(no subject)

[rymenhild]

Dear friends (*cough*prosewitch*cough*) who might know the answer,

Could you recommend some basic treatments of variation in folklore, suitable for first-year undergraduates in composition courses?

Thank you,
Rymenhild

Comments

[mythosidhe.livejournal.com]

Oh goodness, I have to get you in touch with my dear friend mbickers. She's doing graduate work on folklore right now, I'm sure she'd know where to direct you. I'll point her this way --

[rymenhild.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the connection!

[mmymoon.livejournal.com]

Mwah.

Which angle are you coming from -- discussing variation, or more along the lines of giving them a bunch of variants of the same story?

Theoretically, I always like starting off with a brief discussion of the Aarne-Thompson tale type index, to get (non-folkloristic/literary) people really thinking about how variation is a key part of folklore, particularly folktales, and what are the classification of some of (their) favorite tales... Cinderella being 510, Beauty and the Beast being 425, etc... you could then expand that into examining the different motifs (What makes a Cinderella tale?) or to go more hardcore into theory, look at Propp's structure of the folktale, and compare that to tales and modern stories. (I always like talking about Propp and then showing how Star Wars fits into the structure perfectly.)

Stuff like Alan Dundes, Marina Warner, Jack Zipes is probably too advanced for first-years, but I think the AT Index and Propp are a really nice into with enough of that "Wow, what a cool new theory!" college wonder vibe.

As for hitting them with lots of variant texts, of course, it all depends on which tale(s) you want to focus on... or even if you want to do tales at all. Brunvand's books on urban legends are first-year friendly. A good online resource for tales is D. L. Ashliman's website: http://www.pitt.edu/~dash/folktexts.html I use his archive insanely often. I personally did a colorful web-project comparing three main variants of Cinderella: http://mbickers.com/Folklore/510/ which might serve as kind of a painless/brainless intro, although it has some theoretical backing. (Also, I must disclaim that I hate Bettelheim, but he was required. Weep.)

[rymenhild.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the advice! Actually, I'm going to friend you and continue this discussion in a locked post, as providing too many open details about what I plan to teach in an unlocked post makes my identity even easier to guess than it already is. Also, a quick glance at your journal tells me that you absolutely have to start talking to prosewitch. prosewitch, this is mbickers. mbickers, this is prosewitch. Shake hands and discuss tale-type variants in anime. :)

[mmymoon.livejournal.com]

Yay! I'll friend you back; I always need more intelligent thought in my day.

Mwah! I almost wrote my undergrad thesis on tale-types in shoujo manga. Glee!

[taylweaver.livejournal.com]

Out of curiosity, what sort of folktales are you planning to look at? The fairytales we grew up with like Cinderella and Sleeping Beauty, or the kind that are less "mainstream"? (as in, not so European, or not so much about princesses.)

[rymenhild.livejournal.com]

I've posted more details on a filtered post. :)

[goblinmouse.livejournal.com]

Second vote for Aarne-Thompson.

There's also a book called The Classic Fairytales edited by Maria Tatar that follows a few common ones through some variants and modern versions with commentary. Not that scholarly, but very readable for undergrads.