Folklore Rules is a brief introduction to the foundational concepts in folklore studies for beginning students. Designed to give essential background on the current study of folklore and some of the basic concepts and questions used when analyzing folklore, this short, coherent, and approachable handbook is divided into five chapters: What Is Folklore?; What Do Folklorists Do?; Types of Folklore; Types of Folk Groups; and, finally, What Do I Do Now? Through these chapters students are guided toward a working understanding of the field, learn basic terms and techniques, and learn to perceive the knowledge base and discourse frame for materials used in folklore courses. Folklore Rules will appeal to instructors and students for a variety of courses, including introductory folklore and comparative studies as well as literature, anthropology, and composition classes that include a folklore component.

"... Dundes has produced a work which will be useful to both students and teachers who wish to broaden their understanding of modern folklore." --Center for Southern Folklore Magazine "It is impossible ever to remain unimpressed with [Dundes'] excursuses, however much one may be in disagreement (or not) with his conclusions." --Forum for Modern Language Studies Often controversial, Alan Dundes's scholarship is always provocative, perceptive, and intelligent. His concern here is to assess the material folklorists have so painstakingly amassed and classified, to interpret folklore, and to use folklore to increase our understanding of human nature and culture.

The essays of Alan Dundes virtually created the meaning of folklore as an American academic discipline. Yet many of them went quickly out of print after their initial publication in far-flung journals. Brought together for the first time in this volume compiled and edited by Simon Bronner,  the selection surveys Dundes's major ideas and emphases, and is introduced by Bronner with a thorough analysis of Dundes's long career, his interpretations, and his inestimable contribution to folklore studies. Runner-up, the Wayland Hand Award for Folklore and History, 2009

East Boston has long been known as an Italian neighborhood and Southie as an Irish one, while nearby North Quincy has seen in recent decades an influx of Chinese Americans and immigrants. Such urban spaces in America can become intimately intertwined with ethnic identities (Little Italy, Greektown, Chinatown, Little Havana). Yet local residents often readily acknowledge an underlying diversity--both historically and as a result of more recent changes--that complicates such stereotypes.             Digging into the ever-shifting terrain of American ethnicity and urban spaces, Anthony Bak Buccitelli investigates folk practices, social memory, and local histories in three Boston-area neighborhoods. He looks at the ways locals represent their neighborhoods and themselves via events, symbols, stories, and landmarks, from the shamrock to the Chinese flag, whether the St. Patrick's Day parade in Southie or the Columbus Day parade in East Boston, from urban graffiti and websites to the Dorchester Heights Monument. City of Neighborhoods exposes the processes of selection and emphasis that produce, sustain, challenge, and change understandings of urban spaces as ethnic places. Honorable mention, Wayland Hand Prize for Folklore and History, American Folklore Society

Ph.D. Pennsylvania State University 2015.

This dissertation looks at Mormon folklore during the adolescent stage of the life cycle. Using primarily folkloric sources, it examines how Mormon youth, primarily in the Mormon Cultural Region (MCR), negotiate the competing demands of being both Mormon and American while competing with being both insiders and outsiders in both of those communities during a time of life where peer affiliation and being "in" with one's peers is particularly important. While Mormon youth have greater demands on and expectations for growing up than many adolescents in America, many aspects of folklore have helped ease the many stresses as they come of age. This dissertation looks at official discourse from biannual church-wide meetings (General Conference), outdoor disaster legends, the practice of toilet papering and creative dating, and folk interpretations of scientific and archaeological evidence connected with the Book of Mormon and Japanese heritage to show the many ways that adolescents create traditions to help them build community and ways of coping with the stresses of growing up as both Americans and Mormons. Mormon adolescent folklore becomes a useful tool to help Mormon youth cohere as a group and successfully negotiate the tempestuous teen years despite high and competing expectations and value systems.

This volume introduces a new concept to explore the dynamic relationship between folklore and popular culture: the "folkloresque." With "folkloresque," Foster and Tolbert name the product created when popular culture appropriates or reinvents folkloric themes, characters, and images. Such manufactured tropes are traditionally considered outside the purview of academic folklore study, but the folkloresque offers a frame for understanding them that is grounded in the discourse and theory of the discipline. Fantasy fiction, comic books, anime, video games, literature, professional storytelling and comedy, and even popular science writing all commonly incorporate elements from tradition or draw on basic folklore genres to inform their structure. Through three primary modes--integration, portrayal, and parody--the collection offers a set of heuristic tools for analysis of how folklore is increasingly used in these commercial and mass-market contexts. The Folkloresque challenges disciplinary and genre boundaries; suggests productive new approaches for interpreting folklore, popular culture, literature, film, and contemporary media; and encourages a rethinking of traditional works and older interpretive paradigms.   Contributors: Trevor J. Blank, Chad Buterbaugh, Bill Ellis, Timothy H. Evans, Michael Dylan Foster, Carlea Holl-Jensen, Greg Kelley, Paul Manning, Daniel Peretti, Gregory Schrempp, Jeffrey A. Tolbert

The bawdy exploits of "Barnacle Bill the Sailor" are normally relegated to late-night college parties, sports celebrations, and military clubs, but the crusty seaman has antecedents in ballads reaching back to the sixteenth century. This study explores those roots, the modern variants of the song, and its cultural contexts, uncovering the gender identity and social power themes within these widely-sung ribald verses.