Paper Short Abstract:

The paper examines the leading role of women folklorists in establishing a new research paradigm in early folk song studies based upon empirical collecting and archival documenting. It discusses the example of two leading scholars in early Swiss folklore studies.

Paper Abstract:

Women folklorists were leading, although hidden, figures within the developing ‘thought collective’ of early folklore studies. However, they were participating in the creation of this new ‘thought style’ (Ludwik Fleck) coping with scarce resources and institutional obstacles in academia.

The paper examines early folk song studies, focusing on the example of the Swiss Folk Song Archives (founded in 1906 by the Swiss Folklore Society). The paper pays attention to the contributions of the folklorists Adèle Stoecklin (1876–1960) and Elsa Mahler (1882–1970) for the establishing of the new methods and approaches in the field of folk song research. In particular, the emergence of collecting as a new research paradigm, with its new techniques of empirical recording, ordering and documenting ephemeral ‘folk culture’ in the archive, is analysed. The article highlights their contributions for finding new empirical and "modern" research paths that replaced older romantic song collecting and editing activities. As a part of the (so-called) ‘folklore canon’, this approach remained valid until the dawning of the new paradigm of the everyday which was established in German speaking folkloristics in the 1970s.

The research draws upon archival records of the Swiss Folklore Society (today: Cultural Anthropology Switzerland) and historical publications in the field of folklore.