FOAFTALE NEWS
NEWSLETTER
OF
THE INTERNATIONAL SOCIETY FOR
CONTEMPORARY LEGEND RESEARCH
ISSN 1026-1001
IN
THIS ISSUE
Mikel J. Koven
International Society of Contemporary Legend Research
Foaftale-news@aber.ac.uk
I try to avoid editorializing: anyone who knows me knows how
difficult it is to get me to shut-up once I start. And, as editor of FTN, I do believe that my job is facilitate the on-going discussion about contemporary
legends in this newsletter, rather than lead it.
So let me begin by an apology for the lateness of this issue. It
was supposed to be out to all of you around the beginning of the year and now
we’re approaching the scheduled deadline of the next issue.
But the reason this issue is late is due to the lack of articles
I have received for inclusion. I know I could fill four pages every couple of
months with my own ramblings and discussions – but that would turn this into
something very different, and I’m not sure even I would want to read that.
And so I ask … no, plead
all of you, on virtual bended knee, to contribute to FTN. In particular, as the Bodner piece in this issue is evidence
of, pieces that will facilitate further discussion in these pages. ISCLR’s journal, Contemporary Legend, does not feature
any kind of “Notes and Queries” section, and nor should it. This is the place
for those kinds of pieces and I want to be the one to publish them to our
group.
While I am still in begging mode, I have received a number of
references to journal articles and books which might be of interest to you.
I’ve not received enough to really post the kind of enormous ‘recently
published’ lists that FTN used to,
and was wondering whether or not someone out there (Paul?) would be willing to
take up that banner and produce for me, every few months or so, this kind of
bibliographical list.
As always, these correspondences should be posted to the FTN email account:
***
John Bodner
h63jmb@morgan.ucs.mun.ca
On
GREEN PARTY USA will hold press conference in
GREEN PARTY
Armed government agents grabbed Nancy Oden,
Green Party USA coordinating committee member, Thursday at
"An official told me that my name had been flagged in the
computer," a shaken Oden said. "I was
targeted because the Green Party USA opposes the bombing of innocent civilians
in
Oden, a long-time organic farmer and
peace activist in northern
Oden is scheduled to speak in
The Greens National Committee -- the governing body of the Green
Party USA -- is meeting in Chicago Nov. 2-4 to hammer out the details of national
campaigns against bio-chemical warfare, the spraying of toxic pesticides,
genetic engineering, and the Party's involvement in the burgeoning peace
movement.
"I am shocked that
For further information, please call 1-866-GREENS-2 (toll-free)
***
Laura Tonks
Lat9@aber.ac.uk
Aliens,
Ghosts and Cults: Legends We Live. By Bill
Ellis. (
In his book Aliens, Ghost
and Cults: Legends We Live, Bill Ellis elaborates on his work moving away
from the traditional treatment of legends as just “texts” to a consideration of
legends as a social and cultural process by examining the extraordinary
relationship between ‘real life’ and ‘legend’. In his introduction, he explains
his intentions for the book: “[T]he essays in this collection try out ways of
analyzing legends that credit their emergent nature and force” (xv). It is this
approach, in “trying out” different modes of analysis that makes this book so
exceptional.
The volume is divided into three main parts: “The Life of
Legends” (3-92), “Life as Legend” (93-159) and “Legend as Life” (161-235). The
first section focuses on the very foundations of the subject, the legend. Ellis
states: “As folklorists’ scholarship grows, the need also grows for defining
our goals and methods to suit the peculiarly elusive nature of the living beast
we are chasing, or at least trying to observe from the underbrush” (4). Rather
than assuming what is understood to be a legend, Ellis explores the debates
that surround definitions and challenges the assumptions made about a subject
tackled numerous times before. He emphasizes the importance of the actual
communication of a legend, explaining how it can expose the reasons for the
circulation of a given text and what it can mean to narrator and audience
alike. Ellis not only reconsiders the discourses that concern studies in
folklore, such as the accuracy of identifying a legend as ‘contemporary’ but
also views the analysis of legends in light of other disciplines.
In a part of the first section entitled “Why is a Legend”, in an
examination of how legends can function on the individual, Ellis presents
possibly one of the most intriguing approaches. He draws on the work,
zoologist, Richard Dawkins’ has conducted on “mind viruses” (76). Mind viruses,
are explained as “packets of information that with the apparently autonomous
ability to pass from brain to brain” (76). Dawkins exemplifies ‘chain letters’
as a form of mind virus, an aspect of his work that, for Ellis, exhibits
relevance to folklorists. Ellis identifies a parallel between the ‘mind virus’
and the approach to studying folklore that, quoting Linda Dégh, pays attention
“to the dynamics of telling and transmitting stories from person to person and
from people to people, through means of direct contact, interaction, and
resulting processes responsible for the formation and continual recreation of
narrative” (90).
The second section, Ellis textually analyses
specific examples of unexplained occurrences, such as vanishing hitchhikers,
ghosts and alien abductions at first demonstrating the complexities of legend
interpretation by presenting the perspectives of those other than folklorists.
