FF Network 17 - Turku welcomes FFSS in August 1999

Contents of FF Network 17
(June 1999)

Other related topics

Turku welcomes FFSS in August 1999
(FFN 17, June 1999: 1-5)

The preparations for the 5th Folklore Fellows' Summer School to be held in Turku on August 8-23, 1999 at the two universities, the Finnish-language University of Turku and the Swedish-language Åbo Akademi University, have progressed so far that the programme can now be published (see below). The scholarly training course will provide researchers, university teachers and archivists with insights into current theoretical and practical issues in folklore research. Its general topic, "Variation and textuality in oral tradition", will focus on a reassessment of the folkloristic theories about variation and meaning. The question is: where do we stand now that new thoughts on performance, context, intertextualism, ethnopoetics and many other key concepts have shattered the basics of the classical comparative method? Scholars have become interested in creating "thick" materials able to reveal the organic variation of folklore in a tradition system, be it in the mind of one storyteller or singer, or in an interactive social group or region. This approach often requires fieldwork, because the materials to be culled from publications and archive collections may be scattered, contextless and thin. It becomes necessary to form ideas about the division of labour between various types of variation, such as organic and phenomenological variation and intracultural and intercultural comparison.

The study of "variation" will have two tasks: it will 1) disclose the largely unexplored width of "real" variation in its cultural context and 2) show why there cannot be two identical performances of the same folklore integer. The latter argument is suitably illustrated through models of textualisation, i.e. the whole process of primary oral textualisation and its secondary written codification. By showing all the variables affecting oral textualisation in a particular situation of performance, the study of variation will link form and meaning and, eventually, make the problem "why variation?" disappear.

Another keyword in this context will be "textuality". From where does a performance, a narrative or a song, draw its cohesion and meaning? From the performer, from the oral "text", from the context of performance, from the audience or from a combination of sources? How do long forms, such as long oral epics, behave in the minds of their performers and audiences? The methodological consequences of new theoretical stances will affect our fieldwork techniques and principles of archiving. Another concern is the ethical aspect of our research, the rules regulating the relations between scholars and informants, academic institutions and traditional communities in the modern world.

Structure of FFSS99

As before, the recruitment for the course became truly global. Out of 106 applicants from 41 countries 35 were accepted. They represent 19 countries. The regular number 30 was augmented by five places sponsored by different projects. In order to penetrate the different dimensions of the main topic in more detail, the participants were divided into four thematic workshops which will have their sessions during the afternoons. The workshops are: I. Variation and Textuality in Oral Literature, II. Variation and Textuality in Oral Epics, III. Principles of Fieldwork and Archiving and IV. Folkloristic Research Ethics. In each workshop there will be two group leaders directing the activities, one from outside Finland and one from Finland. The workshops will work independently but at the end of the Summer School they will present a report on their achievements in plenary sessions of the School.

The faculty of FFSS99 consists of 30 teachers and about 15 assisting staff members, altogether 11 teachers come from Germany, Ireland, Norway, Sweden and the U.S.A. No fewer than 19 teachers come from Finland. The high number of the latter is due to our need to exemplify different projects utilising "thick" materials by letting the researchers themselves explain their problems and methodologies. Since a good many examples were available in Finland, we could engage a broad variety of experience at minimum cost. In a few cases, teachers could be recruited among the participants, which reminds us of the fact that the line between "teacher" and "student" is thin indeed at the FF Summer School, for which even professors, department heads and chief archivists apply (but are not always accepted).

The assisting staff will be mainly recruited from the two universities in Turku with occasional reinforcements from Helsinki, Jyväskylä and Joensuu. The staff will take care of the practical arrangements at the sessions to be held at Fennicum at the University of Turku and in Domus at Åbo Academy University (buildings located side by side) and during the excursions in Turku and its vicinity. They will be on duty at the FFSS99 office, library, computer class, exhibition hall and coffee room in the same or nearby buildings.

The participants will have access to computers and e-mail facility. They can write their reports in the computer class and utilise the various libraries of the two universities and the handy FFSS Library of the Kalevala Institute. They may acquaint themselves with the teaching of folklore in two languages and the different profiles of the folklore discipline and current projects at the two university departments. The basic facts will be made available through small exhibitions offered by the folklore departments and the Kalevala Institute. A special exhibition on the Kalevala and its worldwide impact will be held at Fennicum as part of the 150th Anniversary of the (New) Kalevala of 1849.

