What is folklore? Genres of Russian folklore: the age-old wisdom of the people carried through the centuries

The theme of oral folk art in Russian literature is extremely diverse; there are numerous genres and types of folklore. All of them were formed gradually, as a result of the life and creative activity of the people, manifested over several hundred years. Currently, there are specific types of folklore in literature. Oral folk art is that unique layer of knowledge on the basis of which thousands of classical works were built.

Interpretation of the term

Folklore is oral folk art, endowed with ideological depth and highly artistic qualities; it includes all poetic, prose genres, customs and traditions, accompanied by verbal artistic creativity. Folklore genres are classified in different ways, but basically there are several genre groups:

1. Labor songs - formed in the process of work, for example, sowing, plowing, haymaking. They represent a variety of shouts, signals, chants, parting words, and songs.
2. Calendar folklore - conspiracies, signs.
3. Wedding folklore.
4. Funeral lamentations, recruiting lamentations.
5. Non-ritual folklore is small folklore genres, proverbs, fables, signs and sayings.
6. Oral prose - traditions, legends, tales and incidents.
7. Children's folklore - pestushki, nursery rhymes, lullabies.
8. Song epic (heroic) - epics, poems, songs (historical, military, spiritual).
9. Artistic creativity - magical, everyday tales and tales about animals, ballads, romances, ditties.
10. Folklore theater - raek, nativity scene, mummers, performances with dolls.

Let's look at the most common types folklore in more detail.

Labor songs

This is a song genre distinguishing feature of which is mandatory support of the labor process. Labor songs are a way of organizing collective, social work, setting the rhythm using a simple melody and text. For example: “Wow, let’s get a little more friendly to make it more fun.” Such songs helped to start and finish work, united the working squad and were spiritual helpers in the hard physical labor of the people.

Calendar folklore

This type of oral folk art belongs to the ritual traditions of the calendar cycle. The life of a peasant working on the land is inextricably linked with weather conditions. That is why a huge number of rituals appeared that were performed to attract good luck, prosperity, large offspring of livestock, successful farming, etc. The most revered holidays of the calendar were considered Christmas, Maslenitsa, Easter, Epiphany and Trinity. Each celebration was accompanied by songs, chants, incantations and ritual actions. Let us remember the famous custom of singing songs to Kolyada on the night before Christmas: “Cold is not a problem, Kolyada is knocking on the house. Christmas is coming to the house, bringing a lot of joy.”

Wedding folklore

Each place had its own types of folklore, but mostly they were lamentations, sentences and songs. Wedding folklore includes song genres that accompanied three main rituals: matchmaking, farewell of parents to the bride and wedding celebration. For example: “Your product, our merchant, is simply a miracle!” The ritual of handing over the bride to the groom was very colorful and was always accompanied by both drawn-out and short cheerful songs. At the wedding itself, the songs did not stop; they mourned their single life, wished for love and family well-being.

Non-ritual folklore (small genres)

This group of oral folk art includes all types of small genres of folklore. However, this classification is ambiguous. For example, many of the types relate to children's folklore, such as pesters, lullabies, riddles, nursery rhymes, teasers, etc. At the same time, some researchers divide all folklore genres into two groups: calendar-ritual and non-ritual.

Let's consider the most popular types of small genres of folklore.

A proverb is a rhythmic expression, a wise saying that carries a generalized thought and has a conclusion.

Signs - a short verse or expression telling about those signs that will help predict natural phenomena and weather.

A proverb is a phrase, often with a humorous slant, illuminating a life phenomenon or situation.

A saying is a short verse addressing natural phenomena, living beings, and surrounding objects.

A tongue twister is a small phrase, often rhymed, with words that are difficult to pronounce, designed to improve diction.

Oral prose

Oral prose includes the following types of Russian folklore.

Legends - a story about historical events in the folk retelling. The heroes of legends are warriors, kings, princes, etc.

Legends are myths, epic stories about heroic deeds, people covered with honors and glory; as a rule, this genre is endowed with pathos.

Bylichki are short stories that tell about the hero’s meeting with some kind of “evil spirits”, real incidents from the life of the narrator or his friends.

Happened - summary something that really happened once and with someone, while the narrator is not a witness

Children's folklore

This genre is represented in a variety of forms - poetic, song. Types of children's folklore are what accompanied the child from birth until he grew up.

Pestushki are short rhymes or songs that accompany the very first days of a newborn. With the help of them they nursed and nurtured children, for example: “The nightingale sings, sings, pretty, and pretty.”

Nursery rhymes are small melodious poems intended for playing with children.

Stretch, stretch,

Rotok - talker,

Handles - grips,

Walking legs.

Calls - poetic and song appeals to nature and animals. For example: “Red summer, come, bring warm days.”

A joke is a short fairy tale poem sung to a child, a short story about the world around him.

Lullabies are short songs that parents sing to their child at night to lull him to sleep.

Riddle - poetic or prose sentences that require solving.

Other types of children's folklore are counting rhymes, teasers and fables. They are extremely popular in our time.

Song epic

The heroic epic demonstrates the most ancient types of folklore; it tells about events that once happened in song form.

An epic is an old song told in a solemn but leisurely style. Glorifies the heroes and tells about their heroic deeds for the benefit of the state, the Russian fatherland. about Dobrynya Nikitich, Volga Buslaivaich and others.

Historical songs are a kind of transformation of the epic genre, where the style of presentation is less eloquent, but the poetic form of the narrative is preserved. For example, “The Song of the Prophetic Oleg.”

Artistic creativity

This group includes epic and song genres created in the spirit of folk and artistic creativity.

A fairy tale is a short or long epic narrative, one of the most common genres of oral folk art about fictional events and heroes. All this is folklore, the types of fairy tales in it are as follows: magical, everyday and reflect those ideas about the world, good, evil, life, death, nature that existed among the people. For example, good always defeats evil, and there are wonderful mythical creatures in the world.

Ballads are poetic songs, a genre of song and musical creativity.