Throughout the chapter, Ellis draws attention not only to the attempts
scientists make to provide rational explanations but more interestingly, also
to the work of those outside of the academy, namely the Forteans.
The Forteans involvement in this area is the
publishing of unexplained occurrences collected from media sources “as a
challenge to conventional science” (96). By considering possible Fortean explanations in the analysis of “The Frackville
Angel” (99-116), Ellis is demonstrating how important it is to take into
account all forms of communication and interpretation to “provide academics
with a more complete picture of how the legend process actually works” (115).
In addition to varying interpretations and explanations by
analysts from varying disciplines, Ellis considers and explains the difficulties
that are often encountered by those who attempt to tell of unexplainable
occurrences that they were involved in or had been told about. Ellis explains
this in terms of “belief-language” (94), and how the lack of belief-language
available can make them more concerned about the social consequences of
communicating such stories that are difficult to comprehend in terms of
reality. He examines thoroughly, through a detailed textual analysis of the
“Pizza Hut Ghost”, how those who when retelling their supernatural encounters
attempt to rationalize the experiences through available belief-language. The
following section that focuses on alien abduction discusses the problem for
those who do not have a belief-language and the explanations that arise from
outsiders who analyze such encounters, from this Ellis intelligently negotiates
positions in which the folklorist can take when analyzing these empirical
experiences.
In the third part, drawing on the subjects of some of his most
familiar work, such as legend-tripping and ‘satanic’ cults, Ellis examines how
legends can influence reality through the notion of ostension. Throughout this
part he explains and illustrates the varying degrees in which ostension could
explain actions that “suggests the legend but does not fully enact it” (162)
although, he suggests that rarely, certain legends may have been acted out.
Ellis discusses the social implications of what the dramatization of a legend
(in a seemingly controlled environment) and legend-tripping can mean to its participants.
In analyzing an incident in
With seemingly unfamiliar legends always in emergence, those who
wish to study them must have the appropriate “tools” in which to deal with
them. As Ellis states, folklorists are in a prime position to shed light on the
reasons behind their often puzzling, appearance within society. He states that
“We [folklorists] have the theoretical tools to distinguish between the
experience observed, the interpretations provided by culture and the language
choices used by an individual to mediate the two” (157). What Ellis does in Aliens, Ghosts and Cults… is attempt to
provide such tools or suggests a range of possibilities and ideas to develop
further when seemingly new legends emerge or present themselves.
Due to Ellis’ constant consideration and reconsideration of
folklorists’ aims within the discipline, he reveals a number of avenues in
which to follow rather than presenting a narrow, restricted path by developing
methods already used and also by the unearthing of more appropriate ways of
thinking. Therefore he is presenting those interested with numerous
possibilities in which to study of legends in the future.
***
FTN
needs your contributions!
Please
send me news, queries, research notes, clippings, calls for papers, book and
movie reviews, or notes about local rumor and legend cycles for inclusion in FTN.
Deadline
for next issue:
May
2002
Next
Issue Out:
June
2002
FoafTale
News (FTN) is the newsletter of the International
Society for Contemporary Legend Research.
We study "modern" and "urban" legends, and also any
legend circulating actively. To join,
send a cheque made out to "ISCLR" for
US$30.00 or UK£18 to Mark Glazer, Arts & Sciences, University of Texas -
Pan-American, Edinburgh TX 78539-2999, USA for North American subscriptions, or
Sandy Hobbs, ASS Department, University of Paisley, Paisley, Scotland, PA1 2BE
for European subscriptions. Institutional rates available
upon request. Members also
receive Contemporary Legend, a refereed academic journal. Most back issues of FTN are available
from the Editor at a charge of US$3 each.
FoafTale News is indexed in the MLA
Bibliography.
This newsletter is called FoafTale
News for the jocular term current among legend scholars for over twenty
years. The term "foaf" was introduced by Rodney Dale (in his 1978 book,
The Tumour in the Whale) for an oft-attributed
but anonymous source of contemporary legends: a "friend of a
friend." Dale pointed out that
contemporary legends always seemed to be about someone just two or three steps
from the teller — a boyfriend’s cousin,
a co‑worker’s aunt, or a neighbor of the teller’s mechanic. "Foaf"
became a popular term at the
FoafTale
News welcomes contributions, including those documenting
legends” travels on electronic media and in the press. All research notes and articles are
copyright by the individual authors who reserve all rights. For permission to reprint, contact them at
the addresses given in the headnote of the article.
Send queries, notices, and research reports to a maximum of 3000 words to the
Editor; clippings, offprints, and citations are also
encouraged.
The opinions expressed in FoafTale
News are those of the authors and do not in any necessary way represent
those of the editor, the contributing compilers, the International Society for
the Study of Contemporary Legends, its Council, or its members.
Editor: Mikel J. Koven, Department of Theatre, Film
and Television Studies, Parry-Williams, Building, Penglais Campus, University
of Wales, Aberystwyth, United Kingdom, SY23 2AJ
Email:
Web page:
www.panam.edu/faculty/mglazer/isclr/isclr.htm
ISSN 1026-1001