The main problems of modern folkloristics. Basic approaches to the study of folklore

Records of folklore during the period of Old Russian literature (XI-- 391 XVII centuries). As was said in the previous chapter, Russian literature makes extensive use of folklore already at the earliest early stages its formation and development. Various genres of folklore (traditions, legends, songs, fairy tales, proverbs and sayings) are included in chronicle“The Tale of Bygone Years” (beginning of the 12th century), in “The Tale of Igor’s Campaign” (end of the 12th century), “Zadonshchina” (end of the 14th century), “The Tale of Peter and Fevronia” (15th century), “ The Tale of Misfortune-Grief" (XVII century) and other monuments of ancient Russian literature.

It is possible that individual folklore works were first written down before being included in literature. For example, scientists believe that “Zadonshchina” and “The Tale of Peter and Fevronia” were created on the basis of recorded folklore legends and stories. In manuscripts of the 16th century. Scientists have discovered records of fairy tales. From the 17th century The names of collectors of Russian folklore have reached us. For example, it is known that for the English traveler Richard James in 1619-1620. In the Arkhangelsk region, historical songs were recorded about the events of the era of “Troubles”. Another English traveler, Collins, wrote down two tales about Ivan the Terrible between 1660 and 1669. In 1681 folk lyrical songs recorded by P. A. Kvashnin-Samarin.

In the 17th century works of almost all genres of Russian folklore were recorded. For example, the fairy tales “About Ivan Ponomarevich”, “About the Princess and Ivashka the White Shirt”, etc., epics about Ilya Muromets, Mikhail Potyk and Stavr Godinovich, many legends, songs, proverbs and sayings.

By the 17th century The tradition of compiling handwritten folklore collections is ascending. At this time, there were many handwritten songbooks among the people, which, in addition to literary poems with spiritual content, also included folk songs. From the 17th century A handwritten collection of “Tales or popular proverbs in alphabetical order” has reached us. The collection included about 2800 proverbs.

Collection, study and publication of folklore in the 18th century. The tradition of compiling handwritten folklore collections continues in the 18th century. There are especially many handwritten songbooks that contain literary and folk songs. The 18th century marks the beginning of the development of folkloristic thought in Russia. Scientific interest in folklore in the first half of the 18th century. associated with the names of V. N. Tatishchev, V. K. Trediakovsky and M. V. Lomonosov.

V.N. Tatishchev (1686-1750) turned to the study of folklore while working on “Russian History...”. He draws on folklore as a historical source. Tatishchev studies folklore from chronicles and in real life. Characterizing ancient Russian history, Tatishchev touches on the epics about Ilya Muromets, Alyosha Popovich, Nightingale the Robber and Duke Stepanovich. He was also interested in other genres of folklore. Tatishchev, for example, compiled a small collection of proverbs.

Unlike the historian V.N. Tatishchev, the poet V.K. Trediakovsky (1703-1768) had a philological, rather than historical, interest in folklore. Trediakovsky studies folklore as a source of poetic phraseology and the national metric system. In the practice of Russian literature before Trediakovsky's reform, syllabic versification was used. Having studied the features of Russian folk versification, Trediakovsky, in his treatise “A New and Brief Method for Composing Russian Poems” (1735), proposed a system of syllabonic versification, which was later used by all Russian literary poetry. Some interesting remarks by Trediakovsky about the peculiarities of the Russian language folk poetry. In particular, he notes the constant folklore epithets “tight bow”, “white tent”, etc.

The works and individual statements of M.V. Lomonosov (1711-- 1765) are of even greater importance in the study of Russian folk poetry. Growing up in the North, Lomonosov was well acquainted with all genres of Russian folklore (fairy tales, epics, songs, proverbs and sayings). He also studies folklore from chronicles and handwritten collections. In his works, Lomonosov talks about folklore as a valuable source of information in pagan rituals, talks about conducting calendar holidays. Following Trediakovsky, Lomonosov studies folk versification and in his work “Letter on the Rules of Russian Poetry” (1739) further develops the theory of syllabic-tonic versification. Lomonosov studies the language of folk poetry to understand the national characteristics of the Russian language. He uses folk proverbs and sayings in his works “Rhetoric” (1748) and “Russian Grammar” (1757). In his works on the history of Russia, Lomonosov uses folklore as a historical source.

In the middle of the 18th century. S. P. Krasheninnikov is engaged in collecting folklore for historical and ethnographic purposes. In 1756, the first volume of his work “Description of the Land of Kamchatka” was published, which talks about the rituals of the Kamchadals and contains a number of folk songs. A.P. Sumarokov responded to S.P. Krasheninnikov’s book “Description of the Land of Kamchatka” with a review that expressed his views on folk poetry. Sumarokov evaluates the folklore of the Kamchadals mainly from an aesthetic point of view. The pathos of Sumarokov's review is the struggle for simplicity and naturalness in poetry.

The work of collecting Russian folklore intensified in the last third of the 18th century. If earlier folklore records were concentrated in handwritten collections, now they, like literary works, are published. For the first time, samples of Russian folklore were published in N.G. Kurganov’s “Pismovnik” (1796). More than 900 proverbs, about 20 songs, several fairy tales and anecdotes were published in the appendices to the “Pismovnik”.

