Folklore

V

Modern Folklore Scholarship

The collection and analysis of folklore increasingly occupied the attention of scholars in Europe during the 19th and early 20th centuries. Numerous journals and societies devoted to the recording and preservation of the folk heritage were founded. The research of the 19th-century German philologist and Sanskrit scholar Theodor Benfey formed the basis for all later comparative studies in the field. His views were espoused by such scholars as the Scottish classicist and folklorist Andrew Lang, who wrote Custom and Myth (1884) and Myth, Literature and Religion (2 volumes, 1887), and the British anthropologist Sir James George Frazer, author of The Golden Bough (1890; expanded to 13 volumes, 1915). Their works were landmarks of the so-called anthropological school of folklore study.

As early as 1905 the Danish Folklore Archives used the Edison phonograph to record songs from Denmark, Greenland, and the Faroe Islands. Among a number of Scandinavian scholars prominent in the field of folklore was the Finnish folklorist Antti Aarne, who helped to develop procedures for ascertaining the component elements, place of origin, and approximate date of popular narratives. Aarne created in 1910 an important system of folktale indexing, later translated and enlarged by the American folklorist Stith Thompson in The Types of the Folk Tale (1928; 1961). See Folktales.

Significant folklore studies written in the United States include English and Scottish Popular Ballads (5 volumes, 1882-1898) by Francis James Child; Celtic Myth and Arthurian Romance (1927) by Roger Sherman Loomis; The Mind of Primitive Man (1911) by Franz Boas; and Thompson’s Motif-Index of Folk-Literature (6 volumes, 1932-1937; enlarged edition, 1955-1958), perhaps the most important work in the folktale field. A popular comprehensive reference source is Funk & Wagnalls Standard Dictionary of Folklore, Mythology and Legend (revised 1972).

VI

Folklore Societies and Study Facilities

Folklore societies in Europe and the United States have fostered the collecting (by tape recording and photography) and classifying of extensive archives of folklore materials. These scholarly societies, which have helped to make the study of folklore a valuable tool in anthropological, ethnological, and psychological research, as well as a burgeoning field in its own right, include the English Folklore Society, founded in 1878; the French Société des Traditions Populaires, which in 1886 began the publication of the journal Revue des Traditions Populaires; and the American Folklore Society, founded in 1888, which through its publication Journal of American Folklore and through investigations, studies, and publications by its branch groups has extensively promoted general knowledge of, and interest in, all aspects of American folklore.

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Facilities for field collection of folklore and for independent research exist at centers such as the Folklore Institute of Indiana University, founded in 1963; in addition, the institute maintains a folklore library. Since 1946 the Library of Congress has maintained an archive of recorded material and has provided equipment for field recording to other institutions; it also has exchange agreements with folklore centers throughout the world.

Also of importance is the international organization Folklore Fellows, founded in 1907, with headquarters in Helsinki, Finland. Through a series of publications, Folklore Fellows Communications, the organization has brought out more than 200 publications, including almost 40 indexes. The International Society for Folk-Narrative Research, founded in 1959, with headquarters in Åbo (Turku), Finland, has also helped advance the study of comparative folklore.

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