In this work, Simon Bronner has compiled a series of essays (some already in print—revised for this volume—and some new pieces) that make the case for “the practice turn” in folkloristics. He argues that practice theory can elucidate tradition as well as provide coherence in a discipline that has often been diffuse in its approaches to the material under consideration. Folklorists, he contends, must consider how a tradition (verbal, material, behavioral) is practiced, but also its cognitive resonance. Bronner incorporates psychology, cognitive studies, and linguistics into his analyses, arguing that folklore is largely a mental and communicative exercise. To omit those aspects from our work, he insists, is to overlook key elements necessary to understanding folk genres of all kinds. As a specialist in folkloristics and linguistics, I study human meaning systems, so that it is particularly rewarding to see a folklorist turn to the theory of mind and cognition as a central tenet. While some would undoubtedly object to the Freudian bent in some of the essays, connecting folklore analysis to cognitive processes within the context of practice theory holds much promise for the field.
The volume is organized into three sections. In the first part Bronner introduces the theoretical framework. The second includes four essays illustrating the application of this framework. The concluding section examines how practice approaches to folk tradition can elucidate public policy related to education, government, and economics. The first chapter contrasts the performance approach, with its focus on folklore as public artistry, to the practice approach, with its conception of folklore emerging from a traditional set of embodied behaviors that emerge out of social relations and community values. Bronner presents the case that practice theory is best suited to deal with the traditional and cognitive basis for folklore and its social roles. Bronner argues that practice theory views “tradition as a kind of shapeable, contestable norm within which social agency can be enacted” (35-36). My own research on Russian life-cycle rites within the practice theory framework has also borne out the role of ritual participants as agents in negotiating traditional actions. After outlining the practice approach in the first two chapters, Bronner ultimately proposes a new definition of folklore as “traditional knowledge put into, and drawing from, practice” (76). He concludes that the performance approach privileges verbal genres, while practice theory is better suited to an understanding of artifacts and sociofacts as well as verbal lore.
In the second section, Bronner offers practice approaches to North American folk traditions, including: the bogeyman; the idiom “who’s your daddy?”; narratives about perpetrators of mass shootings; and the bawdy ballad “Barnacle Bill.” The bogeyman, one of the new essays composed for this volume, is particularly thought-provoking. Bronner discusses the ongoing connection of this figure to fears about sexual abuse of children. He concludes the essay with an examination of how this transgressive figure has been reimagined in contemporary American political discourse, moving from a denotation of sexual predator to connote morally ambiguous politicians. Even more successful is Bronner’s analysis of the folk psychology reflected in narratives about mass shooters, who the media often claim, without any medical evidence, suffer from Asperger’s Syndrome. In his view, this narrative motif elucidates fears about social decay in the guise of a (folk) medical diagnosis; this essay is the highlight of this section. The remaining two essays, on the taunt “who’s your daddy?” and on “Barnacle Bill,” are less effective overall. Bronner provides a comprehensive history of these two verbal forms, but does not consistently engage with the range of interpretations available to the agentive participants in the chant or song, as practice theory demands. For example, in the “Barnacle Bill” chapter, he focuses almost exclusively on how the song, as sung in all-male groups, helps to cope with male anxiety about gender roles and social position. However, there is abundant evidence from social science and psychological research that this song may well reflect internalized male dominance toward women (and their bodies), a very different conclusion for some male performers. Space constraints may have played a role, since he does include versions of this song sung by women, but the analysis does not acknowledge (even briefly) other possibilities that merit consideration.
The final articles demonstrate that the study of folk tradition can inform an understanding of how it intersects with institutional culture. The first essay explores the relationship between traditional practices and business through the lens of Amish participation in farmers markets. It explores how the decision to engage in commerce affects Amish (and “English”) perceptions of the group and how it functions. The next two pieces elucidate how the public face of folkloristics is reflected in governmental policy and in the design of ethnographic museums. Bronner compares public folklore events in Europe, Asia, and North America to unpack how folkloristics and fundamental assumptions about folklore/life are perceived in these different cultural contexts. The museum chapter discusses how the goals and design of ethnographic museums have changed over time and have adapted to attract attention to folklife in unexpected ways. The last article provides an overview of the discipline and its changes through a statistical analysis of the keywords at American Folklore Society presentations in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries.
A particular strength of this volume is Bronner’s extensive knowledge of the discipline and its historical underpinnings. While he explicitly makes the case for better historical contextualization of the material as part of an ongoing tradition at various points in the volume, its value is made abundantly clear in his analyses. This volume provides an excellent example for students of folklore to show how and why this step is crucial to an analysis of any folk practice or object. In doing so, Bronner has produced a thought-provoking volume that explores the future of our discipline through the lens of its past. In particular, he explores its connections to cognate fields, some of which have been largely overlooked in the discipline as a whole.
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[Review length: 992 words • Review posted on June 4, 2020]