Paper short abstract:

This paper is a preliminary account of the contributions of Spanish folklorists to the history of anthropological thought and practice which aims to be situated in the broader context of the history of science and scholarship.

Paper long abstract:

The study of folklore and "popular customs and traditions", markedly influenced by the ideals and concerns of Romanticism, experimented an exponential growth in Spain during the last decades of the 19th century. People like Luis de Hoyos Sáinz (1868-1951) should be mentioned here. Outstanding contributions were made from particular regions like Catalonia, Andalusia, the Basque Country, Castile, Galicia, and the Balearic Islands.

Inspired by the ideals of a native renaissance (Renaixenca Catalana), a large group of Catalan intellectuals and writers undertook to revive and study traditions rooted in popular culture, while turning their gaze to local literary traditions. It was a Herderian task of great scope which aimed at the revival of the Catalan language, culture and sense of nationhood or volksgeist.

In the Basque Country there is José Miguel de Barandiarán (1889-1991), founder of a Society of Eusko-Folklore. In Andalusia the Machado family saga, which began with committed Darwinian Antonio Machado y Núñez, founder of the Sociedad Antropológica de Sevilla in 1871, and run through to his son the renowned folklorist Antonio Machado y Álvarez (1846-1893).

Outside the academy proper, it is of interest to consider the contributions of foreign authors like George H. Borrow (1803-1881), who published important essays on the gypsies of Spain. There is also the canonical travel narrative produced by Richard Ford (1796-1858). The outstanding personality of Archduke Ludwig Salvator of Austria (1847-1915) and his works during a sojourn of many years in the Balearic Islands also merits consideration.

Paper short abstract:

Folk culture was an important element in the Czech national emancipation, which culminated at the turn of the 20th century. The collectors´ interest in folklore expressions led to the creation of a source base which has been used to date. It gave an impetus to the formation of Czech folkloristics.

Paper long abstract:

Traditional folk culture played an important role in national movements in the European environment of the 19th century. So was it in the Czech lands which were part of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy. The development of the interest in folk culture was always linked to social development of a particular region. In the Czech lands, as in other countries, this line related to the ideas of Romanticism (with regard to rendering the Czech language and folklore expressions), however, in the beginnings it was connected with the search for the importance of homeland within the Habsburg Empire. The ideas of Pan-Slavism were associated with the rise of national struggles in the 1880s. This development was crowned by the formation of independent Czechoslovakia in 1918. Although many traditions were closing in their original functions in the countryside at that time, their importance as a symbol of national peculiarity was strengthened mainly through the presentation of folklore expressions. The one-hundred-year long work of collectors and researchers, who created funds with folk songs, dances and literature mainly for societally motivated reasons, was put to good use. Even today those resources are a source of knowledge about spiritual culture in the Czech countryside of last centuries, and they also have become an impetus to the formation of folkloristics (ethnology) as a scientific discipline.

Paper short abstract:

Bjarni Þorsteinsson's collection of Icelandic folk-music, published in 1906-09, was deemed inauthentic, amateurish and unworthy of publication by members of parliament and cultural institutions, but rose from virtual obscurity to being considered today a key source on Icelandic folk-music.

Paper long abstract:

Icelandic musical heritage is grounded in Bjarni Þorsteinsson's folk-music collection "Íslenzk þjóðlög" published in 1906-09, and today the collection is considered an invaluable source of Icelandic folk music; a national treasure.

The folklore collecting effort in 19th century Iceland, including collection and publication of folk-tales and legends, folk-poetry and games, proverbs, customs and traditions, along with a growing interest in Icelandic medieval literature (the Sagas and Eddas), played a key role in Icelandic nation building and subsequently in the declaration of independence in 1944.

During his collection effort (1880-1905) Bjarni did not receive the financial and moral support he sought from Alþingi (Icelandic Parliament) and cultural institutions and in some cases the collecting effort and publication was actively undermined and hindered by members of Alþingi and others, finally resulting in the publication being funded by the Danish Carlsberg Foundation.

After publication the collection was critizised harshly by authoritative figures in the field and was more or less met with silence by the Icelandic public. The collection gained prominence later in the 20th century, rising from virtual obscurity to being considered today a key source on Icelandic folk-music.

My paper aims to shed light on the opposition Bjarni faced during the publication of his folk-music collection bringing forward background information on the cultural, political and personal intrigues involved.

Paper short abstract:

In 2018, Institute of Ethnomusicology ZRC SAZU has started with the project which places so-far overlooked bilingual and translated songs into the focus of interest. It denotes a turn in the folklore studies and questions disciplinary history through the concepts of its social role.

