Grand Theory in Folkloristics [Paperback]

Why is there no Grand Theory in the study of folklore? Talcott Parsons (19021979) advocated grand theory, which put the analysis of social phenomena on a new track in the broadest possible terms. Not all sociologists or folklorists accept those broad terms; some still adhere to the empirical level. Through a forum sponsored by the American Folklore Society, the diverse answers to the question of such a theory arrived at substantial agreement: American folklorists have produced little grand theory. One speaker even found all the theory folklorists need in the history of philosophy. The two women in the forum (Noyes and Mills) spoke in defense of theory that is local, apt, suited to the audience, and humble ; the men (Bauman and Fine) reached for something Parsons might have recognized. The essays in this collection, developed from the forum presentations, defend diverse positions, but they largely accept the longstanding concentration in American folkloristics on the quotidian and local.

Foreword
Michael Dylan Foster and Ray Cashman

Folkloristics in the Twenty-First Century
Alan Dundes

Introduction
America's Antitheoretical Folkloristics
Lee Haring

The Sweep of Knowledge: The Politics of Grand and Local Theory in Folkloristics
Gary Alan Fine

What(s) Theory?
Margaret A. Mills

The Philology of the Vernacular
Richard Bauman

Humble Theory
Dorothy Noyes

Grand Theory, Nationalism, and American Folklore
John W. Roberts

There is No Grand Theory in Germany, and for Good Reason
James R. Dow

Responses
What Theory Is
Newton Garver

Weak Theory in an Unfinished World
Kathleen Stewart

Or in Other Words : Recasting Grand Theory
Kirin Narayan

Disciplining Folkloristics
Charles L. Briggs

Afterwords
Reflections on Grand Theory, Graduate School, and Intellectual Ballast
Chad Edward Buterbaugh

Ten Years After
Lee Haring

Lee HalS$