Jokes - special kind an epic narrative about comic situations from people's lives. Initially they did not exist in the form in which we know them. These were stories that were complete in meaning.

Fables - a short narrative about impossible, incredible events, something that was fiction from beginning to end.

A chastushka is a small song, usually a quatrain with humorous content, telling about events and incidents.

Folklore theater

Street performances were very common among the people; the subjects for them were various genres, but most often of a dramatic nature.

A nativity scene is a type of dramatic work intended for street puppet theater.

Rayok is a type of picture theater, a device in the form of a box with changing drawings; the stories told reflect oral types of folklore.

The presented classification is the most common among researchers. However, it is worth understanding that the types of Russian folklore complement each other, and sometimes do not fit into the generally accepted classification. Therefore, when studying the issue, a simplified version is most often used, where only 2 groups of genres are distinguished - ritual and non-ritual folklore.

The development of society is based on the ability of each new generation to perceive the experience accumulated by the people who lived before them. This applies to all spheres of life. What is folklore? This is exactly the kind of creative experience passed on to descendants for preservation and further development.

Artistic traditions are strong in the visual arts, folk crafts, music, and dance. But the basis that largely determines the national character has always been oral folk art.

Folk wisdom

The term "folklore" (Old English folc lore - " folk wisdom") was coined in the mid-nineteenth century by William John Toms, an English historian and archaeologist. Scientists various countries people have different understandings of what folklore is. Defining it as folk literature and forms of folk art associated with the word are accepted by our art critics. In the West, folklore includes traditions in different sides everyday and cultural life: in housing, clothing, cooking, etc.

The general essence of these definitions is artistic creative experience, transmitted and preserved by many generations. This experience is based on the realities of life and is closely related to the working conditions and everyday life of people. AND epic tales, And short proverbs- reflection of folk concepts about the surrounding nature, historical events, spiritual and material things. A close connection with work and everyday life is the main feature of folk art, its difference from classical types artistic activity.

Literature and folklore - the art of words

There are differences in the understanding of what folklore is and what traditional literature is. One of the types of verbal creativity exists in the memory of the people and is transmitted mainly in orally, and the means of storing and transmitting literary text is the book. In literature, the author of a work has a specific first and last name. And folk poetry is anonymous. A writer mainly works alone; a fairy tale or epic is the result of collective creativity. The narrator is in direct contact and interaction with the audience, the influence on the reader is indirect and individual.

The novelty of ideas and innovation in views on reality are what is valued in the book. Traditions born of previous generations are what folklore is in literature. The writer has found a unique and precise place for each word in a story, novel, or novel. Each new narrator makes his own changes to a fairy tale or anecdote, and this looks like an element of creativity.

The connection between folk and traditional word creation is also obvious and significant. The most ancient monuments of literature were born from recorded oral traditions. Many forms of poetic and prose writings are borrowed from folklore. From the collective art of words come the fairy tales of Pushkin and Ershov, Tolstoy and Gorky, and the tales of Bazhov. What is folklore in literature today? Characters from folk art are present in Vysotsky’s songs. “The Tale of Fedot the Archer” by Filatov is folk in form and language. This is an example of the mutual influence of traditional literature and folklore. It was disassembled into quotes and “went to the people.”

Genre wealth

Like traditional literature, there are three types of folklore prose and poetry: epic (epics, tales, fairy tales, legends, traditions, etc.), lyrics (poems and songs of various types) and drama (nativity scenes, games, wedding and funeral rites, etc. .d.).

It is customary to divide folklore genres according to their affiliation with calendar and family rituals. The first includes poetic accompaniment of New Year, Christmas, Maslenitsa festivities, welcoming spring, harvest festivals, etc. These are carols, fortune telling, round dances, games, etc. The second includes wedding poems and songs, toasts and congratulations on important dates and events, funeral laments, etc.

A large group of folk poetry is associated with a functional environment. Songs, sentences, sayings, ditties help in work (crafts, workers, peasants), with them it is easier to endure hardships (soldiers, prison camps, emigrants). Narrative prose is associated with this group: fairy and everyday tales, short stories, narratives, fables, etc.

Children's folklore is composed by adults for children (lullabies, nursery rhymes, nursery rhymes) and by children for games and communication (counting books, teasers, peace books, horror stories, etc.). What is folklore in small forms? Who doesn’t know proverbs, sayings, tongue twisters? Who hasn't heard or told jokes? They have always been the most active and relevant forms of folk art.

Word and music

The origins of folk art go back to the times of prehistoric rituals. Then music, songs, and dances formed a single action that had a mystical or utilitarian meaning. Together with elements of decorative and applied art: costumes, musical instruments, such rituals had a great influence on the development of art. And also on the formation of national identity.

Music performed on folk instruments occupies a large place in the performing arts. But what is folklore in music if not the accompaniment of poetic works of various kinds? Russian guslars, French troubadours, oriental ashugs and akyns accompanied epics and tales, legends and stories by playing musical instruments.

Folk song is a phenomenon of world culture. In every language, in sorrow and in joy, songs are sung, composed in ancient times and understandable to our contemporaries. In arrangements by classical composers, at grandiose rock concerts folklore motives loved and relevant.

Soul of the people

In our global world, folk art is one of the most important ways to preserve national character, the soul of the nation. Russian folk art was born from Slavic mythology, Byzantine Orthodoxy. It is a reflection of national traits that developed during turbulent historical cataclysms. Nature and climate also undoubtedly left their mark on the Russian mentality. Addiction common man in large and small ways, from the lordly or royal will, accompanied him for many centuries. But this dependence did not kill his love for small homeland and awareness of the greatness of Russia.

Hence the main features of the Russian character. Taking them into account, you can understand what Russian folklore is. Patience in work and perseverance in war, faith in goodness and hope for the best, grief without boundaries and joy without restraint - all this is inherent in the Russian people and is reflected in folk poetry and music.

Until the spring runs dry

The art of the people is alive as long as the people are alive. It changes with him. They wrote epics about heroes, and now they make cartoons. But knowing what folklore is, how it influences national and world art, and preserving and developing traditions is important for any generation.

