Folklore studies / Study of myth Books
University of Toronto Press The Pleasant Nights Volume 1
Book SynopsisRenowned today for his contribution to the rise of the modern European fairy tale, Giovan Francesco Straparola (c. 1480–c. 1557) is particularly known for his dazzling anthology The Pleasant Nights. Originally published in Venice in 1550 and 1553, this collection features seventy-three folk stories, fables, jests, and pseudo-histories, including nine tales we might now designate for ‘mature readers’ and seventeen proto-fairy tales. Nearly all of these stories, including classics such as ‘Puss in Boots,’ made their first ever appearance in this collection; together, the tales comprise one of the most varied and engaging Renaissance miscellanies ever produced. Its appeal sustained it through twenty-six editions in the first sixty years.This full critical edition of The Pleasant Nights presents these stories in English for the first time in over a century. The text takes its inspiration from the celebrated Waters translation, whichTrade Review'Beecher deserves full credit and admiration for having produced a superlative piece of work.' -- Joseph Russo Journal of Folklore Research; October 22, 2013 'Beecher has produced a handsome edition of Water's translation, and has thoroughly reworked the reference apparatus... His book is a distinctly valuable and scholarly contribution to the subject.' -- Ruth B. Bottigheimer Renaissance Quarterly vol 67:01:2014
£81.60
The University of North Carolina Press Otto Wood the Bandit The Freighthopping Thief
Book SynopsisLegions of bluegrass fans know the name Otto Wood from a ballad made popular by Doc Watson, telling the story of Wood's crimes and his eventual end. However, few know the history of this Appalachian figure beyond the version heard in song. Trevor McKenzie reconstructs Wood's life, tracing how he became a celebrated folk hero.
£17.95
University of Texas Press Frankie and Johnny
Book SynopsisWith chapters on Lead Belly, Thomas Hart Benton, John Huston, Mae West, and Sterling Brown, this innovative book presents a new argument for the centrality of African American folklore as a source of cultural expression in the 1930s.Trade ReviewMorgan's brilliant examination of race and gender in creative appropriations of the 'Frankie and Johnny' ballad furthers the discourse on how African American folk culture contributed to the unique characteristics of American modernism during the 1930s. * Journal of Southern History *A well-researched analysis of the complex intersections between African American culture and folklore and mainstream popular music and film culture of the 1930s. * Journal of American Folklore *[A] masterpiece...Frankie and Johnny showcases the talents of performers, entertainers, composers, and artists while simultaneously telegraphing the tormented rawness of unrequited fidelity...Morgan’s tireless, copious research yields rich rewards, allowing the reader an emotionally vicarious experience of a 'somebody done somebody wrong' theme. * Journal of African American History *Table of Contents Acknowledgments Chapter 1. Frankie and Johnny Take Center Stage: African American Folk Culture in 1930s America Chapter 2. Lead Belly's Ninth Symphony: Huddie Ledbetter and the Changing Contours of American Folk Music Chapter 3. Pistol Packin' Mama: Imperiled Masculinity in Thomas Hart Benton's A Social History of the State of Missouri Chapter 4. Whiteface Marionettes: John Huston's Comic Melodrama Chapter 5. The Finest Woman Ever to Walk the Streets: Mae West's Outlaw Exploits in She Done Him Wrong Chapter 6. The Lynching of Johnny: Sterling Brown's Social Realist Critique Epilogue. African American Women's Voices and the Tightrope of Respectability Notes Index
£999.99
University of Texas Press Frankie and Johnny
Book SynopsisWith chapters on Lead Belly, Thomas Hart Benton, John Huston, Mae West, and Sterling Brown, this innovative book presents a new argument for the centrality of African American folklore as a source of cultural expression in the 1930s.Trade ReviewMorgan's brilliant examination of race and gender in creative appropriations of the 'Frankie and Johnny' ballad furthers the discourse on how African American folk culture contributed to the unique characteristics of American modernism during the 1930s. * Journal of Southern History *A well-researched analysis of the complex intersections between African American culture and folklore and mainstream popular music and film culture of the 1930s. * Journal of American Folklore *[A] masterpiece...Frankie and Johnny showcases the talents of performers, entertainers, composers, and artists while simultaneously telegraphing the tormented rawness of unrequited fidelity...Morgan’s tireless, copious research yields rich rewards, allowing the reader an emotionally vicarious experience of a 'somebody done somebody wrong' theme. * Journal of African American History *Table of Contents Acknowledgments Chapter 1. Frankie and Johnny Take Center Stage: African American Folk Culture in 1930s America Chapter 2. Lead Belly's Ninth Symphony: Huddie Ledbetter and the Changing Contours of American Folk Music Chapter 3. Pistol Packin' Mama: Imperiled Masculinity in Thomas Hart Benton's A Social History of the State of Missouri Chapter 4. Whiteface Marionettes: John Huston's Comic Melodrama Chapter 5. The Finest Woman Ever to Walk the Streets: Mae West's Outlaw Exploits in She Done Him Wrong Chapter 6. The Lynching of Johnny: Sterling Brown's Social Realist Critique Epilogue. African American Women's Voices and the Tightrope of Respectability Notes Index
£21.59
Duke University Press Bear with Me
Book Synopsis
£81.60
University of Toronto Press Ukrainian Epic and Historical Song
Book SynopsisNatalie Kononenko's expert translation and analysis of Ukrainian epics provides a sweeping social history of folklore that is vital to Ukrainian identity.Trade Review"This volume, with its meticulous attention to detail and comprehensive coverage of a significant aspect of Ukrainian history is the product of Kononenko’s many years of dedicated research on folklore and the folk epic, and their part in shaping the Ukrainian consciousness." -- Marian J. Rubchak, Valparaiso University * Slavic Review *"Kononenko weaves translations of entire poems directly into her historicizing analyses. This manner of presentation makes for an integrated and coherent reading experience that all who pick up this volume will appreciate." -- Jonathan Ready, University of Michigan * Journal of Folklore Research *Table of ContentsList of Illustrations Acknowledgements Introduction 1 Collection and Scholarship 2 Minstrels and Minstrelsy 3 Slavery 4 Kozak Battles 5 Khmelnytskyi 6 Everyday Life Conclusion Epilogue Notes Bibliography Index
£54.40
University of Toronto Press A Bibliography of Canadian Folklore in English
Book SynopsisThis book is the only comprehensive bibliography of Canadian folklore in English. The 3877 different items are arranged by genres: folktales; folk music and dance; folk speech and naming; superstitions, popular beliefs, folk medicine, and the supernatural; folk life and customs; folk art and material culture; and within genres by ethnic groups: Anglophone and Celtic, Francophone, Indian and Inuit, and other cultural groups. The items include reference books, periodicals, articles, records, films, biographies of scholars and informants, and graduate theses. Each items is annotated through a coding that indicates whether it is academic or popular, its importance to the scholar, and whether it is suitable for young people. The introduction includes a brief survey of Canadian folklore studies, putting this work into academic and social perspective.The book covers all the important items and most minor items dealing with Canadian folklore published in English up to the end of 1979
£25.19
MP-MPP University Press of Mississippi Stable Views Stories and Voices from the Thoroughbred Racetrack
Book SynopsisOffers an inside look at the thoroughbred racing industry through the words and perspectives of those who labour within its stables. In more than fourteen years of field research, Ellen E. McHale has travelled to gather oral narratives from those most intimately involved with racing: the stable workers, exercise riders, and horse trainers who form the backbone of the industry.