Due to the Kalevala Anniversary a special arrangement has been made to integrate an international symposium on traditional epics into the FFSS99 programme. During two days the FFSS participants may contribute to the discussions conducted by top scholars in the field of comparative research on epics.

The excursions will take the School to the historical town of Turku, a few museums and a countryside tour culminating in the Folklore Fellows' Party at the "Cave of Louhi", a real cave turned into a Kalevala-inspired restaurant in Laitila.

FFSS99 Preprints, Plenaries, Workshop keynotes, Panels and Demos

In view of the large number of speakers and the limited time, a plan was devised to publish most of the papers in advance. A series called FFSS99 Preprints was created for this purpose. The magnificent response from the teachers has made it possible for 24 articles to be printed and distributed to the participants in June 1999. After the course, a book entitled Thick Corpus, Organic Variation and Textuality in Oral Tradition will be edited on the basis of the Preprints and published probably by the Finnish Literature Society.

The idea behind the Preprint project was to lower the threshold for fruitful discussion at the plenary sessions. It is not fair that an established scholar comes and talks on his/her favourite subject in broken (or worse: fluent but too rapid) English to a totally unprepared audience coming from a score of different academic traditions with limited knowledge of the subject at hand. Prepublication makes the performer and the audience more equal. Questions begin to take shape in the mind of the reader well before the actual performance. Prepublication goes hand in hand with the sharper performative focus and limitation of time. It is relatively useless to read out a text already consumed by the audience. Instead, it becomes important to delineate the key problems and draw attention to the main results, perhaps with some schematic illustration of the argument. There is more time for additional information provoked by questions from the floor or spontaneously offered by the speaker. Discussion will continue the process started by the paper. Altogether there will be nine plenary papers.

The difference between a plenary paper, given in some cases by a lecturer visiting the course for a few days only, and a "workshop keynote" paper is slight. The latter are plenary lectures given by group leaders, i.e. teachers responsible for the work conducted in workshops which continue for the full two weeks. The idea is to open the workshops to the School regardless of placement in a particular workshop group. The workshop keynote papers will reflect the ideas of the main teachers and prepare the ground for the final day, which will consist of group reports in plenary. Six workshop keynote papers will be delivered during the first four days of the School.

Whereas the time allotted to a plenary or workshop-keynote speaker is 35 to 40 minutes, the rest of the time being reserved for questions from the floor, the category of panel papers offers even less time for the speaker. In a panel, 1-2 papers will be summarised in 10-15 minutes each, after which there will be discussion. All 15 panel papers will have been read in advance and the participants will have chosen six on which they would prefer to comment in a panel. On the basis of these prioritisations 2-3 panelists will be selected among the participants for each paper, thus making each participant join two panels during the course. A panelist is expected to comment on the paper, put questions but also relate relevant research experience of his or her own. It is hoped that this arrangement will activate the more passive listeners.

You cannot have everything in one course (pun intended). Due to the integration of the Kalevala symposium with the FFSS99 programme, the practical exercises in fieldwork and digital archiving have had to be reduced to a minimum. The only consolation is, perhaps, that this time we will be thinking about fieldwork and archiving most of the time. As a small compensation three optional "demo" hours have been placed to conclude the day not with formal lectures but with fresh field experiences concerning "pictorial ethnography", i.e. the usefulness of audiography, photography and videography in analytic work, and "archiving systems and their digitalisation". There will be one or two invited persons who will open the discussion with their personal experiences but after that all the participants will be invited to join in the discussion and provide more examples.

Folklore Fellows' Summer School 1999
Programme

9.8. MON

Morning
Opening:
Keijo Virtanen, Rector of the University of Turku
Gustav Björkstrand, Rector of Åbo Akademi University
Plenum 1: Lauri Honko, Thick Corpus and Organic Variation
Presentation of participants

Afternoon
Plenum 2: Anna-Leena Siikala, Variation and Genre as Practice
Workshop II Keynote: John Miles Foley, Individual Poet and Epic Tradition

Workshops I-IV

Workshop I. Group Leaders: Ulrich Marzolph & Anna-Leena Siikala
Variation and Textuality in Oral Literature
Workshop II. Group Leaders: John Miles Foley & Lauri Harvilahti
Variation and Textuality in Oral Epics
Workshop III. Group Leaders: Barbro Klein & Ulrika Wolf-Knuts
Principles of Fieldwork and Archiving
Workshop IV. Group Leaders: Margaret Mills & Lauri Honko
Folkloristic Research Ethics

10.8. TUE

Morning
Workshop III Keynote: Barbro Klein, Folklore Archives, Heritage Politics and Ethical Dilemmas: Notes on Writing and Printing
Panel 1: Maria Vasenkari, Armi Pekkala & 2-3 invited panelists
Dialogic Methodology & Producing Thick Data

Afternoon
Workshop I Keynote: Ulrich Marzolph, Variation, Stability and the Constitution of Meaning

Workshops I-IV
Demo 1: Pictorial ethnography I: Video. Scholars present their experience of audiovisual documentation and its relevance in analytic work.

