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Paper short abstract:

Notions of national culture and folklore defined the modern era. I will tackle the question, how nineteenth-century Finnish public discourse debated about oral tradition and its connection with national culture. What kind of ideas, ideologies and aesthetics were attributed to the Finnish folklore?

Paper long abstract:

Notions of national culture, language and folklore have in many ways defined the. This paper will tackle the question, how early nineteenth-century Finnish public discourse debated about oral tradition and its connection with national culture. What kind of ideas, ideologies and aesthetics were attributed to the Finnish folklore? How these definitions were constructed, validated and propagated? The goal is to understand how these ideas and ideologies affected the representation of Finnish folklore, culture and nationality.

The romantic presupposition was that the authentic and original oral poetry could ground Finnish culture. Thus from the beginning of the century nationality was connected with oral poetry, which was represented as a source for an original and authentic ‘Finnishness’. Yet simultaneously, and paradoxically, the oral tradition itself was interpreted and defined by learned academics who operated transnationally. For example an early anthology of Finnish oral poetry was published in Sweden, edited by German scholar with major assistance from various Finnish students. In other words, at same time as these young academics took interest on marginal oral culture, they were also keen to observe and follow the latest philosophical, aesthetical and ethical debates in Europe.

Thus a small educated fraction was in the core of determining how oral culture should be represented. My paper concentrates on these academic and transnational discourses that have since the nineteenth century influenced how oral culture have been understood. The goal is to track down cultural history of various intellectual and transnational influences from the public discourse concerning oral poetry.