£23.96
University Press of Mississippi Dancing on the Color Line
Book SynopsisTrade Review“Dancing on the Color Line is a significant contribution to nineteenth-century American literary and cultural studies. Original, illuminating, and meticulously researched, Martin’s book examines texts of John Pendleton Kennedy, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Herman Melville, Joel Chandler Harris, and Mark Twain, showing how these writers assimilated and employed black aesthetic strategies of ‘signifying’ and ‘double voice’ associated with the trickster figure. Martin lays the groundwork for further scholarly inquiry, particularly regarding possible lines of influence of minority American writers on modern and postmodern canonical authors and their works.” —Ed Piacentino, emeritus professor of English at High Point University and editor of Southern Frontier Humor: New Approaches (University Press of Mississippi)|“Dancing on the Color Line explores the familiar world of nineteenth-century US writing about race to defamiliarize it by suggesting its hybrid nature. Through Martin’s careful readings, well-known figures emerge as deeply influenced by the aesthetics and techniques of African American storytelling, and their literature reveals multiple trickster figures who turn a critical eye on the white power that frames them. Martin’s readers encounter the fiction she discusses differently and with more attention to the complexity of the historical and literary context in which it was created.” —Kathryn McKee, McMullan Associate Professor of Southern Studies and English at the University of Mississippi and coeditor of American Cinema and the Southern Imaginary|“Martin has proven to be one of our most important scholars in American humor and culture. Wherever she focuses her attention, and brings to bear her critical intelligence, new insights and useful ideas emerge. Dancing on the Color Line is a thoughtful and enlightening study of the African American trickster figure. The result is a solid contribution to both African American studies and our understanding of the continuously complex nature of American humor.” —M. Thomas Inge, Blackwell Professor of Humanities at Randolph-Macon College and author of many works on American humor, southern culture, comic art, and William Faulkner
£65.08
University Press of Mississippi Vampires and Zombies
Book SynopsisThe vampire, with roots in medieval European folklore, and the zombie, with origins in Afro-Caribbean mythology, have both undergone significant transformations in global culture, proliferating as deviant representatives of the zeitgeist. As this volume demonstrates, distribution of vampires and zombies across time and space has revealed these undead figures to carry multiple meanings.
£65.08
University Press of Mississippi A Vulgar Art
Book SynopsisTHE FIRST EXAMINATION OF STAND-UP COMEDY THROUGH THE LENS OF FOLKLOREIn A Vulgar Art Ian Brodie uses a folkloristic approach to stand-up comedy, leveraging the discipline''s central method of studying interpersonal, artistic communication and performance. Because stand-up comedy is a rather broad category, people who study it often begin by relating it to something they recognize such as literature or theatre, and analyze it accordingly. A Vulgar Art begins with a more fundamental observation: someone is standing in front of a group of people, talking to them directly, and trying to make them laugh. So this book takes the moment of performance as its focus and shows that stand-up comedy is a collaborative act between the comedian and the audience.Although the form of talk on the stage resembles talk among friends and intimates in social settings, stand-up comedy remains a profession. As such, it requires performance outside of the comedian''s own community to gain larger and larger aud
£26.06
MP-MPP University Press of Mississippi Vampires and Zombies Transcultural Migrations and Transnational Interpretations
Book SynopsisAs this volume demonstrates, distribution of vampires and zombies across time and space has revealed these undead figures to carry multiple meanings. This book - with scholars from different national and cultural backgrounds - explores the transformations that the vampire and zombie figures undergo when they travel globally and through various media and cultures.
£27.96
MP-MPP University Press of Mississippi Superman in Myth and Folklore
Book SynopsisMany studies have examined the ways in which folklore has provided inspiration for other forms of culture, especially literature and cinema. In Superman in Myth and Folklore, Daniel Peretti explores the meaning of folklore inspired by popular culture, focusing not on the Man of Steel's origins but on the culture he has helped create.Trade Review"Daniel Perretti’s Superman in Myth and Folklore (University Press of Mississippi) is a fascinating examination of the cultural and societal ramifications of the character, as seen through the eyes of a variety of admirers. [...] Perretti approaches his subject from a variety of other perspectives, making for a fascinating (if specialist) study." — DVD Choices
£77.35
MP-MPP University Press of Mississippi Superman in Myth and Folklore
Book SynopsisMany studies have examined the ways in which folklore has provided inspiration for other forms of culture, especially literature and cinema. In Superman in Myth and Folklore, Daniel Peretti explores the meaning of folklore inspired by popular culture, focusing not on the Man of Steel's origins but on the culture he has helped create.
£26.06
MP-MPP University Press of Mississippi Erna Brodber and Velma Pollard Folklore and
Book SynopsisErna Brodber and Velma Pollard, two sister-writers born and raised in Jamaica, re-create imagined and lived homelands in their literature by commemorating the history, culture, and religion of the Caribbean. Drawing on interviews with the authors, this is the first book to give Brodber and Pollard their due.
£81.75
MP-MPP University Press of Mississippi Sexy Like Us Disability Humor and Sexuality
Book SynopsisTakes a humorous, intimate approach to disability through the stories, jokes, performances, and other creative expressions of people with disabilities. Author Teresa Milbrodt explores why individuals can laugh at their leglessness, find stoma bags sexual, discover intimacy in scars, and flaunt their fragility in ways both hilarious and serious.
£26.06
MP-MPP University Press of Mississippi Frankenstein Was a Vegetarian Essays on Food
Book SynopsisTackles topics often overlooked in foodways. Michael Owen Jones explains how we communicate through what we eat, the connection between food choice and who we are or want to appear to be, the ways that many of us self-medicate moods with foods, and the nature of disgust.
£78.40
MP-MPP University Press of Mississippi Finding Myself Lost in Louisiana
Book SynopsisIn Finding Myself Lost in Louisiana, author Keagan LeJeune brilliantly weaves the unusual folklore, landscape, and history of Louisiana along with his own family lineage that begins in 1760 to trace the trajectory of people’s lives in the Bayou State.Trade ReviewKeagan LeJeune argues that despite the challenges of climate change, a troubled economy, and racial inequity, the idiosyncrasies of Louisiana’s geography, mythology, and people make it a place worth fighting for." - Shane Rasmussen, director of the Louisiana Folklife Center, Northwestern State University"Combining memoir with careful research, LeJeune’s work approaches the culture and landscape of Louisiana through the lens of solastalgia, a term coined by Glenn Albrecht for the feeling of homesickness when one has not left home. Finding Myself Lost in Louisiana beautifully depicts Louisiana’s folklore and traditions through the personal journey of its narrator." - Marcia Gaudet, author of Carville: Remembering Leprosy in America
£73.80
Cornell University Press Hear My Sad Story
Book SynopsisIn 2015, Bob Dylan said, I learned lyrics and how to write them from listening to folk songs. And I played them, and I met other people that played them, back when nobody was doing it. Sang nothing but these folk songs, and they gave me the code for everything that''s fair game, that everything belongs to everyone. In Hear My Sad Story, Richard Polenberg describes the historical events that led to the writing of many famous American folk songs that served as touchstones for generations of American musicians, lyricists, and folklorists. Those events, which took place from the early nineteenth to the mid-twentieth centuries, often involved tragic occurrences: murders, sometimes resulting from love affairs gone wrong; desperate acts borne out of poverty and unbearable working conditions; and calamities such as railroad crashes, shipwrecks, and natural disasters. All of Polenberg's account of the songs in the book are grounded in historical fact and illuminate the social hTrade ReviewI never knew that 'Railroad Bill,' which I used to sing at summer camp, is about an African American outlaw (real name Morris) who terrorized Alabama in the 1890s. People had good reason to fear Bill, but that fear was also used as an excuse for the blatantly racist treatment of people whose only connection to him seems to have been the color of their skin. ('A number of Negroes have been arrested,' Polenberg quotes an 1895 news report. 