Customer Reviews

German Folklore: A Handbook (Greenwood Folklore Handbooks)

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Readers interested in a good summary of key issues in German folklore will find this volume an interesting and useful resource. It begins with a good introduction to the various concepts used in the study of folklore. The bulk of the book is an overview of genres and forms of folk culture that are rooted in German history. There are good summaries of various myths, legends, folktales, customs, holiday practices, material culture, and other kinds of folklore. I also enjoyed the numerous versions and variants of a lots of tales, and there were some excellent descriptions of various traditional foods and food traditions from Germany. The book also includes a good bibliography of reference sources and a review of how German folklore is related to the history of folklore research in Germany and German-speaking regions of Europe. Readers will also find some discussion of the presence of German folklore within the United States. I was surprised, for example, to discover that a number of common folk beliefs and sayings in America are derived from German sources. The book concludes with a summary of recent trends in folklore scholarship. These two chapters are not likely to appeal to the non-specialist, but they could be useful for readers intrigued by connections between politics, nationalism, and the various ways in which culture is conceptualized and presented to the public.