Folklore and Place: Four Themes

Abstract

I, a geographer, am privileged to raise four themes for consideration by folklorists. My naiveté in regard to your discipline's scope, methodology, and philosophy is compensated, I hope, by a certain clarifying boldness. The four themes or questions are: 1. What is the relationship between a genre of storytelling and a unit of land—for example, between folklore and landscape? 2. Fear in the experiencing of place has diminished in modern society, which leads us to ask, will it disappear altogether one day? 3. What is the moral content of folklore? 4. Human beings everywhere and in all times assume an emotional bond between themselves and external reality. What if the bond, the existence of which is the basis of all storytelling and our very humanity, is an illusion?