'None of them will be permitted to go about for fear that they might sneak some information to Railroad.') Many of Polenberg's stories shed similar light on the uglier aspects of American history, and he tells them well. -- Peter Keepnews * New York Times Book Review *Polenberg writes engagingly about the Crescent City at the turn of the last century, as he does about everything he addresses in this entertaining and enlightening book. -- Jerome Clark * fRoots *This thought-provoking study will help us to delve further into the reasons why so many of America's most popular songs have concerned white and male violence while obscuring black agency and side-stepping the terrorism of racism and male supremacy. Perhaps then we can better ask the questions we might have gleaned from these songs all along. Thanks to Richard Polenberg for pulling the covers off and allowing us to think more deeply about our history when we sing the folk songs that tell my sad story. -- Michael K. Honey * Missouri Historical Review *Well researched and packed with fascinating detail, Hear My Sad Story tells more than just the origins of popular folk songs. It tells an unflinching and honest story of America. At times viciously misguided and undoubtedly ugly, the country's history has nevertheless been documented through the lenses of those who witnessed these events and passed them down to subsequent generations. Celebrated in song, the tales outlined through the book’s nearly 300 pages seem poised to continue their grip on the fabric of society as we move further away from the actual events. As history continues to unfold, there are surely those amongst us today whose interpretations of modern events will be relied upon by future songwriters to help make sense of life in our time. It’s the American tradition.. -- Jeff Strowe * PopMatters *Table of ContentsPrologue: The Streets of Laredo St. Louis1. St. Louis Blues (1914) 2. Duncan and Brady (1890) 3. Stagolee (1895) 4. Frankie and Johnny (1899) Lying Cold on the Ground5. Omie Wise (1807) 6. The Ballad of Frankie Silver (1831) 7. Tom Dooley (1866) 8. Poor Ellen Smith (1892) 9. Pearl Bryan (1896) 10. Delia's Gone (1900) Bold Highwaymen and Outlaws11. Cole Younger (1876) 12. Jesse James (1882) 13. John Hardy (1894) 14. Railroad Bill (1896) 15. Betty and Dupree (1921) Railroads16. John Henry (1870s) 17. Engine 143 (1890) 18. Casey Jones (1900) 19. Wreck of the Old 97 (1903) Workers20. Cotton Mill Blues (1930s) 21. Chain Gang Blues (1930s) 22. Only a Miner (1930s) 23. House of the Rising Sun (1930s) Disasters24. The Titanic (1912) 25. The Boll Weevil (1920s) Martyrs26. Joe Hill (1915) 27. Sacco and Vanzetti (1927) Epilogue: Hear My Sad Story
£19.94
Cornell University Press Raja Yudhisthira
Book SynopsisIn Raja Yudhisthira, Kevin McGrath brings his comprehensive literary, ethnographic, and analytical knowledge of the epic Mahabharata to bear on the representation of kingship in the poem. He shows how the preliterate Great Bharata song depicts both archaic and classical models of kingly and premonetary polity and how the king becomes a ruler who is viewed as ritually divine. Based on his precise and empirical close reading of the text, McGrath then addresses the idea of heroic religion in both antiquity and today; for bronze-age heroes still receive great devotional worship in modern India and communities continue to clash at the sites that have beenfor millenniaassociated with these epic figures; in fact, the word hero is in fact more of a religious than a martial term.One of the most important contributions of Raja Yudhisthira, and a subtext in McGrath''s analysis of Yudhisthira''s kingship, is the revelation that neither of the contesting moieties of tTrade Review"This is a remarkable, learned work that shows great sensitivity, born of very close reading, to the epic Mahabharata as an oral performative phonomenon. Kevin McGrath's arguments for the nature of archaic kingship envisioned by the poets of the Mahabharata as one in which 'sovereignty' is of a cooperative rather than absolute nature are persuasive and eye-opening. His exposition and clarification of the ideals of kingship in the Mahabharata are masterful: a better summing up of the complexity of the picture for the modern reader could not be found. Anyone interested in Greek epic poetry from a comparative perspective and, more broadly, in Indo-European myth and poetics will profit immensely from this work." -- Roger Dillard Woodard, Andrew Van Vranken Raymond Chair of the Classics and Professor of Classics, Linguistics, and Anthropology, University of Buffalo, author of Myth, Ritual, and the Warrior in Roman and Indo-European AntiquityTable of Contents1. The Beginning2. Kingship The Rajasuya Sequence War as Royal Rite The Asvamedha 3. Ideals of Kingship Archaic Ideals Installation Classical Ideals 4. The End
£39.95
MB - Cornell University Press The Transmission of Beowulf Language Culture and
Book SynopsisBeowulf, like The Iliad and The Odyssey, is a foundational work of Western literature that originated in mysterious circumstances. In The Transmission of "Beowulf," Leonard Neidorf addresses philological questions that are fundamental to the study of the...Trade ReviewA short review like this hardly does justice to the genius of this astonishing book. The Transmission of Beowulf is a coup de théâtre, a scholarly manifesto of the utmost importance in its evidentiary rigor, theoretical utility, and vigorous prose. By any measure, it ranks as one of the most pivotal books ever written on Old English literature and will be recognized as a historic achievement. * Anglia *For close engagement with the linguistic idiosyncrasies of Beowulf, one may turn to Leonard Neidorf’s recent study The Transmission of ‘Beowulf’: Language, culture, and scribal behavior. Here formidable scholarship provides rich insights into the attitudes and methods of the scribes who made the only surviving copy of Beowulf... [t]he evidence that he puts forward in this book, based on rigorous scrutiny of several hundred errors in Beowulf, is both fascinating and highly persuasive, and the book is indispensable reading for anyone interested in the manuscript context of Beowulf, scribal culture in Anglo-Saxon England more generally, or the early history of the English language. * Times Literary Supplement *Neidorf....obviously understands that inhibitions of this kind are profoundly unhealthy. His study is essential reading for all future editors of Old English poems and, of course, for everyone interested in Beowulf and its place in literary history. * Saga-Book *Leonard Neidorf's monograph is a thorough, detailed analysis of scribal error in the Beowulf text, an argument for the early date and Mercian origin of the poem, and a passionate defense of traditional philological research and textual emendation. * TOEBI *Neidorf provides perceptive discussions... articulates a much needed theory of scribal behavior; he concisely establishes the unity of the poem.... This book is essential reading for anyone concerned with Beowulf or the study of Old English scribal practice. * Studia Neophilologica *[The Transmission of "Beowulf": Language, Culture, and Scribal Behavior] is an essential treatment of the subject that no student of the poem can afford to ignore. The author shows himself exceptionally knowledgeable in matters of language and metre, and readers of this book have much to be grateful for. * The Review of English Studies *Table of Contents1. Introduction1. The Duration of Transmission2. The Detection of Scribal Error3. Meter and Alliteration4. Probabilistic Reasoning5. General Prefatory Remarks2. Language History1. Diachronic Variation2. Dialectal Variation3. Syntactic Misconstruction4. Trivialization5. Interpolation3. Cultural Change1. Obliteration of Personal Names2. Obliteration of Ethnic Names3. Erroneous Spacing4. Scribal Self-Correction5. Chronological Significance4. Scribal Behavior1. The Lexemic Theory2. Competing Theories3. Variation in Parallel Texts4. The Four Poetic Codices5. Theory and Evidence5. Conclusion1. The Unity of Beowulf2. Linguistic Regularities3. Methodological Considerations4. Textual Criticism5. Manuscript ContextAppendix: J. R. R. Tolkien's Beowulf Textual Criticism
£999.99
Cornell University Press Merlin