Folklore and literature - two types verbal art. However, folklore is not only the art of words, but also an integral part folk life, closely intertwined with its other elements, and this is a significant difference between folklore and literature. But also as an art of words, folklore differs from literature. These differences do not remain unshakable at various stages of historical development, and yet the main, stable features of each of the types of verbal art can be noted. Literature is an individual art, folklore is a collective art. In literature there is innovation, and in folklore tradition comes to the fore. Literature exists in written form, a means of storage and transmission literary text, the book serves as an intermediary between the author and his addressee, while a work of folklore is reproduced orally and stored in the memory of the people. A work of folklore lives in many variants; with each performance it is reproduced as if anew, with direct contact between the performer-improviser and the audience, which not only directly influences the performer (feedback), but sometimes also joins in the performance.

Anika the warrior and death. Splint.

Publications of Russian folklore.

The term “folklore,” which was introduced into science by the English scientist W. J. Toms in 1846, translated means “folk wisdom.” Unlike many Western European scientists, who classify folklore as the most diverse aspects of folk life (even culinary recipes), including also elements of material culture (housing, clothing), domestic scientists and their like-minded people in other countries consider oral folk art to be folklore - poetic works, created by the people and existing among the broad masses, along with musical and dance folklore. This approach takes into account artistic nature folklore as the art of words. Folkloristics is the study of folklore.

The history of folklore goes back to the deep past of humanity. M. Gorky defined folklore as the oral creativity of the working people. Indeed, folklore arose in the process of labor, always expressed the views and interests of mainly working people, in it, in the most varied forms, a person’s desire was manifested to make his work easier, to make it joyful and free.

Primitive man spent all his time on work or preparing for it. The actions through which he sought to influence the forces of nature were accompanied by words: spells and conspiracies were pronounced, the forces of nature were addressed with a request, threat or gratitude. This undifferentiation of different types of essentially artistic activity (although the creators-performers themselves set themselves purely practical goals) - the unity of words, music, dance, decorative arts- known in science as " primitive syncretism", traces of it are still visible in folklore. As a person accumulates more and more significant life experience, which needed to be passed on to subsequent generations, the role of verbal information increased: after all, it was the word that could most successfully communicate not only about what was happening Here And Now, but also about what happened or will happen somewhere And once upon a time or some day. The separation of verbal creativity into an independent form of art is the most important step in the prehistory of folklore, in its independent, although associated with mythological consciousness, state. The decisive event that paved the line between mythology and folklore proper was the appearance of the fairy tale. It was in the fairy tale that imagination - this, according to K. Marx, a great gift that contributed so much to the development of mankind - was first recognized as an aesthetic category.

With the formation of nations and then states, heroic epic: Indian “Mahabharata”, Irish sagas, Kyrgyz “Manas”, Russian epics. Lyrics not related to ritual arose even later: it showed interest in the human personality, in the experiences of the common man. Folk songs of the period of feudalism tell about serf bondage, about the hard female share, about public defenders such as Karmelyuk in Ukraine, Janosik in Slovakia, Stepan Razin in Rus'.

When studying folk art, one should constantly keep in mind that people are not a homogeneous concept and are historically changeable. The ruling classes sought by all means to introduce into the masses thoughts, moods, works that were contrary to the interests of the working people - songs loyal to tsarism, “spiritual poems”, etc. Moreover, in the people themselves, centuries of oppression accumulated not only hatred for exploiters, but also ignorance and downtroddenness. The history of folklore is both a process of constant growth in the self-awareness of the people and the overcoming of what their prejudices were expressed in.

By the nature of the connection with folk life There are ritual and non-ritual folklore. The folklore performers themselves adhere to a different classification. For them, it is important that some works are sung, others are spoken. Philological scholars classify all works of folklore into one of three categories - epic, lyric or drama, as is customary in literary criticism.

Some folklore genres are interconnected by a common sphere of existence. If pre-revolutionary folklore was very clearly distinguished by the social class of its speakers (peasant, worker), now age differences are more significant. A special section of folk poetry is children's folklore - playful (drawing lots, counting rhymes, various play songs) and non-fictional (tongue twisters, horror stories, changelings). The main genre of modern youth folklore has become the amateur, so-called bard song.

The folklore of every nation is unique, as is its history, customs, and culture. Epics and ditties are inherent only in Russian folklore, dumas - in Ukrainian, etc. The lyrical songs of every nation are original. Even the shortest works of folklore - proverbs and sayings - express the same idea in each nation in its own way, and where we say: “Silence is golden,” the Japanese, with their cult of flowers, will say: “Silence is flowers.”

However, already the first folklorists were struck by the similarity of fairy tales, songs, and legends belonging to different peoples. This was explained at first common origin related (for example, Indo-European) peoples, then by borrowing: one people adopted plots, motifs, and images from another.

A consistent and convincing explanation of all phenomena of similarity can only be provided by historical materialism. Relying on the richest factual material, Marxist scientists explained that similar plots, motifs, and images arose among peoples who were at the same stages of socio-cultural development, even if these peoples lived on different continents and did not meet each other. So, a fairy tale is a utopia, a dream of justice that took shape among various peoples as private property appeared in them, and with it social inequality. Primitive society did not know fairy tales on any of the continents.

Fairy tales, heroic epics, ballads, proverbs, sayings, riddles, lyrical songs different nations, differing in national identity both in form and content, are at the same time created on the basis of what is common to a certain level artistic thinking and laws established by tradition. Here is one of the “natural experiments” that confirms this position. French poet P. J. Beranger wrote the poem “The Old Corporal”, using as a basis (and at the same time significantly reworking it) a “complaint” - a special kind of French folk ballad. The poet V. S. Kurochkin translated the poem into Russian, and thanks to the music of A. S. Dargomyzhsky, the song penetrated into Russian folklore repertoire. And when, many years later, it was recorded on the Don, it was discovered that the folk singers had made significant changes to the text (and, by the way, to the music), as if essentially restoring the original form of the French “complaint,” which the Don Cossacks, of course, had never heard. This affected general laws folk song creativity.

