Contribution short abstract:

Traditional place-lore studies often focus on folklore genres and styles, overlooking human relationship with place. This paper adopts a phenomenological approach to explore “story-places” as key parts of human experience, emphasizing joy and happiness in Lithuanian belief narratives.

Contribution long abstract:

The traditional approach to place-lore studies often treats places as mere containers for the folk legends. While folklorists' engagement with place-lore is directly concerned with the notion of place, the emphasis is typically on the folklore itself—its genre, style, and nuances. A natural place (a hill, a stone, or a river) becomes a focal point in the landscape to which the narrative is “attached”. Meanwhile, the relationship between the human being and the place itself is often overlooked.

In this paper, I employ a phenomenological approach to examine the concept of story-places. They are an integral part of the lifeworld, forming an inseparable component of everyday human experience. The emotional response, whether positive or negative, is an integral aspect of how this relationship between an individual and a place is expressed.

This paper will examine the role of joy and happiness as integral aspects of our relationship with place, as evidenced in folk legends, belief narratives, and personal memories. This approach is based on phenomenological thinking, which is oriented towards experience. I will present a number of examples from Lithuanian belief narratives and place-lore, as well as cases from other countries, which demonstrate how the overwhelming quality of a place often associates it with the joy of being in a place, or even only thinking about it. And what features or qualities of the specific place raises this joy in a first place.