Book SynopsisMerlin, the wizard of Arthurian legend, has been a source of enduring fascination for centuries. In this authoritative, entertaining, and generously illustrated book, Stephen Knight traces the myth of Merlin back to its earliest roots in the early Welsh figure of Myrddin. He then follows Merlin as he is imagined and reimagined through centuries of literature and art, beginning with Geoffrey of Monmouth, whose immensely popular History of the Kings of Britain (1138) transmitted the story of Merlin to Europe at large. He covers French and German as well as Anglophone elements of the myth and brings the story up to the present with discussions of a globalized Merlin who finds his way into popular literature, film, television, and New Age philosophy. Knight argues that Merlin in all his guises represents a conflict basic to Western societies-the clash between knowledge and power. While the Merlin story varies over time, the underlying structural tension remains the same whTrade ReviewKnight frames Merlin's career in terms of the different functions he performs in successive periods.... Knight ends his history with a brief but heartfelt warning that the dialectical relationship between knowledge and truth and the public institutions of power remains crucial to both the academy and to the health of the body politic. * Times Literary Supplement *Table of ContentsIntroductionChapter 1: British Myrddin-Merlin: Wisdom Myrddin-Merlin The Earliest Materials Natural Wisdom: Myrddin of Cumbria Prophetic Wisdom: Myrddin of Wales Wisdom at Court: Geoffrey of Monmouth's Historia Regum Britanniae Twelfth-Century Natural Wisdom: Geoffrey of Monmouth’s Vita MerliniChapter 2: Medieval Merlin: Advice From Prophecy to Advice: Wace Christian Advice: Robert de Boron Grand Vizier: The Vulgate Merlin Darkening Advice: The Post-Vulgate Merlin Advising a Nation: from Layamon to MaloryChapter 3: English Merlin: Cleverness Prophecy and Advice in Decline Renaissance Cleverness Cleverness High and Low: The Seventeenth Century Cleverness High and Low: The Eighteenth Century The Dangers of Cleverness: The Romantics The Dangers of Cleverness: The VictoriansChapter 4: International Merlin: Education Continental Merlin: From Cleverness Back to Wisdom Toward Education: America Toward Education: Britain Education and the Novel: White, Lewis, and Cooper Education and the Novel: Historicism, Juveniles, and Fantasy Merlin on Screen International MerlinNotes Primary Bibliography Secondary Bibliography Index
£16.14
Cornell University Press Heroic Poets Poetic Heroes
Book SynopsisAn astonishingly rich oral epic that chronicles the early history of a Bedouin tribe, the Sirat Bani Hilal has been performed for almost a thousand years. In this ethnography of a contemporary community of professional poet-singers, Dwight F. Reynolds reveals how the epic tradition continues to provide a context for social interaction and commentary. Reynolds's account is based on performances in the northern Egyptian village in which he studied as an apprentice to a master epic-singer. Reynolds explains in detail the narrative structure of the Sirat Bani Hilal as well as the tradition of epic singing. He sees both living epic poets and fictional epic heroes as figures engaged in an ongoing dialogue with audiences concerning such vital issues as ethnicity, religious orientation, codes of behavior, gender roles, and social hierarchies.Trade ReviewThe richness of Reynolds’s text and his scholarly accomplishment serve as poignant reminders of how little we know about Arab folk performances and how difficult it is to teach these great traditions to our students. -- Virginia Danielson * Middle East Studies Association Bulletin *Reynolds’s book both complements the works of his predecessors and surpasses them in the area on which he focuses. With it, we have a full and methodologically sophisticated treatment of the social poetics of Sirat Bani Hilal performance that is a model of how such research should be conducted. -- Peter Heath * International Journal of Middle East Studies *
£16.13
Cornell University Press Gender and Genre in the Folklore of Middle India
Book SynopsisIn Gender and Genre in the Folklore of Middle India, Joyce Burkhalter Flueckiger analyzes six representative Indian folklore genres from a single regional repertoire to show the influence of their intertextual relations on the composition and interpretation of artistic performance. Placing special emphasis on women's rituals, she looks at the relationship between the framework and organization of indigenous genres and the reception of folklore performance. The regional repertoire under examination presents a strikingly female-centered world. Female performers and characters are active, articulate, and frequently challenge or defy expectations of gender. Men also confound traditional gender roles. Flueckiger includes the translations of two full performance texts of narratives sung by female and male storytellers respectively.Trade ReviewIn this superbly crafted, absorbing book, Flueckiger explores the relationships among folklore genres in the Chattisgarh region of north India, achieving a pioneering model of the study of a ‘folklore system’ in its entirety. This is ethnographic scholarship at its best. The multigenre approach is a major contribution, and this rich book should be read by all students of folklore, literature, performance, and South Asia. * Choice *Based on fifteen months of original research at the boundary between the states of Madhya Pradesh and Orissa, as well as on many return visits over the course of fifteen years, this book is one of the most wide-ranging, meticulous, and insightful monographs on Indian folklore ever published. -- Gloria Goodwin Raheja * American Ethnologist *
£15.99
Cornell University Press The ManyMinded Man
Book SynopsisIn The Many-Minded Man, Joel Christensen explores the content, character, and structure of the Homeric Odyssey through a modern psychological lens, focusing on how the epic both represents the workings of the human mind and provides for its audiencesboth ancient and moderna therapeutic model for coping with the exigencies of chance and fate.By reading the Odyssey as an exploration of the constitutive elements of human identity, the function of narrative in defining the self, and the interaction between the individual and their social context, The Many-Minded Man addresses enduring questions about the poem, such as the importance of Telemachus''s role, why Odysseus must tell his own tale, and the epic''s sudden and unexpected closure. Through these dynamics, Christensen reasons, the Odyssey not only instructs readers about how narrative shapes a sense of agency but also offers solutions for avoiding dangerous stories and destructive patterns Trade ReviewWhile the arguments are usually complex and intricate, Christensen has successfully achieved what he set out to do, thanks in part to his clear style and presentation. Attentive and contemplative readers will gain insights not only into the Odyssey but also into their own experiences. * Choice *Joel Christensen shows that he has thoroughly digested not only the vast field of Classics – specifically Homeric scholarship – but also the equally immense realm of human psychology, although he modestly denies the latter. [H]e offers a deeply personal study, one that emphasizes process over product in a way that seems quite appropriate to both the Odyssey and modern psychology. * The Classical Journal *Table of ContentsIntroduction 1. Homeric Psychology 2. Treating Telemachus, Education and Learned Helplessness 3. Escaping Ogygia, An Isolated Man 4. Odysseus's Apologoi and Narrative Therapy 5. Odysseus's Lies 6. Marginalized Agencies and Narrative Selves 7. Penelope's Subordinated Agency 8. The Politics of Ithaca 9. The Therapy of Oblivion, Unforgettable Pain and the Odyssey's End
£32.30
Cornell University Press Old Norse Folklore
Book SynopsisThe medieval northern world consisted of a vast and culturally diverse region both geographically, from roughly Greenland to Novgorod and culturally, as one of the last areas of Europe to be converted to Christianity. Old Norse Folklore explores the complexities of this fascinating world in case studies and theoretical essays that connect orality and performance theory to memory studies, and myths relating to pre-Christian Nordic religion to innovations within late medieval pilgrimage song culture.Old Norse Folklore provides critical new perspectives on the Old Norse world, some of which appear in this volume for the first time in English. Stephen A. Mitchell presents emerging methodologies by analyzing Old Norse materials to offer a better understandings ofunderstanding of Old Norse materials. He examines, interprets, and re-interprets the medieval data bequeathed to us by posteritymyths, legends, riddles, charms, court culture, conversion narratives, la
£97.20
Cornell University Press Fables in Jewish Culture The Jon A. Lindseth
Book Synopsis
£80.75
Stanford University Press The Way That Lives in the Heart: Chinese Popular
Book SynopsisThe Way That Lives in the Heart is a richly detailed ethnographic analysis of the practice of Chinese religion in the modern, multicultural Southeast Asian city of Penang, Malaysia. The book conveys both an understanding of shared religious practices and orientations and a sense of how individual men and women imagine, represent, and transform popular religious practices within the time and space of their own lives. This work is original in three ways. First, the author investigates Penang Chinese religious practice as a total field of religious practice, suggesting ways in which the religious culture, including spirit-mediumship, has been transformed in the conjuncture with modernity. Second, the book emphasizes the way in which socially marginal spirit mediums use a religious anti-language and unique religious rituals to set themselves apart from mainstream society. Third, the study investigates Penang Chinese religion as the product of a specific history, rather than presenting an overgeneralized overview that claims to represent a single "Chinese religion."Trade Review"This is an excellent study on Chinese spirit medium and on Chinese popular religion in Malaysia."—Asian Folklore Studies"I wholeheartedly endorse the text; its most powerful quality for me is that it is a superbly crafted piece of ethnography that transcends the merely descriptive capacity. The theorizing is sophisticated and self-reflexive, and it offers for reflection a number of critical questions and problematics about how to theorize the persistence of folk/popular religious practices... in an urban, modern capitalist society."—Pacific Affairs"This richly detailed study of spirit mediums manages at once to portray an ethnically mixed society in the throes of modern change, and to illuminate the millennial role of spirit-medium performance in Chinese popular cultural traditions."—Donald S. Sutton, Carnegie Mellon University"Except for the detailed observations of de Groot made in the southern provinces in the late nineteenth century, few reports of spirit mediumship in modern China have appeared in print Jean DeBernardi now contributed a richly detailed ethnographic analysis of the practice of Chinese popular religion and spirit mediums in Penang, Malaysia. This newly added title regarding Malaysian Chinese spirit mediumship is most welcome, and will be beneficial to both the general reader and the specialist." —Journal of Chinese Religions