Literature appeared later than folklore and has always, although in different ways, used its experience. At the same time, literary works have long penetrated folklore and influenced its development.

The nature of the interaction between the two poetic systems is historically determined and therefore varies at different stages artistic development. On this path, what is done on sharp turns history, the process of redistribution of social spheres of action of literature and folklore, which is based on the material of Russian XVII culture V. noted by Academician D.S. Likhachev. If back in the 16th century. storytellers were kept even at the royal court, then a century and a half later, folklore disappears from the life and everyday life of the ruling classes, now oral poetry is the property of almost exclusively the masses, and literature - of the ruling classes. So later development can sometimes change the emerging trends in the interaction of literature and folklore, and sometimes in the most significant way. However, the completed stages are not forgotten. What began in the folk art of the time of Columbus and Afanasy Nikitin uniquely echoed in the quests of M. Cervantes and G. Lorca, A. S. Pushkin and A. T. Tvardovsky.

The interaction of folk art with realistic literature reveals more fully than ever before the inexhaustibility of folklore as an eternal source of continuously developing art. The literature of socialist realism, like no other, is based not only on the experience of its immediate predecessors, but also on all the best that characterizes literary process throughout its entire length, and on folklore in all its inexhaustible richness.

The law “On the Protection and Use of Cultural Historical Monuments”, adopted in 1976, also includes “recordings of folklore and music” among national treasures. However, recording is only an auxiliary means of recording folklore text. But even the most accurate recording cannot replace the living spring of folk poetry.

FOLKLORE

(eng. folklore - folk knowledge, folk wisdom), folk poetry, folk poetry, oral folk art - a set of different types and forms of mass oral arts. creativity of one or several. peoples The term "F." introduced in 1846 archaeologist W. J. Toms, as a scientist. the term is officially adopted by English. folklore society "Folklore Society", main. in 1878. Originally "F." meant both the subject of research and the corresponding science. In modern historiography is a science that studies the theory and history of f. and its interaction with other types of art, called. folkloristics.

The definition of F. cannot be unambiguous for all historians. stages, because its social and aesthetic. functions, content and poetics are directly dependent on the presence or absence in the cultural system of a given people of its other forms and types (handwritten or printed books, professional theater and pop music, etc.) and various methods of dissemination of literary arts. works (cinema, radio, television, sound recordings, etc.).

F. arose in the process of the formation of human speech and in ancient times covered all forms of spiritual culture. It is characterized by comprehensive syncretism - functional and ideological. (F. contained the rudiments of artistic creativity, historical knowledge, science, religion, etc.), social (F. served all layers of society), genre (epic, fairy tale, legend, myth, song, etc. not yet differentiated), formal (the word appeared in inextricable unity with the so-called extra-textual elements - intonation, melody, gesture, facial expressions, dance, sometimes figurative art). Subsequently, in the process of social differentiation of society and the development of culture, various types and forms of f. arose, expressing the interests of the department. social strata and classes, folklore genres were formed that had various social and everyday purposes (production, social-organizing, ritual, gaming, aesthetic, cognitive). They were characterized by varying degrees of aesthetic development. beginning, various combinations of text and extra-textual elements, aesthetic. and other functions. In general, F. continued to remain multifunctional and syncretic.

The use of writing to record text distinguished literature from the oral forms of literary arts that preceded it. creativity. From the moment of their inception, writing and literature turned out to be the property of the highest social strata. At the same time, literature at first, as a rule, was not yet a phenomenon. artistic (for example, chronicles and annals, diplomatic and journalistic works, ritual texts, etc.). In this regard, the actual aesthetic. The needs of society as a whole were satisfied for a long time mainly by oral tradition. The development of literature and growing social differentiation led to the fact that already in the late feudal period. F.'s period became predominant. (and among many nations exclusively) the property of the working people. the masses, because literary forms of creativity remained inaccessible to them. Social differences in the environment that created literary and folklore works led to the emergence of a definition. range of ideas and various arts. tastes. This was accompanied by the development of specific systems of literary (story, novel, poem, poem, etc.) and folklore (epic, fairy tale, song, etc.) genres and their poetics. The transition from oral forms of creation and transmission of art. works, which are characterized by the use of naturals. means of communication (voice - hearing, movement - vision), to fixing and stabilizing the text and reading it meant not only a more advanced way of accumulating and preserving cultural achievements. He was accompanied and determined. losses: a spatial and temporal gap in the moment of creation (reproduction) of art. the work and its perception, the loss of the immediate. contact between its creator (writer) and the perceiver (reader), loss of extra-textual elements, contact empathy and the possibility of making textual and other changes depending on the reaction of the perceivers. The significance of these losses is confirmed by the fact that even in conditions of universal literacy, not only traditional folklore, but also other oral and at the same time synthetic ones continue to exist and re-emerge. forms, and some of them are of a contact nature (theater, stage, readers, performances of writers in front of an audience, performance of poetry with a guitar, etc.).

Characteristic features of f. in the conditions of its coexistence with literature and in opposition to it: orality, collectivity, nationality, variability, combination of words and arts. elements of other arts. Each work arose on the basis of poetics developed by the team, was intended for a certain circle of listeners and acquired its origins. life, if it was accepted by the team. Changes made by the department. performers could be very different - from stylistic. variations until a significant reworking of the plan and, as a rule, did not go beyond the boundaries of the ideology and aesthetics of the definition. environment. Collectiveness creative. process in F. did not mean its impersonality. Talented masters not only created new songs, fairy tales, etc., but also influenced the process of dissemination, improvement or adaptation of traditions. texts to the historically changed needs of the collective. Dialectical the unity of the collective and the individual was contradictory in F., as in literature, but in general the tradition in F. had higher value than in the literature. In social conditions. division of labor on the basis of oral tradition, in parallel with mass and unprofessional performance, which is characteristic of the arts of all nations, unique professions arose associated with the creation and performance of poetic, musical and other works (Ancient Greek rhapsodes and aedas; Roman mimes and French jonglers; later Russian kobzars and chansons. In the early feud. period, performers who served the dominant social strata emerged. A transitional type of singer-poet emerged, closely associated first with chivalry (French troubadours or German minnesingers), later with the burghers (German meistersingers) or the clerical-student environment (French or German vagantes; Polish, Ukrainian and Belarusian . nativity scenes). In some countries and regions, in conditions of slow development, patriarchal-feudalism. way of life, transitional forms of a unique oral literature were formed. Poetic works were created specifically. persons, disseminated orally, there was a desire to stabilize their texts. At the same time, the tradition has preserved the names of the creators (Toktogul in Kyrgyzstan, Kemin and Mollanepes in Turkmenistan, Sayat-Nova in Armenia, Georgia and Azerbaijan, etc.). In Russian F. there was no developed professionalization of singers. We can only talk about the department. names mentioned in the writing of Ancient Rus' (singer Mitus; possibly Boyan).