Paper long abstract:

In the time of coexistence of Slovenians with other nations of the Austro-Hungarian monarchy, bilingual songs, or songs transferred from one linguistic community to others were strongly disturbing element in the conceptualization of the canon of national culture. In the search for national identity, Slovenian folkloristics has circumvented intersections between Slovene song creativity and the song creativity of neighboring nations. Despite these strivings, with the written folk song collections some bilingual songs came into the archive aimed for the representative collection of Slovene folk songs.

After the disintegration of the Habsburg Monarchy, the majority of Slovenian lands were integrated in Yugoslavia. In Slovenia, German culture was no longer perceived as dangerous to the Slovenian national identity, therefore the need to collect bilingual songs and to discuss cultural intertwining in song creativity appeared. However, in the identifying role of folklore studies, the signs of disciplinary turn marked by the need of study of national intersections of songs were lost.

With the project of bilingual songs and songs transferred from other languages to Slovenian in the focus of research, these songs offer a new disciplinary challenge on two levels - as the cultural phenomenon and from the contextual point of view. For the revisiting non-realized insights, the testimony of existence of German songs in the institute's archive was extremely promising since the transcriptions were needed. The finding that a great number of transcriptions is missing posed a new insight into history of folklore studies: what is the message of the missing transcriptions?

Paper short abstract:

Taking a well-known Portuguese painting as an example, I'll propose a meta-ethnographic approach to talk about nineteenth-century European understandings and uses of ethnography and its relations to the construction of national cultures in the long run.

Paper long abstract:

Quite often we attribute "ethnographic" qualities to picture or a realistic painting coming from former epochs, namely from the nineteenth century. On the other hand, for a contemporary anthropologist it will appear at least ambiguous to say that she is making an "ethnographic" approach of a given painting or picture (although we stick to simple, tacit, definition of ethnography as something touched by the "magic" - Stocking jr. - of our practice). Taking a well-known Portuguese painting as an example, I'll propose a meta-ethnographic approach to talk about nineteenth-century European understandings and uses of ethnography and its relations to the construction of national culture in the long run. I'll maintain that "in-depth" approach to the variety of the history of ethnographic practices is needed if we are to recognize how common national cultures came to be shared and how new possibilities of work for the future can be opened.

Paper short abstract:

Should we recognise Raymond Firth as the founder of the approach known as 'the anthropology of/at home'? Using archival and creative collaborative techniques, this paper contends as much by exploring his pre-Tikopian research in Aotearoa/NZ amongst the Māori.

Paper long abstract:

Intellectual biographies are becoming central to the way in which many humanities and social science disciplines write their own histories. This presentation traces the early career path and initial written output of one of the longest lived and most influential ethnographers/ethnologists to have ever lived - Raymond Firth. It contributes to expanding the biographical genre - both regarding antipodean academic history, as well as in terms of dealing with international migration, the movement of ideas and social anthropology's diasporic intellectual landscapes. The paper examines Firth's pre-Tikopian research amongst the Māori, in the country of his birth and early upbringing. This paper not only provides an overview of his MA and PhD research, but also demonstrates the use of experimental methods in creating an 'archaeology of us'. Despite there being two Festschrifts honouring Firth's contributions to the discipline, there is as yet no lengthy biography of this internationally acclaimed economic anthropologist. Using archival and creative collaborative techniques to look at anthropology's contemporary past, I contend that Firth could be recognised as the founder of the ethnographic approach known as 'the anthropology of/at home' but for work which well pre-dates his involvement with examining English kinship in London.

Paper short abstract:

In the official history of anthropology, the work of many women, both pioneering scholars and collaborators, remains unacknowledged. Presenting the case of Elsie Masson, Malinowski's wife, this paper aims to discuss theoretical concepts that may help to trace a different story of the discipline.

Paper long abstract:

Bronislaw Malinowski and Elsie Masson met in 1916 in Melbourne. At that time, Malinowski was processing the ethnographic data he collected during his first fieldwork in the Trobriand Islands. Masson was a nurse trainee, who had published newspaper articles and a book (1915) on the wild Northern Territories of Australia, where she had lived and traveled, when she started helping Malinowski to organize his ethnographic material and to copyedit his manuscripts. After their marriage in 1919, they moved to Europe where Malinowski became one of the most important figure of modern anthropology, partly assisted by Masson.

In the official history of anthropology, however, there is not so much space for the many anthropologists' wives and collaborators, such as Elsie Masson, who contributed to their husbands' work. Several pioneering women scholars, as well, are still not included in the genealogy of the discipline that consists above all of male founding fathers. Presenting the case of Elsie Masson, Malinowski's wife, this paper aims to discuss theoretical concepts from feminist anthropology that may help to trace a different story of the discipline recovering the hidden contributions.