£26.99
University of Minnesota Press Noah's Arkive
Book SynopsisA timely rethinking of the archetypal story of Noah, the great flood, and who was left behind as the waters rose Most people know the story of Noah from a children’s bible or a play set with a colorful ship, bearded Noah, pairs of animals, and an uncomplicated vision of survival. Noah’s ark, however, will forever be haunted by what it leaves to the rising waters so that the world can begin again.In Noah’s Arkive, Jeffrey J. Cohen and Julian Yates examine the long history of imagining endurance against climate catastrophe—as well as alternative ways of creating refuge. They trace how the elements of the flood narrative were elaborated in medieval and early modern art, text, and music, and now shape writing and thinking during the current age of anthropogenic climate change. Arguing that the biblical ark may well be the worst possible exemplar of human behavior, the chapters draw on a range of sources, from the Epic of Gilgamesh and Ovid’s tale of Deucalion and Pyrrah, to speculative fiction, climate fiction, and stories and art dwelling with environmental catastrophe. Noah’s Arkive uncovers the startling afterlife of the Genesis narrative written from the perspective of Noah’s wife and family, the animals on the ark, and those excluded and so left behind to die. This book of recovered stories speaks eloquently to the ethical and political burdens of living through the Anthropocene.Following a climate change narrative across the millennia, Noah’s Arkive surveys the long history of dwelling with the consequences of choosing only a few to survive in order to start the world over. It is an intriguing meditation on how the story of the ark can frame how we think about environmental catastrophe and refuge, conservation and exclusion, offering hope for a better future by heeding what we know from the past.Trade Review "Noah’s Arkive is an indispensable book—one that takes on a central charismatic narrative equipped to address the shuddering socio-ecological transition within which we (a vastly differentiated “we”) find ourselves. Magisterial yet wisely irreverent, it touches upon urgent challenges, including ecofascism, decolonialization, and racial justice, while also delivering a learned, meticulously researched exhibit of historical ark narratives."—Stephanie LeMenager, University of Oregon "Aboard Noah’s Arkive you’ll experience the Flood from the perspectives of its human and animal passengers and the multitude of creatures drowning shipside, accompanied by the sanctimonious dove and the raucous raven. This beautiful, deep, funny, ardent, rageful book will float the boat of anyone interested in ecocriticism, material culture, science studies, and design."—Julia Reinhard Lupton, University of California, Irvine
£86.40
University of Minnesota Press Fearless Ivan and His Faithful Horse Double-Hump:
Book SynopsisA classic Russian tale retold for our time by an eminent folklorist “Many years ago in the great empire of Russia where wicked winds and cruel storms tormented the lives of poor peasants . . .” So begins the magical story of a simple peasant boy who defeats a cruel tsar with the help of his loyal pony. Written by the Russian poet Pyotr Yershov and first published in 1834, the tale became such a favorite and was so often repeated that it soon joined the oral tradition of Russian folklore that had been Yershov’s inspiration.In Fearless Ivan and His Faithful Horse Double-Hump, Jack Zipes, doyen of folklorists, adapts this classic tale, capturing the full charm and exoticism of the original. Rendered in the style and idiom of traditional Russian folk tales, the story speaks with the voice of the underdog, slyly satirizing the hypocrisy of the Russian bureaucracy and ruling classes—a taunt to tyranny that transcends time. With pertinent historical and biographical commentary from Zipes, along with thirty striking illustrations by Russian artists that were originally featured on postcards, this timeless tale—written for adults and celebrated as a children’s classic—is now a visual and literary delight for all generations of readers.Trade Review"This is definitely a book that bridges the gap between children and adults. With all the pictures and a relatively short length, it could easily be read aloud to the youngest set. Adult fans of folklore will appreciate the touch of the venerable fairy tale scholar Jack Zipes." —Timeless Tales MagazineTable of ContentsPart OnePart TwoPart ThreeAfterword
£15.19
University of Minnesota Press The Monster Theory Reader
Book SynopsisA collection of scholarship on monsters and their meaning—across genres, disciplines, methodologies, and time—from foundational texts to the most recent contributions Zombies and vampires, banshees and basilisks, demons and wendigos, goblins, gorgons, golems, and ghosts. From the mythical monstrous races of the ancient world to the murderous cyborgs of our day, monsters have haunted the human imagination, giving shape to the fears and desires of their time. And as long as there have been monsters, there have been attempts to make sense of them, to explain where they come from and what they mean. This book collects the best of what contemporary scholars have to say on the subject, in the process creating a map of the monstrous across the vast and complex terrain of the human psyche.Editor Jeffrey Andrew Weinstock prepares the way with a genealogy of monster theory, traveling from the earliest explanations of monsters through psychoanalysis, poststructuralism, and cultural studies, to the development of monster theory per se—and including Jeffrey Jerome Cohen’s foundational essay “Monster Theory (Seven Theses),” reproduced here in its entirety. There follow sections devoted to the terminology and concepts used in talking about monstrosity; the relevance of race, religion, gender, class, sexuality, and physical appearance; the application of monster theory to contemporary cultural concerns such as ecology, religion, and terrorism; and finally the possibilities monsters present for envisioning a different future. Including the most interesting and important proponents of monster theory and its progenitors, from Sigmund Freud to Julia Kristeva to J. Halberstam, Donna Haraway, Barbara Creed, and Stephen T. Asma—as well as harder-to-find contributions such as Robin Wood’s and Masahiro Mori’s—this is the most extensive and comprehensive collection of scholarship on monsters and monstrosity across disciplines and methods ever to be assembled and will serve as an invaluable resource for students of the uncanny in all its guises.Contributors: Stephen T. Asma, Columbia College Chicago; Timothy K. Beal, Case Western Reserve U; Harry Benshoff, U of North Texas; Bettina Bildhauer, U of St. Andrews; Noel Carroll, The Graduate Center, CUNY; Jeffrey Jerome Cohen, Arizona State U; Barbara Creed, U of Melbourne; Michael Dylan Foster, UC Davis; Sigmund Freud; Elizabeth Grosz, Duke U; J. Halberstam, Columbia U; Donna Haraway, UC Santa Cruz; Julia Kristeva, Paris Diderot U; Anthony Lioi, The Julliard School; Patricia MacCormack, Anglia Ruskin U; Masahiro Mori; Annalee Newitz; Jasbir K. Puar, Rutgers U; Amit A. Rai, Queen Mary U of London; Margrit Shildrick, Stockholm U; Jon Stratton, U of South Australia; Erin Suzuki, UC San Diego; Robin Wood, York U; Alexa Wright, U of Westminster.Trade Review"This book, indeed, may bite. The best books often do."—PopMatters"Weinstock's organization is carefully considered, and the overlap between some of the arguments and works cited between essays suggests that the discipline of monster theory has been built on a bedrock of canonical sources, several of which—most notably Freud's "The Uncanny"—are included in the first section of this book."—CHOICE"In the real world, monstrosity is used as a vague catch-all to justify acts of violence and even murder; these essays offer readers a digestible and critical examination of the monstrous as a way to force us to consider the politics behind what we deem monstrous, and how a deeper understanding of what haunts us may lead to a new, previously unimagined, future."—Ploughshares" An entertaining subject for students."—Gramarye
£100.00
University of Minnesota Press The Monster Theory Reader
