Paper short abstract

This paper explores how everyday supernatural experiences in the United States inspired a family narrative tradition that reaffirms belief of the tellers and fosters belief in succeeding generations. It proposes extending David Hufford’s experiential theory of belief to include memorate listeners.

Paper long abstract

This paper considers the role of the memorate in family tradition in the United States, in the context of a post-Enlightenment world of Weberian disenchantment where supernatural experience is deemed abnormal. Based on ethnographic interviews, the paper examines the memorates of three sisters (the author’s mother and two aunts) who share a closely related set of beliefs involving the survival of human consciousness after death which stem from personal interactions with spirits/the dead. The paper explores how these experiences have transformed into a family narrative tradition that has created a community of dialogue that serves to reaffirm the belief of the tellers as well as to create a foundation of belief in succeeding generations. In so doing, the paper extends folklorist David Hufford’s experiential theory of belief that centers on personal experience. It argues that Hufford’s theory should be expanded to include individuals whose close relationships of trust with memorate tellers leads to the memorates fundamentally impacting the listeners’ belief systems as well.

Paper short abstract

The butchery trade in Australia is disappearing. Through the personal narrative of a retired Perth butcher, I explore what social im/perceptibility can reveal about class, community and human-animal relations in the transformation of the meat processing industry.

Paper long abstract

On the high streets of Australia’s towns and suburbs, the butcher shop has historically held pride of place. The butcher himself has always been hyper-visible; resplendent in blue-striped apron, he would banter with customers, while tailoring cuts to their tastes. Australians remain among the highest per capita meat eaters globally, but today supermarkets sell around 85% of the nation’s meat. By 2023, the two largest supermarkets had phased out in-store butchery, obtaining pre-packaged meat direct from the abattoirs’ mechanised production lines. The skilled trade of whole-carcass, high street butchery is disappearing, which aids the maintenance of the public secret of the staggering scale of animal slaughter underpinning our diets. In this paper, I offer and analyse the fascinating personal narrative of a recently retired Perth butcher. A master raconteur, through his life history, I explore what social im/perceptibility can reveal about class, community, and human/nonhuman animal relations.

Paper short abstract

This paper explores Garhwali women’s folktales, where ripening kafal (bayberry) and cuckoo songs express grief, and ecological knowledge. Through sensory metaphors, these narratives trace human–nature entanglements, preserving memory and revealing how folk speech shapes cultural understanding.

Paper long abstract

This paper examines the role of metaphorical folk speech in Garhwali women’s oral traditions in the Uttarakhand Himalayas, with particular attention to the interplay between ecological knowledge, memory, and gendered experience. In this region, nature is not merely a backdrop for storytelling but acts as a co-producer of meaning, morality, and shared cultural “common sense.” Through ethnographic fieldwork and analysis of oral narratives and songs, the study investigates how metaphors drawn from mountains, rivers, forests, and seasonal cycles encode survival strategies, social norms, and ecological consciousness.

A central case is the folktale Kafal pako, main ni chaakho (“The kafals [bayberries] have ripened but I have not tasted them”), in which a mother-daughter misunderstanding over fruit harvest serves as a metaphor for women’s labor, grief, and resilience. The narrative illustrates cyclical patterns of social expectation, emotional labor, and ecological interdependence. The recurring imagery of shriveling and regenerating kafals, and the mother and daughter reborn as cuckoos in local lore, exemplifies how folk metaphors mediate human and non-human relations while preserving collective memory.

The paper argues that Garhwali oral traditions, through their sensory-rich metaphorical language, transform figurative speech into forms of ecological activism, making women’s embodied experiences legible while sustaining ethical and cultural reflection. By situating these narratives within the framework of sensus communis and the phenomenology of feeling “as” versus “with”, this study contributes to understanding how folk speech sharpens shared knowledge, naturalizes cultural values, and reimagines what constitutes common sense in human-environment relations.