11.8. WED

Morning
Plenum 3: Lauri Harvilahti, Variation and Memory
Panel 2: Tove Fjell, Lena Marander-Eklund & 2-3 invited panelists
Variation in Repeated Interviews

Afternoon
Workshop IV Keynote: Margaret Mills, The Question of Truth in Folk Narrative Research

Excursion to the historical town of Turku, including a visit to the archaeological museum Aboa Vetus et Ars Nova.

12.8. THU

Morning
Workshop IV Keynote: Lauri Honko, Safeguarding Tradition as Ethics
Panel 3: Ríonach uí Ógáin, Jyrki Pöysä & 2-3 invited panelists
Comments on Context, Text and Subtext & Variation in Archived Jokes

Afternoon
Workshop III Keynote: Ulrika Wolf-Knuts, On the Construction of Research Material

Workshops I-IV

Demo 2: Archiving systems. Different systems of archiving and experiences of their digitalisation.

13.8. FRI

Morning
Plenum 4: Senni Timonen, Thick Corpus and the Poetics of a Singer
Panel 4: Ilkka Pyysiäinen, Seppo Knuuttila & 2-3 invited panelists
Variation from a Cognitive Perspective & How to Seize Mentalities

Afternoon
Workshops I-IV

14.8. SAT

Kalevala and the World's Traditional Epics, Day 1

15.8. SUN

Kalevala and the World's Traditional Epics, Day 2

16.8. MON

Morning
Plenum 5: Dell Hymes, Variation and Narrative Competence
Panel 5: Tuija Hovi, Päivikki Suojanen, Ülo Valk & 2-3 invited panelists
Textualising Religious Experience & The Encounter of Rural and Urban Traditions

Afternoon
Workshops I-IV

17.8. TUE

Morning
Plenum 6: Ulrika Wolf-Knuts, On the History of Folkloristic Comparison
Panel 6: Anders Salomonsson, Ann-Helene Bostad Skjelbred & 2-3 invited panelists
Documentation and Research & Problems and Limitations - A Critical Look at a Norwegian Tradition Archive

Afternoon
Workshops I-IV

Demo 3: Pictorial ethnography II: Photography. Scholars present their experience of audiovisual documentation and its relevance in analytic work.

18.8. WED

Morning
Plenum 7: Annikki Kaivola-Bregenhøj, Varying Folklore
Panel 7: Patricia Nyberg, Marjut Huuskonen, Pasi Enges & 2-3 invited panelists
Observations on Interview in a Depth Study on Saami Folklore

Afternoon
Excursion to the traditional landscapes of Southwest Finland
Folklore Fellows' Party at "Cave of Louhi" in Laitila

19.8. THU

Morning
Plenum 8: Barbro Klein, The Miracle in Södertälje, Sweden: Mass Media, Interethnic Politics, and the Profusion of Text and Images
Panel 8: Carola Ekrem, Ríonach uí Ógáin & 2-3 invited panelists
Variation and Continuity in Children's Counting-out Rhymes & Aspects of Change in the Irish Language Tradition

Afternoon
Workshops I-IV

20.8. FRI

Morning
Plenum 9: Margaret Mills, Women's Tricks: Subordination and Subversion in Afghan Folktales
Panel 9: Bente Alver, Anneli Honko, Lauri Honko & 2-3 invited panelists
Variation and Textuality in Oral Epics: a South Indian Case

Afternoon
Workshops I-IV

21.8. SAT

Morning
Workshop I: Report by the Group
Variation and Textuality in Oral Literature

Afternoon
Workshop II: Report by the Group
Variation and Textuality in Oral Epics

Workshop III: Report by the Group
Principles of Fieldwork and Archiving

Workshop IV: Report by the Group
Folkloristic Research Ethics

22.8. SUN

Morning
Closing discussion

Afternoon
Departure
or: Excursion to Mannerheim's home Louhisaari in Askainen and to Uusikaupunki, a small coastal town.

Lauri Honko
Course leader, FFSS99