1st Edition

South Asian Folklore in Transition Crafting New Horizons

Edited By Frank J. Korom, Leah K. Lowthorp Copyright 2019
196 Pages
by Routledge

196 Pages
by Routledge

196 Pages
by Routledge

The Indian Subcontinent has been at the centre of folklore inquiry since the 19th century, yet, while much attention was paid to India by early scholars, folkloristic interest in the region waned over time until it virtually disappeared from the research agendas of scholars working in the discipline of folklore and folklife. This fortunately changed in the 1980s when a newly energized group of... Read more

1. Introduction: locating the study of folklore in modern South Asian studies  Part I. Historicizing Folklore  2. How stories lodge in lives  3. The scribal life of folktales in medieval India  4. Nameless in history: when the imperial English become the subjects of Hindu narrative  Part II. Materializing Folklore  5. Standing in cement: possibilities created by Ravan on the Chhattisgarhi Plains  6. Tools and world-making in the worship of Vishwakarma  7. Pavitra Hindu homes: producing sacred purity in domestic diasporic settings  8. Shrines, stones, and memories: the entangled storyworld of a goddess temple in Assam  Part III. Politicizing Folklore  9. Criminal ‘folk’ and ‘legal’ lore: the kidnap and castrate narrative in colonial India and contemporary Chennai  10. Folklore, politics, and the state: Kutiyattam theatre and National/Global Heritage in India  11. The amplified sacrifice: sound, technology, and participation in modern Vedic ritual

Biography



Frank J. Korom is Professor of Religion and Anthropology at Boston University, USA. He specializes in the cultures of South Asia and the diasporas derived from the region. He is the author and/or editor of ten books, most recently The Anthropology of Performance (2013).



Leah K. Lowthorp is Assistant Professor of Anthropology and Folklore at the University of Oregon, USA. Her work spans the impact of global cultural policy on artist communities in South Asia, community advocacy and the arts, and the digital folklore of human reproductive and genetic technologies. She has authored several articles and book chapters on these topics.