This article contains the basic structural features of a same-named Ph.D. research thesis. The main tasks of the research are to identify three focal fields with mythological elements, whether they ...are phenomena, objects, people, or creatures that some believe and others doubt exist. These focal fields are found in various collections of folk stories, and contemporary literary texts as well as in interviews with storytellers. However, the focus of this article is primarily on the introductory story and on providing the background of the general idea. The goal is to acquaint the readers with the background that explains the origin of the mentioned stories among the people. It talks about death, man’s natural fear of it, and the world of the paranormal, religious, and mythological, which combined create inexplicable phenomena that contradict the rational reasoning of man. One of the hypotheses of the research itself is to understand why this phenomenon is still present in the human community and what benefits it brings. Furthermore, the methodology used in the research includes a comparison and contrast of information between folk stories and contemporary literary works. In addition, the most important research method used is the interview technique with the aforementioned storytellers with strategically selected persons who are assumed to possess quality information.
Dealing with the Devil is one of most prominent cultural motifs across the history of recorded folk tales. From ancient folk tales to contemporary cultural products, the Devil has appeared as an ...illicitly desirable being. The focal point of dealing with the Devil is that it is instigated by a pre-existent desire to exceed one's capacity determined by their temporal circumstances. In the Christian narrative tradition, a deal with the devil occurs over a Manichean undercurrent and ends in the condemnation of the participant or in the devil's humiliation. Pantheistic traditions discombobulate this contract by virtue of the nonexistence of Manichean binaries. This study aims to analyze the prevalence of desire in the deal with the devil motif throughout various tales and how the video game Witcher 3: The Wild Hunt (2015) complicates notions that are often taken for granted in Christian folk tales through its core narrative design.
This comparative anthology showcases the rich and mutually intertwined folklore of three ethno-religious communities from northern Iraq: Aramaic-speaking (‘Syriac’) Christians, Kurdish Muslims and—to ...a lesser extent—Aramaic-speaking Jews. The first volume contains several introductory chapters on language, folkore motifs and narrative style, followed by samples of glossed texts in each language variety. The second volume is the anthology proper, presenting folklore narratives in several distinct varieties of North-Eastern Neo-Aramaic and Northern and Central Kurdish. The stories are accompanied by English translations. The material includes different genres such as folktales, legends, fables and anecdotes, and is organised into seven thematic units. The folkloristic material of these three communities is shared to a large extent. The anthology is, therefore, a testament to the intimate and long-standing relations between these three ethno-religious communities—relations that existed in a multilingual environment centuries before the modern era of nationalism.
Venda musicians incorporate aspects of "traditional" Venda life and music while still trying to make their music marketable to a larger audience. Johannesburg, the "City of Gold" was never such for ...many popular Venda musicians as their music did not yield any gold for them. Two significant influences take center stage in realizing a wider market for popular Venda music. These influences reference melodic and rhythmic motifs from indigenous Venda music and children's songs, while retaining a touch of "homegrown" in the music. Interviews with several popular musicians and an analysis of music indicates cultural relevancy in popular Venda music quoting.
"In The Anguished and the Enchanted, M.H. Bowker offers a lengthy critical essay and richly annotated English translation of a lost Finnish translation of Antoine de Saint-Exupéry’s The Little ...Prince. Featuring a substantial Translator’s Preface, M.H. Bowker develops a psychoanalytic lens through which to regard Saint-Exupéry’s classic work, offering a more nuanced and less ""fable-esque"" text than any translation and interpretation to date. On Bowker’s reading, dark and primitive unconscious forces — including neglect and abuse at home, the hatred of maturation and development, the projection of feelings of worthlessness onto others, the creation of an absurd and futile world, and more — infest the story, not unlike the Baobab trees dreaded by the little prince. Those already familiar with The Little Prince will find in The Anguished and the Enchanted a new way of regarding what has perhaps become a favorite or even a beloved book. Those unfamiliar with the original work will discover a sometimes tragic, sometimes sympathetic, sometimes harrowing account of the lengths to which persons will go in their struggle to find — or to escape from — meaningful places for themselves in the world of adults."
Fantasy, fear, and freedom all play a part in A Story of Witchery, a book-length narrative poem by Jennifer Calkins, and newly illustrated by Thor Harris. Here we meet Emily, our “small and weedy” ...protagonist, an orphan complicit (perhaps) in her own abandonment who is caught up, as poet Amy Gerstler writes in her Introduction, in a story “entwined with science facts and twisted clinical fictions.” In language rolling and tripping with spare precision, Calkins makes a modern pilgrim progress into the imagination and the dark world of medicine. Rich and haunting images create a seemingly familiar environment which, like the internal landscape of the protagonist, dissolves only to reform, until finally resolving into a healed whole.
At Eastertime, the most important holiday in the Christian world, religious processions in many Latin American countries pass over ornate street "carpets" fashioned from colored sawdust, flowers and ...fruit. Children in Finland and Sweden dress as "Easter witches." In the Caribbean, those who swim on Good Friday risk bad luck. In the Philippines, some penitents volunteer to be crucified. In some European countries, Easter Monday is the day for dousing women with water. With 240 entries, this book explores these and scores of other unusual and sometimes bizarre international Holy Week customs, both sacred and secular, from pilgrimages to Jerusalem to classic seasonal films and television specials.
The Chuj of northwestern Guatemala are among the least studied
groups of the Mayan family, and their relative isolation has
preserved a strong indigenous tradition of storytelling. In
Chuj (Mayan) ...Narratives , Nicholas Hopkins analyzes six
narratives that illustrate the breadth of the Chuj storytelling
tradition, from ancient mythology to current events and from
intimate tales of local affairs to borrowed stories, such as an
adaptation of Oedipus Rex . The book illustrates the broad
range of stories people tell each other, from mythological and
legendary topics to procedural discussions and stories borrowed
from European and African societies. Hopkins provides context for
the narratives by introducing the reader to Chuj culture and
history, conveying important events as described by indigenous
participants. These events include customs and practices related to
salt production as well as the beginnings of the disastrous civil
war of the last century, which resulted in the destruction of
several villages from which the narratives in this study
originated. Hopkins also provides an analytical framework for the
strategies of the storytellers and presents the narratives with
Chuj text and English translation side-by-side. Chuj (Mayan)
Narratives analyzes the strategies of storytelling in an
innovative framework applicable to other corpora and includes
sufficient grammatical information to function as an introduction
to the Chuj language. The stories illustrate the persistence of
Classic Maya themes in contemporary folk literature, making the
book significant to Mesoamericanists and Mayanists and an essential
resource for students and scholars of Maya linguistics and literary
traditions, storytelling, and folklore.