Book SynopsisA collection of scholarship on monsters and their meaning—across genres, disciplines, methodologies, and time—from foundational texts to the most recent contributions Zombies and vampires, banshees and basilisks, demons and wendigos, goblins, gorgons, golems, and ghosts. From the mythical monstrous races of the ancient world to the murderous cyborgs of our day, monsters have haunted the human imagination, giving shape to the fears and desires of their time. And as long as there have been monsters, there have been attempts to make sense of them, to explain where they come from and what they mean. This book collects the best of what contemporary scholars have to say on the subject, in the process creating a map of the monstrous across the vast and complex terrain of the human psyche.Editor Jeffrey Andrew Weinstock prepares the way with a genealogy of monster theory, traveling from the earliest explanations of monsters through psychoanalysis, poststructuralism, and cultural studies, to the development of monster theory per se—and including Jeffrey Jerome Cohen’s foundational essay “Monster Theory (Seven Theses),” reproduced here in its entirety. There follow sections devoted to the terminology and concepts used in talking about monstrosity; the relevance of race, religion, gender, class, sexuality, and physical appearance; the application of monster theory to contemporary cultural concerns such as ecology, religion, and terrorism; and finally the possibilities monsters present for envisioning a different future. Including the most interesting and important proponents of monster theory and its progenitors, from Sigmund Freud to Julia Kristeva to J. Halberstam, Donna Haraway, Barbara Creed, and Stephen T. Asma—as well as harder-to-find contributions such as Robin Wood’s and Masahiro Mori’s—this is the most extensive and comprehensive collection of scholarship on monsters and monstrosity across disciplines and methods ever to be assembled and will serve as an invaluable resource for students of the uncanny in all its guises.Contributors: Stephen T. Asma, Columbia College Chicago; Timothy K. Beal, Case Western Reserve U; Harry Benshoff, U of North Texas; Bettina Bildhauer, U of St. Andrews; Noel Carroll, The Graduate Center, CUNY; Jeffrey Jerome Cohen, Arizona State U; Barbara Creed, U of Melbourne; Michael Dylan Foster, UC Davis; Sigmund Freud; Elizabeth Grosz, Duke U; J. Halberstam, Columbia U; Donna Haraway, UC Santa Cruz; Julia Kristeva, Paris Diderot U; Anthony Lioi, The Julliard School; Patricia MacCormack, Anglia Ruskin U; Masahiro Mori; Annalee Newitz; Jasbir K. Puar, Rutgers U; Amit A. Rai, Queen Mary U of London; Margrit Shildrick, Stockholm U; Jon Stratton, U of South Australia; Erin Suzuki, UC San Diego; Robin Wood, York U; Alexa Wright, U of Westminster.Trade Review"This book, indeed, may bite. The best books often do."—PopMatters"Weinstock's organization is carefully considered, and the overlap between some of the arguments and works cited between essays suggests that the discipline of monster theory has been built on a bedrock of canonical sources, several of which—most notably Freud's "The Uncanny"—are included in the first section of this book."—CHOICE"In the real world, monstrosity is used as a vague catch-all to justify acts of violence and even murder; these essays offer readers a digestible and critical examination of the monstrous as a way to force us to consider the politics behind what we deem monstrous, and how a deeper understanding of what haunts us may lead to a new, previously unimagined, future."—Ploughshares" An entertaining subject for students."—Gramarye
£26.99
University of Minnesota Press The Book of One Hundred Riddles of the Fairy
Book SynopsisReviving a lost classic of American fairy–tale literature Charles Godfrey Leland was one of the most popular American writers and artists of the nineteenth century, publishing more than twenty books of legends, fairy tales, humor, and essays. Today, however, he is a woefully underappreciated writer. Written, designed, and illustrated by Leland in 1892, The Book of One Hundred Riddles of the Fairy Bellaria is a forgotten classic and a small sample of his influential and experimental work. The Book of One Hundred Riddles of the Fairy Bellaria features the Scheherazade-like fairy goddess Bellaria: powerful and mysterious, courageous and clever, goddess of spring, flowers, love, fate, and death. In this story, Bellaria engages in a duel of wits with an evil king, a death match of one hundred riddles. Each riddle is spoken as a rhyme and illustrated by an original engraving in the arts and crafts style. This book is a beautiful reintroduction to Leland and his pioneering design.
£19.79
University of Tennessee Press What Are the Animals to Us?: Approaches from
Book SynopsisFrom the first woolly mammoths painted in exquisite detail on Paleolithic cave walls to contemporary depictions of anthropomorphized mice as heroes of animated films and fiction, animals have played crucial roles in human cultures around the world. In What Are the Animals to Us? scholars from a wide variety of academic disciplines explore the diverse meanings of animals in science, religion, folklore, literature, and art.The contributors focus especially on analyzing cultural products about animals. The chapters in the first section of the book, “From Totems to Tales,” interpret folklore of cats, foxes, snakes, and frogs in various cultures, while the chapters in thesection on “Real Toads in Imaginary Gardens” concern themselves with literary and historical representations of reindeer, wild birds, tigers, and other animals. The chapters in “Holy Dogs and Scared Bunnies” consider the roles of animals in art and religion. In the section on “Ethics, Ethology, and Konrad Lorenz,” the contributors evaluate the legacy of this cofounder of the science of animal behavior in the light of recent revelations about Lorenz’s National Socialist past. Finally, an extensive afterword offers theoretical and practical ways in which readers might better understand animal others in their own right, and discusses the ethical implications of such an understanding.Accessible and lively, What Are the Animals to Us? is a uniquely wide-ranging and well-written interdisciplinary introduction to the emerging field of animal studies that offers not just novel approaches to the study of what animals mean to people but also fresh insights into a broad range of topics, from environmental history to animal behavior, postmodern art to Christian theology.
£999.99
University of North Texas Press,U.S. Mustangs And Cow Horses
£21.56
University of North Texas Press,U.S. Folktales from the Helotes Settlement
Book SynopsisFolktales from the Helotes Settlement is a collection of personal memories from the Folklore Society’s longest active member, who first joined more than fifty years ago. Here we find legends, customs, and beliefs of the people of the Helotes Settlement near San Antonio. These stories capture the lore of a place similar to lots of other places—our places. They’re familiar to us all because, when we get right down to it, the Helotes Settlement is not very different from wherever we’re from.
£17.95
University Press of Mississippi A Spiral Way: How the Phonograph Changed
Book SynopsisThe invention of the cylinder phonograph at the end of the nineteenth century opened up a new world for cultural research. Indeed, Edison's talking machine became one of the basic tools of anthropology. It not only equipped researchers with the means of preserving folk songs but it also enabled them to investigate a wide spectrum of distinct vocal expressions in the emerging fields of anthropology and folklore. Ethnographers grasped its huge potential and fanned out through regional America to record rituals, stories, word lists, and songs in isolated cultures. From the outset the federal government helped fuel the momentum to record cultures that were at risk of being lost. Through the Bureau of American Ethnology, the Smithsonian Institution took an active role in preserving native heritage. It supported projects to make phonographic documentation of American Indian language, music, and rituals before developing technologies and national expansion might futher undermine them. This study of the early phonograph's impact shows traditional ethnography being transformed, for attitudes of both ethnographers and performers were reshaped by this exciting technology. In the presence of the phonograph both fieldwork and the materials collected were revolutionized. By radically altering the old research modes, the phonograph brought the disciplines of anthropology and folklore into the modern era. At first the instrument was as strange and new to the fieldworkers as it was to their subjects. To some the first encounter with the phonograph was a deeply unsettling experience. When it was demonstrated in 1878 before members of the National Academy of Sciences, several members of the audience fainted. Even its inventor was astonished. Of his first successful test of his tinfoil phonograph, Thomas A. Edison said, ""I was never taken so aback in my life."" The cylinders that have survived from these times offer an unrivaled resource not only for contemporary scholarship but also for a grassroots renaissance of cultural and religious values. In tracing the historical interplay of the talking machine with field research, A Spiral Way underscores the natural adaptablity of cultural study to this new technology.
