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The Meaning of Folklore Alan Dundes. Photo by Simon Bronner The Meaning of Folklore The Analytical Essays of Alan Dundes Edited and Introduced by Simon J. Bronner Utah State University Press Logan, Utah Copyright ©2007 Utah State University Press All rights reserved Utah State University Press Logan, Utah 84322-7200 www.usu.edu/usupress Manufactured in the United States of America Printed on recycled, acid-free paper ISBN: 978-0-87421-683-7 (cloth) ISBN: 978-0-87421-684-4 (e-book) Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Dundes, Alan. The meaning of folklore : the analytical essays of Alan Dundes / edited and introduced by Simon J. Bronner. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-0-87421-683-7 (cloth : alk. paper) 1. Folklore. 2. Dundes, Alan. I. Bronner, Simon J. II. Title. GR71.D88 2007 398.2--dc22 2007033333 Contents Preface and Acknowledgments Introduction: The Analytics of Alan Dundes References vii 1 36 Part I: Structure and Analysis 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. Folklore as a Mirror of Culture The Study of Folklore in Literature and Culture: Identification and Interpretation Metafolklore and Oral Literary Criticism From Etic to Emic Units in the Structural Study of Folktales (Postscript) The Motif-Index and the Tale Type Index: A Critique How Indic Parallels to the Ballad of the “Walled-Up Wife” Reveal the Pitfalls of Parochial Nationalistic Folkloristics Structuralism and Folklore (Postscript) Binary Opposition in Myth: The Propp/ Lévi-Strauss Debate in Retrospect On Game Morphology: A Study of the Structure of NonVerbal Folklore The Devolutionary Premise in Folklore Theory 53 67 77 88 101 107 123 145 154 164 Part II: Worldview and Identity 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. Folk Ideas as Units of Worldview (Postscript) Worldview in Folk Narrative As the Crow Flies: A Straightforward Study of Lineal Worldview in American Folk Speech Much Ado About “Sweet Bugger All”: Getting to the Bottom of a Puzzle in British Folk Speech Grouping Lore: Scientists and Musicians (A) Science in Folklore? Folklore in Science? (B) Viola Jokes: A Study of Second String Humor Medical Speech and Professional Identity (A) The Gomer: A Figure of American Hospital Folk Speech (B) “When You Hear Hoofbeats, Think Horses, Not Zebras”: A Folk Medical Diagnostic Proverb 179 193 196 211 229 232 237 249 252 264 Part III: Symbol and Mind 14. 15. 16. 17. 18. 19. 20. Index Getting the Folk and the Lore Together Gallus as Phallus: A Psychoanalytic Cross-Cultural Consideration of the Cockfight as Fowl Play The Symbolic Equivalence of Allomotifs: Towards a Method of Analyzing Folktales Earth-Diver: Creation of the Mythopoeic Male (Postscript) Madness in Method Plus a Plea for Projective Inversion in Myth Theses on Feces: Scatological Analysis (A) The Folklore of Wishing Wells (B) Here I Sit: A Study of American Latrinalia (C) The Kushmaker The Ritual Murder or Blood Libel Legend: A Study of AntiSemitic Victimization through Projective Inversion On the Psychology of Collecting Folklore (Postscript) Chain Letter: A Folk Geometric Progression 273 285 319 327 343 352 355 360 375 382 410 422 427 Preface and Acknowledgments This is a book that Alan Dundes should have put together, or so I told him. He probably would have done it, had not death in March 2005 put a halt to his tremendous production. The project came about after I read his proposal for a new compilation of his essays following Bloody Mary in the Mirror (2002a). I wanted him to do something different from what he planned. Rather than adding another capsule of writing, I cheekily told him it was time to reflect on the body of his major work covering more than forty years. He appreciated my s