Each genre or group of folk genres fulfilled a specific purpose. social and household functions. This led to the formation of the department. genres of F. with their characteristic themes, images, poetics, and style. In the ancient period, most peoples had tribal traditions, work and ritual songs, mythological. stories, early forms of fairy tales, spells, incantations. Later, at the turn of the transition from pre-class society to class society, modern societies arose. types of fairy tales (magical, everyday, about animals) and archaic. epic forms. During the formation of the state, heroic epic, then epic. ballad and historical songs content, history legends. Later other classical genres. F. formed non-ritual lyrical. song and romance, later types of folklore. drama and even later - the genres of worker F. - revolutionary. songs, marches, satire. songs, oral stories. The process of emergence, development of department. genres of f., especially the duration of their productive period, the relationship of f. with literature and other types of professional arts. creativity are determined by the characteristics of history. the development of each people and the nature of its contacts with other peoples. Thus, tribal traditions were forgotten among some peoples (for example, among the Eastern Slavs) and formed the basis of history. legends from others (for example, Icelandic sagas from Icelanders). Ritual songs, as a rule, were timed to coincide with different periods agricultural, pastoral, hunting or fishing calendars entered into various relationships with the rites of the Christian, Muslim, Buddhist and other religions. The degree of connection between the epic and mythological ideas are determined by specific socio-economic. conditions. An example of this kind of connection is the Nart tales of the peoples of the Caucasus, Karelo-Fin. runes, ancient Greek epic Germanic languages ​​left oral existence relatively early. and Western Roman epic. The epic existed for a long time and acquired later forms. Turkic peoples, south and east Slavs

There are different genre versions of African, Australian, Asian and European fairy tales. peoples The ballad among some peoples (for example, the Scots) acquired clear genre differences, while for others (for example, the Russians) it is close to lyrical. or ist. song. The poetry of each people is characterized by a unique combination of genres and a specific role of each of them in the general system of oral creativity, which has always been multi-layered and heterogeneous.

Despite the bright national coloring folklore texts, many motives, plots and even images of characters in the fiction of different peoples are strikingly similar. Such similarities could arise as a result of the development of f. from a common source (common archaic features of f. the Slavs or Finno-Ugric peoples, which go back to the common Proto-Slavic or Proto-Finnish heritage), or as a result of the cultural interaction of peoples (for example, the exchange of fairy tale plots Russians and Karelians), or the independent emergence of similar phenomena (for example, common plots of fairy tales American Indians and peoples of the Center. Europe) under the influence of general patterns of development of the social system, material and spiritual culture.

In the late feudal period. time and during the period of capitalism in the people. lit. began to penetrate the environment more actively than before. works; some forms of lit. creativity acquired mass distribution (romances and songs of literary origin, so-called. folk books, russian "lubok", German. "Bilderbogen", etc.). This influenced the plot, style, and content of folklore works. People's creativity storytellers acquired certain features of lit. creativity (individualization, psychologism, etc.).

In socialist In society, the availability of education has provided an equal opportunity for the development of talents and professionalization of people, and a variety of modern technologies have become widespread. forms of mass literary arts. culture - amateur lit. creativity (including partly in traditional folklore forms), amateur club performances, folk song creativity. choirs, etc. Some of these forms are creative, others are performing in nature.

Design of folkloristics in independent work. science dates back to the 30-40s. 19th century The formation of folkloristics and the beginning of scientific research. the collection and publication of F. was associated with three main. factors: lit. romanticism, which was one of the forms of expression of the self-awareness of the emerging bourgeoisie. nations (for example, in Germany, France, Italy), national liberation. movement (for example, among the southern and western Slavs) and the spread of social liberation. And educational ideas(for example, in Russia - A. I. Herzen, N. G. Chernyshevsky, N. A. Dobrolyubov; in Poland - A. Mitskevich, etc.). Romantics (German scientists I. G. Herder, L. Arnim and C. Brentano, brothers W. and J. Grimm, etc.; English - T. Percy and J. Macpherson, etc.; Serbian - V. Karadzic and others; Finnish - E. Lönrot and others) saw in F. an expression of nationalism. spirit and national traditions and used folklore works to reconstruct history. facts not reflected in written sources. Emerging within the framework of romanticism, the so-called. mythological school (German scientists A. Kuhn, W. Schwarz, W. Manhardt and others; English - M. Muller, J. W. Cox and others; French - A. Pictet and others; Italian - A . de Gubernatis and others; Russian - F. I. Buslaev, A. N. Afanasyev, etc.), based on the achievements of Indo-European. linguistics, believed F. European. peoples the heritage of the most ancient Proto-Indo-European. myth-making. Romantics in glory. countries saw F. as a general glory. inheritance, preserved to varying degrees by different branches of the Slavs, just like the Germans. Romantics saw modernism in F. German-speaking peoples share the common heritage of the ancient Germans. In the 2nd half. 19th century based on philosophy. positivism, evolutionist schools in folklore studies developed, which is associated with a growing awareness of the unity of the laws of development of folklore and the recurrence of folklore plots and motifs in different ethnic groups. environments So representatives of the so-called. anthropologist schools (E. Tylor, E. Lang and J. Fraser - in England; N. Sumtsov, A. I. Kirpichnikov, A. N. Veselovsky - in Russia, etc.) explained the global recurrence of folklore phenomena by the unity of people. psychology. At the same time, the so-called comparativism (comparative historical method), which explained similar phenomena more or less mechanically. borrowing or “migration of plots” (German - T. Benfey, French - G. Paris, Czech - J. Polivka, Russian - V.V. Stasov, A.N. Pypin, A.N. Veselovsky, etc. .), and the “historical school” (the most vivid expression in Russia - V. F. Miller and his students; K. and M. Chadwick in England, etc.), which sought to connect the history of each people with its history and did great job by comparison of sources documents and folklore stories (especially epic ones). At the same time, the “historical school” was characterized by a simplified understanding of the mechanism of art. reflection of reality in F. and (like certain other trends in bourgeois folklore studies of the late 19th - early 20th centuries) the desire to prove that people. the masses only mechanically perceived and preserved the arts. values ​​created by the upper social strata. In the 20th century Freudianism (which interpreted folklore stories as a subconscious expression of inhibited sexual and other complexes), ritualism, became widespread. theory (linking the origin of verbal art primarily with magical rites; French scientists P. Centiv, J. Dumezil, English - F. Raglan, Dutch - J. de Vries, American - R. Carpenter, etc.) and "Finnish school", establishing historical and geographical. areas of distribution of plots and developing the principles of classification and systematization of F. (K. Kroon, A. Aarne, W. Anderson, etc.).

