Abstract
The two-volume Companion to Irish Literature encompasses the full breadth of Ireland's literary tradition from the Middle Ages to the present day. The article looks at the story of folklore or ethnology in Ireland as protean, plural as much of the discourse that the discipline has collected or studied, Victorian Era, scribes and storytellers, ethnographic imagination in nineteenth-century Ireland generally, the Victorian notion of folklore, idea of neo-tradition, invention of official nationalism and the influence of evolutionary discourse generally.
| Original language | English (Ireland) |
|---|---|
| Title of host publication | A Companion to Irish Literature 1 |
| Editors | Julia M. Wright |
| Publisher | Wiley-Blackwell Publishing Ltd |
| Chapter | 24 |
| Pages | 393-410 |
| Number of pages | 18 |
| Volume | 1 |
| ISBN (Print) | 9781405188098 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - 2010 |
Keywords
- Folklore
- Ethnology
- Seanchas
- Victorian notion of folklore, neo-tradition, invention of official nationalism - of evolutionary discourse
- Aisling Mac Con Glinne, jocose survey of early monastic life - non-modern literary genre
- Classical origins to a range of discourses - august western academic convention, belies a bias
- Early Irish term coimcne, "emphasizing sharing ofcultural knowledge and importance of knowledge shared"
- Fairies, leprechauns, and peasants - checkered roles of the Ascendancy
- Folklore, ethnology or anthropology - exclusively modern phenomena, not foolproof
- Keating's work, recasting as one of the ur-stories of Irish national history
- Ó Danachair's seminal essay in Ulster Folklife - work of Beiner, Briody, Ó Cadhla
- Story of folklore or ethnology in Ireland - protean, plural as much of the discourse that the discipline has collected or studied
- Victorian Era - scribes and storytellers - ethnographic imagination in Nineteenth-Century Ireland