What is Folklore: According to the Preface and Chapters 1-2

Initally when I signed up for this class, I expected to read alot of folklore however, with reading the Preface and the Acknowledgements in the text I was left with the impression that the Acknowlegments themselves should have been part of the preface or part of the first chapter. Durring our first class we were asked to discuss what folklore ws and give a definition,In the preface it is discribed as "not just about time-honored traditions or quaint customs; it is a philosophical approch to understanding people and expressive culture" Also in the Preface to the text mentions"learning about the varities of ways people expres their beleifs values and traditions." here there are two definitions. Overall the Preface and Acknowlegments seem to bleed into each other and seem like they would make more sense added to the first chapter.Theres also the idea that even if folklore can be used to preserve histories it is also part of written histories as well. "folklore commonly suggests that something is untrue, not real-its just a story or an old fashioned beleif."Where people may just expect to learn about"quaint cultures from the past or contemporary cultures of those less educated less fortunate, and less sophisticated than they are-prmative or simpler groups." Folklore has always been a way to bring people together or explain the unexpalinable. The three explinations that were first given to explain what folklore can be each in their own way explain an aspect of what folklore is and is not. Folklore is something that is everywhere, in the types of social gatherings people have and even their daily activities. Folklore according to the text is also “folk songs and legends, boy scout bages, highschool marching, band initiations, jokes, chainletters nicknames, holiday food and many other things you might not expect.” Folklore is in everything even the most simple things. Peoples personal behaviors can even be part of folklore, or identies, concerning the way we dress and the food we decide to eat even the music we like can become a part of our own personal traditions and belief systems. Folklore can also be seen as a common link in peoples humanity; although people may have different types of traditions that they follow the point is they all trust in different things. Folklore is also described as a “way of learning about people” While this is true since the study itself comes from various areas such as “history, literary study, athropology, and sociology” this to me gave off the idea that much like the concept of different traditions coming from different ethnic groups, the concept of folklore coming different schools of thought is not only appropriate but blends as well. I perticularly liked the use of modern examples, to discribed what folklore is and isnt. Take for instance the mention of Elivis as a part of folklore and popular culing the specung ture when discussing speculation of his death and popular claims that he is indeed alive (Pg. 5) I at first didn think it was possible for a person to become folklore. Also I like how vernacular was connected with the idea of folklore. Vernacular as far as I had known was only used in certian types of literature. The concept of vernacular seemed to give folklore a richer meaning. The idea that I took out of this was that, folklore is not just traditions or beleifs but also languages. folklore concerning pop culture and children was another thing I considered interesting in the chapter. It had not crossed my mind to consider card games like Pokemon or YU-GI-oH! a part of traditions, this even though a good example seemed like it could easily be turned into something negative. We learn our family traditions and languages as children, however I feel like it could be just as easy to pick up negative behaviors as positive ones. Ie: Genital mutilation may be part of some cultures traditions, but the psychological affects of the tradition itself can affect the people who go through it.