The origin of the Marxist trend in folklore studies is associated with the names of P. Lafargue, G. V. Plekhanov, A. M. Gorky. In the 20-30s. 20th century The formation of Marxist folklore studies continued in the USSR, after the 2nd World War of 1939-45 it became widespread in socialism. countries (B. M. and Yu. M. Sokolov, M. K. Azadovsky, V. M. Zhirmunsky, V. Ya. Propp, P. G. Bogatyrev, N. P. Andreev, etc. - in the USSR; P Dinekov, C. Romanska, S. Stoykova and others - in Bulgaria; M. Pop and others - in Romania; D. Ortutai and others - in Hungary; , J. Ex, O. Sirovatka, V. Gasparikova and others - in Czechoslovakia; V. Steinitz and others - in the GDR). She considers f., on the one hand, as the oldest form of poetic poetry. creativity, a treasury of arts. people's experience masses, as one of the components of the classic. heritage of the national arts culture of each people and, on the other hand, as the most valuable source. source.

When studying ancient eras history of mankind, F. is often (together with archeology) an indispensable source of history. source, especially for studying history. development of ideology and social psychology of people. wt. The complexity of the problem lies in the fact that archaic. folklore works are known, as a rule, only in records of the 18th-20th centuries. or in earlier lit. processing (for example, German "Song of the Nibelungs"), or archaic. elements included in later aesthetics. systems. Therefore, the use of F. for history. reconstructions require great care and, above all, the involvement of comparisons. materials. The features of reflecting reality in various genres F., combining aesthetic, cognitive, ritual and other functions in different ways. Experience in studying genres that were perceived by performers as an expression of history. knowledge (prosaic historical traditions and legends, song historical epic), showed the complexity of the relationship between plots, characters, time, to which their actions are attributed, epic. geography, etc. and authentic history. events, their real chronological, social and geographical. environment. Development of artistic history the thinking of the people did not come from empiricism. and a specific depiction of events to their poeticization and generalization or legendary-fantastic. processing as events are forgotten, but vice versa - from the so-called. mythological epic, which is a fantastic reflection of reality in mythological categories (for example, the successes of mankind in mastering fire, crafts, navigation, etc. are personified in F. in the image " cultural hero"of the Promethean type), to heroic epics and, finally, to historical songs, in which much more specific historical situations, events and persons are depicted, or historical ballads, in which nameless heroes or heroes with fictitious names operate in a situation close to real-historical ones.

In the department the same stories of history. legends or epic. songs are reflected largely non-empirically. ist. facts, but typical socialist. collisions, history state of politics and arts. consciousness of the people and folklore traditions of previous centuries, through the prism of which history is perceived. reality. At the same time, as in the historical legends, and in historical-epic songs. works often preserved the most valuable historical sources. points of view details, names, geographical. names, everyday realities, etc. So, G. Schliemann found the location of Troy, using data from ancient Greek. epic songs "Iliad" and "Odyssey", although he did not accurately determine the location of the "Homeric" layer in the cultural layers of the Trojan excavations. The mechanism of reflection of the source is even more complex. in reality in vernacular fairy tales, lyrical and everyday songs. Songs of a ritual nature, conspiracies, etc., to a greater extent, reflect non-history. reality as such, and the everyday consciousness of the people themselves are facts of the people. everyday life That. F. as a whole did not passively reproduce the empirical. socio-economic facts and political reality or everyday life, but was one of the most important means of expressing people. aspirations. Great value also has F. to clarify the history of ethnicity. contacts, the process of formation of ethnographic. groups and historical-ethnographic. regions.

