çevrilebileceği hipotezinden hareket etmiştir. Folklorda işlevsel çözümlemelerin daha çok Malinowski ve Bascom’un sayıltılarından etkilendiği bilinmektedir, ancak her iki araştırmacının da ön kabulleri, sistemin işleyişindeki denge ve uyumun hatasız işlediği yönündedir. Ancak şu sorular, açıklığa kavuşturulmadan teori üzerindeki tartışmalar bitecek gibi değildir: Folklorun doğası hep “olumlu” mudur? Her işlev, toplumsal sistemin hayatta kalmasına mı odaklanır? Yapısal ve kurumsal çatışmalarda gerilimi yatıştırıcı folklorik ögelerin etkisi ne yöndedir? Folklor, basit bir eğlence aracı olmanın dışında toplumun ilerleme ve duraklamasında etkili bir öge midir? Makalede, bu sorulardan hareketle folklor incelemelerinde bozuk ve örtük işlevin varlığı tartışmaya açılmıştır
The figure of the fairy1 dances through the literary and oral history of the British Isles: goblins writhe around tithes to the Devil, and children battle fairy kings for freedom. Listed in Middle ...English law alongside witches, fairies took the blame for the inexplicable or unspeakable acts of humans and natures. These dark, demonic fay, not the kindly flower fairies or the petulant pixies popular in current children’s media, peppered the tales of rural England into the Early Modern Period, and here William Shakespeare likely first encountered the magical, liminal creatures. As Shakespeare moved from rural life to the urban stage, he brought the fairies with him and turned their devilish deeds to human-like antics, replacing menace with merriment and ill omens with good will. In his works, Shakespeare consistently returns to the folklore and legends of his youth, leaving “hardly a play which does not have allusions to some branch of folklore.”2 In many of his works, Shakespeare employs witches and the occult, as characters metamorphosize and omens shape narrative, thus driving action. Fairies themselves feature most prominently in A Midsummer Night’s Dream (c. 1595) and The Tempest (c. 1610), as Oberon, Titania, Puck, and Ariel all appear on stage. Meanwhile, a colorful description of Queen Mab in Romeo and Juliet (c. 1591) also provides useful fodder for Shakespeare’s transformation of the fairy folk and later interpretations of the fay. In commercializing, shrinking, and then disembodying his fairies, Shakespeare comments on the excess wealth of the nobles and upper-class Elizabethans, as well as the growing disconnect with nature, while opening up the fairy world for future writers and poets.
A magyar nyelvterület peremvidékein, ahová az iparosodás és a polgárosodás később jutottak el, a közösségek jobban ragaszkodnak az egykori szokásaikhoz. Az anyaországtól leszakított részeken tovább ...élt, és sok helyen napjainkig fennmaradt számos korábbi gyakorlat és hagyomány. Az elszakított nemzetrész közösségei és tagjai védekezésként tartották meg az idők folyamán, és vallják ma is magukénak a bevett gyakorlatokat, kifejezve ezáltal az összetartozást és a közös gyökerekről való származást. Nem anyagi érdek vezérli a közösséget ezen a téren, csupán őseinek, elődeinek tisztelete, a közösség íratlan szabályainak, tradicionális kultúrájának, értékrendjének, szokásrendjének és mentalitásának kifejezője.
If there is one genre that has captured the imagination of people in all walks of life throughout the world, it is the fairy tale. Yet we still have great difficulty understanding how it originated, ...evolved, and spread--or why so many people cannot resist its appeal, no matter how it changes or what form it takes. In this book, renowned fairy-tale expert Jack Zipes presents a provocative new theory about why fairy tales were created and retold--and why they became such an indelible and infinitely adaptable part of cultures around the world.
Drawing on cognitive science, evolutionary theory, anthropology, psychology, literary theory, and other fields, Zipes presents a nuanced argument about how fairy tales originated in ancient oral cultures, how they evolved through the rise of literary culture and print, and how, in our own time, they continue to change through their adaptation in an ever-growing variety of media. In making his case, Zipes considers a wide range of fascinating examples, including fairy tales told, collected, and written by women in the nineteenth century; Catherine Breillat's film adaptation of Perrault's "Bluebeard"; and contemporary fairy-tale drawings, paintings, sculptures, and photographs that critique canonical print versions.
While we may never be able to fully explain fairy tales,The Irresistible Fairy Taleprovides a powerful theory of how and why they evolved--and why we still use them to make meaning of our lives.
This book analyses the ways of conceptualising and interpreting the interaction between physical and metaphysical worlds in Polish folklore. A linguistic and anthropological analysis offered in this ...study focuses primarily on myth, ritual and symbol as reflected in language (dialect lexis, phraseology, speech acts). Employing the methodology and analytical tools of cognitive linguistics (preconceptual image schemas, cognitive scene, profiling of concepts, development of cognitive paths), the author reconstructs mental patterns at the heart of mythical thinking, linguistic actions and symbolic meanings, which reflect universal conceptual schemas and may serve as models for intercultural studies.
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