£27.96
University Press of Mississippi Neo-Pagan Sacred Art and Altars: Making Things
Book SynopsisFire-cat masks, earth mother icons, henna tattoos, ankhs, and water altars--these objects may sound like the inventory in an ancient druid's sanctuary. But they are part of the sacred reliquary created by contemporary artists and practitioners of Neo-Pagan ritual.Calling themselves ""witches"" and ""pagans"" and drawing inspiration from pre-Christian polytheistic worship, the practitioners of Neo-Paganism have often been misunderstood by outsiders. In the uninitiated, their art and iconography have inspired fear.In featuring the works of ten artists, Sabina Magliocco's Neo-Pagan Sacred Art and Altars unlocks the meanings of this religion's creativity and symbolism and makes its sacred nature understandable to non-specialists.A stunning array of color plates and halftones will touch the imagination of insiders and outsiders alike, revealing the imaginative skills of some of the movement's most celebrated artists, as well as amateurs working at home with family and friends.These masks and altars, earrings and necklaces create one of the Neo-Pagan movement's most striking features--its ritual art. Yet this is one of the first books to focus on these spiritual objects rather than on the sociology and psychology of the followers. The odd array of costumes and jewelry, as well as the juxtaposition of neo-primitive and medieval-looking styles, troubles outsiders and contributes to the movement's undeserved reputation for attracting eccentrics. Yet its sacred art is part of one of the most flourishing contemporary traditions in the United States.
£29.71
University Press of Mississippi Aliens, Ghosts, and Cults: Legends We Live
Book SynopsisIn late May, a Pennsylvania high school hums with the rumor that a Satanic cult plans on killing the first four couples through the door on prom night. A horror writer in the Catskills is overcome with grief, alienated from his wife, unable to write, and suffering from recurring thoughts of physical and sexual indignities he has no words to describe. He concludes he has been abducted by aliens. In a Pizza Hut in Ohio, employees refuse to close alone because the ghost of a hanged man haunts the refrigerator. Tales such as these are the subject of Bill Ellis's Aliens, Ghosts, and Cults: Legends We Live. In the book, he explores the complex relationship between ordinary life and outlandish but oft-told legends. What he finds is startling. In multiple case studies legends become part of life. Officials take action in answer to each story's weird details, and people adjust their behavior to avoid or to experience aliens and ghosts. Written for both the cultural studies expert and the reader fascinated with reactions to extraordinary phenomena, Aliens, Ghosts, and Cults pursues motivations for why people tell these ""true stories, heard from a friend of a friend."" Ellis shows legends creating a sense of community in a multi-ethnic institutional camp. He traces some contemporary scares to such old tales as the vanishing hitchhiker and murderous gang initiations. In analyzing some newly emerging legend types, such as alien abductions and computer virus warnings, Ellis discovers connections between earlier types of religious experience and supposed witchcraft. Finally, the book reveals how legends can inspire people to actions, ranging from playful visits to haunted spots to horrifying threats of violence. Legends rely on active discussion to spread and mutate. This book considers them to be a social process, not a kind of narrative with a fixed form. People worldwide may tell a legend or one person to whom the event allegedly occurred may ""own"" the story. Individuals may relate an event as something strongly believed or as something laughable. Legends may be very new or have roots in old folklore. But when high schools, law enforcement agencies, city governments, and individuals take action, the story becomes one of the legends we live. Bill Ellis is an associate professor of English and American studies at Penn State University, Hazleton campus. His previous books include Raising the Devil: Satanism, New Religions, and the Media, and he has been published in Psychology Today, Skeptical Inquirer, Journal of American Folklore, and Journal of Popular Literature.
£27.96
University Press of Mississippi Suddenly They Heard Footsteps: Storytelling for the Twenty-first Century
Book SynopsisIn Suddenly They Heard Footsteps, Dan Yashinsky, one of North America's best-known storytellers, shows how an old tradition has become the new avant-garde. Storytelling is very much alive in the digital age despite the pressures of an ""on-demand"" society. Yashinsky admits that people no longer have to hear and retain information with the same urgency required of previous generations. However, people still choose to listen, and stories still have the power to create a sense of community and a shared past. The belief that storytelling is a necessary and beneficial art for our times has sparked a contemporary renaissance of oral literature with a variety of festivals, groups, and gatherings. These outlets give storytellers new places to explore their art. There is also a burgeoning interest in the way stories flow through and frame everyday lives, anchor identity, preserve family heritage, and build bridges between communities. Yashinsky uses his own experiences in this growing worldwide movement to make a case for the increased importance of storytelling. By turns humorous, inspiring, instructive, and philosophical, Suddenly They Heard Footsteps is fired with the magic of storytelling and instructs both the listener and the storyteller in gaining deep appreciation of the experience. Arguing that we can't double-click on wisdom, Yashinsky celebrates the many ways people choose to tell, listen to, and find meaning in stories. Dan Yashinsky has been a storyteller for almost thirty years. He has performed and taught in Canada, the United States, Europe, and Asia. He edited Tales for an Unknown City, which won the Toronto Book Award.
£27.96
Modern Language Association of America Teaching World Epics
Book SynopsisEssays for teaching ancient and recent epic narratives from around the world.Cultures across the globe have embraced epics: stories of memorable deeds by heroic characters whose actions have significant consequences for their lives and their communities. Incorporating narrative elements also found in sacred history, chronicle, saga, legend, romance, myth, folklore, and the novel, epics throughout history have both animated the imagination and encouraged reflection on what it means to be human. Teaching World Epics addresses ancient and more recent epic works from Africa, Europe, Mesoamerica, and East, Central, and South Asia that are available in English translations.Useful to instructors of literature, peace and conflict studies, transnational studies, women's studies, and religious studies, the essays in this volume focus on epics in sociopolitical and cultural contexts, on the adaptation and reception of epic works, and on themes that are especially relevant today, such as gender dynamics and politics, national identity, colonialism and imperialism, violence, and war.This volume includes discussion of Ludovico Ariosto's Orlando Furioso, Giulia Bigolina's Urania, The Book of Dede Korkut, Luis Vaz de Camões's Os Lusiadas, David of Sassoun, The Epic of Askia Mohammed, The Epic of Gilgamesh, the epic of Sun-Jata, Alonso de Ercilla y Zúñiga's La Araucana, Homer's Iliad and Odyssey, Kalevala, Kebra Nagast, Kudrun, The Legend of Poṉṉivaḷa Nadu, the Mahabharata, Manas, John Milton's Paradise Lost, Mwindo, the Nibelungenlied, Poema de mio Cid, Popol Wuj, the Ramayana, the Shahnameh, Sirat Bani Hilal, Edmund Spenser's The Faerie Queene, Statius's Thebaid, The Tale of the Heike, Three Kingdoms, Gaspar Pérez de Villagrá's Historia de la Nueva México, and Virgil's Aeneid.
£81.60
Modern Language Association of America Teaching World Epics
Book SynopsisEssays for teaching ancient and recent epic narratives from around the world.Cultures across the globe have embraced epics: stories of memorable deeds by heroic characters whose actions have significant consequences for their lives and their communities. Incorporating narrative elements also found in sacred history, chronicle, saga, legend, romance, myth, folklore, and the novel, epics throughout history have both animated the imagination and encouraged reflection on what it means to be human. Teaching World Epics addresses ancient and more recent epic works from Africa, Europe, Mesoamerica, and East, Central, and South Asia that are available in English translations.Useful to instructors of literature, peace and conflict studies, transnational studies, women's studies, and religious studies, the essays in this volume focus on epics in sociopolitical and cultural contexts, on the adaptation and reception of epic works, and on themes that are especially relevant today, such as gender dynamics and politics, national identity, colonialism and imperialism, violence, and war.This volume includes discussion of Ludovico Ariosto's Orlando Furioso, Giulia Bigolina's Urania, The Book of Dede Korkut, Luis Vaz de Camões's Os Lusiadas, David of Sassoun, The Epic of Askia Mohammed, The Epic of Gilgamesh, the epic of Sun-Jata, Alonso de Ercilla y Zúñiga's La Araucana, Homer's Iliad and Odyssey, Kalevala, Kebra Nagast, Kudrun, The Legend of Poṉṉivaḷa Nadu, the Mahabharata, Manas, John Milton's Paradise Lost, Mwindo, the Nibelungenlied, Poema de mio Cid, Popol Wuj, the Ramayana, the Shahnameh, Sirat Bani Hilal, Edmund Spenser's The Faerie Queene, Statius's Thebaid, The Tale of the Heike, Three Kingdoms, Gaspar Pérez de Villagrá's Historia de la Nueva México, and Virgil's Aeneid.