Lit.: Chicherov V.I., K. Marx and F. Engels on folklore. Bibliographical materials, "Soviet folklore", 1936, No. 4-5; Bonch-Bruevich V.D., V.I. Lenin on oral folk art, "Soviet ethnography", 1954, No. 4; Friedlander G.M., K. Marx and F. Engels and questions of literature, 2nd ed., M., 1968 (chapter folklore); Propp V. Ya., Specifics of folklore, in the collection: "Proceedings of the anniversary scientific session of Leningrad State University. Section of Philological Sciences, L., 1946; his, Historical roots of a fairy tale, L., 1946; his, Folklore and reality, "Russian Literature", 1963, No. 3; principles of classification of folklore genres, "Sov. ethnography", 1964, No. 4; his, Morphology of a fairy tale, 2nd ed., M., 1969; Zhirmunsky V.M., On the issue of folk art, "Uch. zap. Leningr. ped. Institute named after A. I. Herzen", 1948, v. 67; his own, Folk heroic epic, M.-L., 1962; Gusev V. E., Marxism and Russian folklore of the late XIX - early XX centuries, M. -L., 1951; his, Problems of folklore in the history of aesthetics, M.-L., 1963; History of the term and its modern meaning. ethnographic.", 1966, No. 2; his own, Aesthetics of Folklore, L., 1967; Putilov B.N., On the main features of folk poetic creativity, "Uch. zap. Groznensky ped. in-ta. Ser. philological Sciences", v. 7, 1952, No. 4; his, On the historical study of Russian folklore, in the book: Russian folklore, v. 5, M.-L., 1960; Cocchiara J., History of folklore in Europe, transl. from Italian, M., 1960; Virsaladze E. B., The problem of the specificity of folklore in modern bourgeois folklore, in the book: Literary research of the Institute of History, vol. 1955 (summary in Russian); Azadovsky M. K., History of Russian folklore, vol. 1-2, M., 1958-63; Meletinsky E. M., Hero of a fairy tale, M., 1958; same, Origin of the heroic epic. Early forms and archaic monument, M., 1963; Chistov K.V., Folklore and modernity, "Soviet ethnography", 1962, No. 3; his, Sovr. problems of textual criticism in Russian. folklore, M., 1963: his own. On the relationship between folklore and ethnography, "Soviet ethnography", 1971, No. 5; his, Specificity of folklore in the light of information theory, "Problems of Philosophy", 1972, No. 6; Folklore and ethnography, Leningrad, 1970; Bogatyrev P. G., Questions of the theory of people. Art, M., 1971; Zemtsovsky I.I., Folklore as a science, in: Slav. musical folklore, M., 1972; Kagan M.S., Morphology of Art, Leningrad, 1972; Early forms of art, M., 1972; Corso R., Folklore. Storia. Obbietto. Metodo. Bibliographie, Roma, 1923; Gennep A. van, Le folklore, P., 1924; Krohn K., Die folkloristische Arbeitsmethode, Oslo, 1926; Croce V., Poesia popolare e poesia d "arte, Bari, 1929; Brouwer S., Die Volkslied in Deutschland, Frankreich, Belgien und Holland, Groningen-Haag., 1930; Saintyves P., Manuel de folklore, P., 1936 ; Varagnac A., Definition du folklore, P., 1938; Alford V., Introduction to English folklore, L., 1952; Ramos A., Estudos de Folk-Lore. (1951); Weltfish G., The origins of art, Indianapolis-N., 1953; Marinus A., Essais sur la tradition, Brux., 1958; Levi-Strauss S., La pendee sauvage, P., 1962; Bawra S. M., Primitive song, N. Y., 1963; Krappe A. H., The science of folklore, 2 ed., N. Y., 1964; "Volkspoesie", B., 1968; Weber-Kellermann J., Deutsche Volkskunde zwischen Germanistik und Sozialwissenschaften, Stuttg., 1969; , Parva chast, 2nd ed., Sofia, 1972; Ortutay G., Hungarian folklor. Essays, Bdpst, 1972.

Bibliography: Akimova T. M., Seminar on Narratives. poetic creativity, Saratov, 1959; Melts M. Ya., Questions of the theory of folklore (materials for the bibliography), in the book; Russian folklore, vol. 5, M.-L., 1960; his, Modern folklore bibliography, in the book: Russian folklore, vol. 10, M.-L., 1966; Kushnereva Z.I., Folklore of the peoples of the USSR. Bibliographical source in Russian language (1945-1963), M., 1964; Sokolova V.K., Sov. folkloristics for the 50th anniversary of the October Revolution, "Soviet ethnography", 1967, No. 5; Volkskundliche Bibliographie, V.-Lpz., 1919-57; Internationale volkskundliche Bibliographie, Basel-Bonn, 1954-; Coluccio F., Diccionario folklorico argentino, B.-Aires, 1948; Standard dictionary of folklore, mythology and legend, ed. by M. Leach, v. 1-2, N.Y., 1949-50; Erich O., Beitl R., Wörterbuch der deutschen Volkskunde, 2 Aufl., Stutt., 1955; Thompson S., Motif-index of folk-literature, v. 1-6, Bloomington, 1955-58; his, Fifty years of folktale indexing, "Humanoria", N.Y., 1960; Dorson R. M., Current folklore theories, "Current anthropology", 1963, v. 4, No. 1; Aarne A. and Thompson S., The types of folktale. A classification and bibliography, 2 rev., Hels., 1961; Slownik folkloru polskiego, Warsz., 1965.

K. V. Chistov. Leningrad.

Soviet historical encyclopedia. - M.: Soviet Encyclopedia. Ed. E. M. Zhukova. 1973-1982 .

See what “FOLKLORE” is in other dictionaries:

- (in the cultural aspect) in the “broad” sense (all folk traditional peasant spiritual and partly material culture) and “narrow” (oral peasant verbal artistic tradition). Folklore is a collection of... ... Encyclopedia of Cultural Studies

Anastasia Mashnova
Article "Children's folklore"

Children's folklore

The child's first acquaintance with oral folk creativity begins with folklore works. Lullabies are the first to enter the life of a little person, and then other forms. folklore. As a rule, at the beginning of life a child gets acquainted with small genres folklore, accessible to his perception. Fairy tales, songs, proverbs, rhymes, nursery rhymes, tongue twisters have always been inextricably linked with experience folk pedagogy.

Acquaintance of a person with works of art, with the best examples of oral folk creativity should begin from the first years of his life, since the period of early and preschool childhood– a defining stage in the development of the human personality. The age of up to five years is the richest in a child’s ability to quickly and greedily learn. the world around us, absorb a huge amount of impressions. It is during this period that children, with amazing speed and activity, begin to adopt the norms of behavior of those around them, and most importantly, to master the means of human communication - speech.

Folklore influences the formation of moral feelings and assessments, norms of behavior, the education of aesthetic perception and aesthetic feelings, promotes the development of speech, provides examples of the Russian literary language, enriches vocabulary new words, figurative expressions, helps the child express his attitude to what he listened to, using ready-made language forms.

Thus, folklore- This is an important means of forming a child’s personality and speech development, a means of aesthetic and moral education of children.

The richness of the Russian language is revealed to the preschooler in the works of oral folk art. Its examples - proverbs, riddles, fairy tales and others - the child not only hears, but repeats and assimilates. Genres are included in children's language in accessible content. Living spoken language and oral works folk creativity - are closely intertwined in influencing the child’s speech.

Works of oral folk creativity are included in children's folklore.

Children's folklore- these are works of traditional folklore of adults, moved to children's repertoire ; works created by adults specifically for children and adopted by tradition. General generic characteristic children's folklore– correlation of literary text with the game.

Folklore gives children the opportunity to meet rich people creative heritage peoples. Each folklore form, be it a riddle, a proverb, a joke, a counting rhyme, a nickname, a fairy tale or a fable - an amazing example of creativity, fertile material for imitation, memorization and reproduction in the speech of children. These samples develop figurative children's speech, broaden the horizons of children.

Ancestral roots of many forms children's folklore go deep into history. Among them, nicknames and sentences are perhaps the most ancient. They are born of faith in the forces of nature and are called upon to use the magic of words in order to evoke the beneficial influence of natural elements or prevent their destructive power.

Calls are small songs designed to be sung by a group of children. Many of them are accompanied by game actions.

The call is not just an appeal to natural elements, but feelings expressed in words, rhythm, intonation - experience, admiration, tenderness, delight.

Oh, you rainbow-arc.

You're tall and tight!

Just like rain, rain,

We've been waiting for you for a long time.

Sentences – communication with nature one on one. The sentences are addressed to home life, to everyday activities. In fact, all living things that surround the child are not ignored.

Ladybug, fly to heaven!

Your kids eat cutlets there!

A sentence built on the principle of a request-wish sets the child up for a respectful attitude towards every plant in the forest, field, and garden.

Sentences during games are a kind of requests to nature for complicity, for kind help. They face the wind, water, stream. They contain the rules of the game that are necessary for all players, often preventing accidents. For example, do not choke when diving, do not get water in your ears. They teach children to be attentive to their actions, to check their actions with rules, and to strictly follow them.

In the genre system children's folklore occupies a special place "the poetry of nurturing", or "mother's poetry". This includes lullabies, nursery rhymes, nursery rhymes, jokes, fairy tales and songs created for the little ones.

Lullabies: adults noticed which words and tunes children fell asleep to better, repeated them, memorized them, and passed them on to the next generations. The words were usually affectionate and melodious. Such songs most often feature cooing ghouls, homely killer whales, a purring cat, and talk about silence and peace. In ancient lullabies, certain living creatures are mentioned, each of them has its own responsibilities.

To the sounds of their affectionate, melodious words, the baby will wake up easier, let himself be washed or feed:

Water, water,

Wash my face

To make your eyes sparkle,

To make your cheeks blush,

To make your mouth laugh,

So that the tooth bites.

Pestushki (from the word "nurture"- educate) are associated with the most early periods child development.

You can hear love and kindness in the pestles. They are foldable and beautiful. And they also teach the baby, he listens and looks where his leg is, where his mouth is.

Then the very first games begin, nursery rhymes: A horned goat is coming, Magpie-crow is cooking porridge, Ladushki. Here, along with pleasure, the child also receives benefits.

TO popular Tongue twisters also include creativity, but they have mainly been and remain a favorite game for older preschool children.

Tongue twisters are the rapid repetition of difficult to pronounce words. Pronunciation mistakes make children laugh. While playing, children simultaneously develop their articulation organs. Tongue twisters with complex and rich sound design are especially popular. Tongue twisters, or pure twisters, teach how to pronounce sounds, develop speech organs and memory.

Four turtles have four turtles.

IN everyday life Communication with a child is often accompanied by jokes. These are small, funny works or statements, often in poetic form. Just like many other small folklore joke genres accompany games. Often jokes have a dialogical form, which also emphasizes their closeness to life. colloquial speech. Typically, they describe a short, fun, action-packed situation. In general, jokes develop a child’s creative imagination and, by involving him in a verbal game with a quick change of events, teach him to think quickly and imaginatively.

Petya-Petya-Cockerel,

Petya - red scallop,

He walked along the path

And I found a penny

I bought myself boots

And the chicken - earrings!

A growing child becomes not only the object of all kinds of games, but also their active participant. At this time he meets another folklore genre- counting rhymes. By opening the game and assigning certain roles to all its participants, the counting rhyme organizes the game process itself and teaches children to communicate with each other in a given situation and obey the established rules. In addition, counting rhymes develop a sense of rhythm.

The bees flew into the field,

They buzzed, they buzzed,

The bees sat on the flowers,

We play - you drive!

A new way of exploring the world is becoming riddles - brief allegorical descriptions of objects or phenomena. A riddle is a question that a child has to answer, and it’s unlikely that anything stimulates the mental activity of a little person as much as this small piece verbal art. The riddle is based on one of the most expressive artistic techniques - metaphor.

Glass house on the window

With clear water

With stones and sand at the bottom,

And with a golden fish.

(Aquarium)

By solving a riddle, a child discovers new properties of familiar objects, learns to compare objects and phenomena with each other, and to find similarities and differences between them. In this way, he organizes his knowledge about the world.

Using small forms folklore it is possible to solve almost all problems of speech development methods and, along with the basic methods and techniques of speech development of preschoolers, it is possible and necessary to use this rich material of verbal creativity people.

Thus, thanks to popular creativity, the child enters into the world around him more easily, feels the beauty of his native nature more fully, and assimilates ideas people about beauty, morality, gets acquainted with the customs and rituals of his people. Leads with amazing teaching talent people a child from simple nursery rhymes, riddles, sayings, etc. to complex poetic images of fairy tales; from lines that are amusing and soothing to situations that require the little listener to exert all his mental strength.