£34.81
University Press of Mississippi Bodies: Sex, Violence, Disease, and Death in Contemporary Legend
Book SynopsisBecause they are so often told as news, contemporary legends force us to reevaluate life as we know it. They confront us with macabre, fantastic, horrific, or hilarious characters and events that seem to come straight out of myths and folktales, but are presented as present day events. The difficulty is that it is not at all easy to decide whether these often disturbing stories should be treated as reliable or dismissed as fantasy. The legends explored in this book are some of the most bizarre, gruesome, and politically sensitive stories in the contemporary legend canon. At any moment a body may be invaded by noxious creatures, deliberately infected with deadly disease, or raided to provide donor organs for sick foreigners. These are ""winter's tales,"" the stuff of nightmares. In this book Gillian Bennett traces the cultural history of six legends, well-known in Europe and America from medieval times to the present day. Appearing in broadsides, ballads, myths, ancient and modern legends, novels, plays, films, television shows, and stories told in the oral tradition, these legends are not just silly tales which can be dismissed as trivial and untrue. They reveal much about the concerns and fears of everyday life and demonstrate the limits of knowledge and power in the modern world. Gillian Bennett is the author of ""Alas, Poor Ghost!"": Traditions of Belief in Story and Discourse and Traditions of Belief: Women and the Supernatural and coauthor of the standard legend bibliography and reader. She lives in Stockport, United Kingdom.
£27.96
University Press of Mississippi The Story-Time of the British Empire: Colonial and Postcolonial Folkloristics
Book SynopsisIn The Story-Time of the British Empire, author Sadhana Naithani examines folklore collections compiled by British colonial administrators, military men, missionaries, and women in the British colonies of Africa, Asia, and Australia between 1860 and 1950. Much of this work was accomplished in the context of colonial relations and done by non-folklorists, yet these oral narratives and poetic expressions of non-Europeans were transcribed, translated, published, and discussed internationally. Naithani analyzes the role of folklore scholarship in the construction of colonial cultural politics as well as in the conception of international folklore studies.Since most folklore scholarship and cultural history focuses exclusively on specific nations, there is little study of cross-cultural phenomena about empire and/or postcoloniality. Naithani argues that connecting cultural histories, especially in relation to previously colonized countries, is essential to understanding those countries' folklore, as these folk traditions result from both internal and European influence. The author also makes clear the role folklore and its study played in shaping intercultural perceptions that continue to exist in the academic and popular realms today. The Story-Time of the British Empire is a bold argument for a twenty-first-century vision of folklore studies that is international in scope and that understands folklore as a transnational entity.
£81.75
University Press of Mississippi Downhome Gospel: African American Spiritual Activism in Wiregrass Country
Book SynopsisJerrilyn McGregory explores sacred music and spiritual activism in a little-known region of the South, the Wiregrass Country of Georgia, Alabama, and North Florida. She examines African American sacred music outside of Sunday church-related activities, showing that singing conventions and anniversary programs fortify spiritual as well as social needs. In this region African Americans maintain a social world of their own creation. Their cultural performances embrace some of the most pervasive forms of African American sacred music--spirituals, common meter, Sacred Harp, shape-note, traditional, and contemporary gospel. Moreover, the contexts in which they sing include present-day observations such as the Twentieth of May (Emancipation Day), Burial League Turnouts, and Fifth Sunday.Rather than tracing the evolution of African American sacred music, this ethnographic study focuses on contemporary cultural performances, almost all by women, which embrace all forms. These women promote a female-centered theology to ensure the survival of their communities and personal networks. They function in leadership roles that withstand the test of time. Their spiritual activism presents itself as a way of life.In Wiregrass Country, ""You don't have to sing like an angel"" is a frequently expressed sentiment. To these women, ""good"" music is God's music regardless of the manner delivered. Therefore, Downhome Gospel presents gospel music as being more than a transcendent sound. It is local spiritual activism that is writ large. Gospel means joy, hope, expectation, and the good news that makes the soul glad.
£81.75
University Press of Mississippi Newslore: Contemporary Folklore on the Internet
Book SynopsisNewslore is folklore that comments on and hinges on knowledge of current events. These expressions come in many forms: jokes, urban legends, digitally altered photographs, mock news stories, press releases or interoffice memoranda, parodies of songs, poems, political and commercial advertisements, movie previews and posters, still or animated cartoons, and short live-action films.In Newslore: Folklore on the Internet and in the News, author Russell Frank offers a snapshot of the items of newslore disseminated via the Internet that gained the widest currency around the turn of the millennium. Among the newsmakers lampooned in e-mails and on the Web were Bill and Hillary Clinton, George W. Bush and Dick Cheney, Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein, and such media celebrities as Princess Diana and Michael Jackson. The book also looks at the folk response to the September 11 attacks and Hurricane Katrina, as well as the presidential elections of 2000 and 2004.Frank analyzes this material by tracing each item back to the news story it refers to in search of clues as to what, exactly, the item reveals about the public's response. His argument throughout is that newslore is an extremely useful and revelatory gauge for public reaction to current events and an invaluable screen capture of the latest zeitgeist.
£41.25
University of Utah Press,U.S. Putting the Supernatural in Its Place: Folklore, the Hypermodern, and the Ethereal
Book SynopsisJust exactly where do we find the supernatural in the contemporary world? It’s both pervasive—everywhere—and specific—a particular somewhere. Otherworldly traditions and stories still spread through oral narration. They pervade mass media and the digital world and often form the stuff of hypermodern folklore—the stew of folk, popular, consumer, and digital culture that constitutes much of contemporary life. People also imbue specific places—from the local haunted house or cemetery to whole towns or cities—with supernatural manifestations or significance.Putting the Supernatural in Its Place explores zombies, vampires, witches, demented nuns, mediums, and ghosts in their natural (and unnatural) habitats while making sense of the current ubiquity of the supernatural on the Internet, in movies, tourism, and in places like New Orleans. This unique study of how we locate the supernatural sheds light on why certain sites and their stories captivate us. It demonstrates how pondering the supernatural can bring a better understanding of the places we create and inhabit.Trade Review"A fine collection of articles exploring the tension between the ethereal and the firmly local in supernatural folklore. The scholarship is up-to-the-minute, and the approach is engaging enough to invite any reader fascinated by allure of the inexplicably spooky."—Erika Brady, Editor-in-Chief of Journal of American Folklore “This book is a feast.”—Association for Mormon Letters “Brings together a number of different perspectives on the relationship between contemporary legend scholarship and place, exploring the ways in which the hypermodern world is examined through localized encounters with the supernatural. These essays could find a valuable place in a course on contemporary legend or American folklore.”—Journal of Folklore Research “A welcome addition to the corpus of folkloristic studies of belief and the supernatural. It will prove especially useful for upper-level undergraduate or graduate seminars on the topic of the supernatural, while specific chapters may be of interest to scholars working in such areas as fan studies, new media, film studies, Japanese studies, and tourism studies.”—Western Folklore
£20.21
University Press of Mississippi Baba Yaga: The Wild Witch of the East in Russian
Book SynopsisBaba Yaga is an ambiguous and fascinating figure. She appears in traditional Russian folktales as a monstrous and hungry cannibal, or as a canny inquisitor of the adolescent hero or heroine of the tale. In new translations and with an introduction by Sibelan Forrester, Baba Yaga: The Wild Witch of the East in Russian Fairy Tales is a selection of tales that draws from the famous collection of Aleksandr Afanas'ev, but also includes some tales from the lesser-known nineteenth-century collection of Ivan Khudiakov. This new collection includes beloved classics such as ""Vasilisa the Beautiful"" and ""The Frog Princess,"" as well as a version of the tale that is the basis for the ballet ""The Firebird."" The preface and introduction place these tales in their traditional context with reference to Baba Yaga's continuing presence in today's culture--the witch appears iconically on tennis shoes, tee shirts, even tattoos. The stories are enriched with many wonderful illustrations of Baba Yaga, some old (traditional ""lubok"" woodcuts), some classical (the marvelous images from Victor Vasnetsov or Ivan Bilibin), and some quite recent or solicited specifically for this collection
£35.96