In the future, separate collections are dedicated to various genres of Russian folklore. So, M.D. From 1770 to 1774 Chulkov published “Collection of Various Songs” in four parts, N.I. Novikov in 1780-1781. publishes in six parts “A New and Complete Collection of Russian Songs”, V.F. Trutovsky for the period from 1776 to 1795 publishes in four parts “Collection of Russian simple songs with notes”. At the end of the 18th century. Less significant songbooks are also published:

“New Russian Songbook” (parts 1--3,

1790--1791), “Selected Songbook” (1792),

“Russian Erata” by M. Popov (1792), “Pocket Songbook” by I. I. Dmitriev (1796), etc.

The greatest value for us is the collection of N. Lvova --I. Pracha “Collection of Russian folk songs with their voices...” (1790). This is the only collection of the 18th century in which folk songs are published in their original form, without any editorial changes. In the period from 1780 to 1783, V. A. Levshin’s collection “Russian Fairy Tales” was published in 10 parts. Literary and folk works are presented here in processing. In addition to fairy tales of a magical and heroic nature, the collection also contains everyday fairy tales, in which satirical elements predominate. Folk tales in processed form are also published in collections 394 “Cure for Thoughtfulness” (1786), “Russian Fairy Tales Collected by Pyotr Timofeev” (1787), “ Peasant tales"(1793), in the collection of V. Berezaisky "Anecdotes of the Ancient Poshekhonians" (1798), etc.

Collections of proverbs appear. Thus, A. A. Barsov published “Collection of 4291 ancient proverbs” in 1770. N.I. Novikov republished this collection in 1787. Two years earlier, the poet I. F. Bogdanovich published the collection “Russian Proverbs,” in which folklore material was selected biasedly and subjected to significant literary processing.

The merit of Russian enlighteners of the second half of the 18th century. (N.G. Kurganova, M.D. Chulkova, V.A. Levshina, N.I. Novikova and others) in that they were able to correctly assess the importance of Russian folklore in the development of national literature, did great job on the publication (though in edited form) of folk songs, fairy tales, proverbs and sayings. In their literary work, they used folklore to depict folk customs and morals.

In the person of A. N. Radishchev (1749--1802) Russian educational thought of the 18th century. receives its highest development, rises to a truly democratic, revolutionary consciousness.

Radishchev's revolutionary beliefs determined the special nature of his use of folklore, a fundamentally new understanding of folk art. Radishchev speaks for the first time about folklore as an exponent of the people's worldview. In folk songs, Radishchev saw “the formation of the soul of our people.” They, according to Radishchev, reflected not only the everyday side of life, but also the social ideals of the people. They serve to comprehend the Russian national character. In “Journey from St. Petersburg to Moscow” (1790), Radishchev draws on folk art as material that reveals the true soul of the oppressed people, their painful situation under serfdom. It is for these purposes that in the chapter “Gorodnya” he cites the laments of the mother and bride for the recruit. Let us note that this is the first publication (albeit of literary treatment) of folk laments.

A.N. Radishchev uses folklore as a means of achieving not only nationality, but also genuine realism and deep psychologism. Thus, in the chapter “Copper”, against the background of a cheerful round dance song “There was a birch tree in the field,” Radishchev, in contrast, deeply truthfully, with great psychological force, depicts the picture of the sale of serfs. Quite a lot important The problem of the folk singer, first put forward by Radishchev, has implications for both literature and folklore. The image of the folk singer is drawn by Radishchev in the chapter “Wedge” of “Travels from St. Petersburg to Moscow.” The singing of the old blind singer as portrayed by Radishchev is true art, “penetrating into the hearts of the listeners.” Then to the topic folk singers Radishchev once again addressed in his poem “Songs sung at competitions in honor of the ancients” Slavic deities"(1800--1802). Here folk singers and poets act as the spiritual leaders of the people. It is curious that Radishchev’s “Songs...” in its poetic imagery and style have some features of “The Tale of Igor’s Campaign,” which Radishchev, like many of his contemporaries, considered not a literary, but a folklore monument.

From what has been said, it is obvious that the 18th century represents an important stage in the prehistory of Russian folkloristics as a science. At this time, significant folklore material is collected and published, and its significance as a phenomenon of national culture is correctly assessed. Radishchev expresses the most valuable idea about 396 folk songs as an expression of the soul of the people.

At the same time, it should be noted that in the 18th century. Russian folkloristics has not yet formed as a science. Folklore has not yet been recognized as an independent object of research; it is not yet clearly separated from literature. In most collections, folklore works are placed together with literary works. Folk works are published in literary adaptations. At this time, specifically folkloristic research methods and techniques had not yet been developed.

Over time, folkloristics becomes an independent science, its structure is formed, and research methods are developed. Now folkloristics is a science that studies the patterns and features of the development of folklore, the character and nature, essence, themes of folk art, its specifics and common features with other types of art, features of the existence and functioning of oral literature texts at different stages of development; genre system and poetics.

According to the tasks specifically assigned to this science, folkloristics is divided into two branches:

History of folklore

Folklore theory

History of folklore is a branch of folkloristics that studies the process of emergence, development, existence, functioning, transformation (deformation) of genres and genre systems in different historical periods different territories. The history of folklore studies individual folk poetic works, productive and unproductive periods of individual genres, as well as an integral genre-poetic system in a synchronous (horizontal section of a separate historical period) and diachronic (vertical slice of historical development) plans.

Folklore theory is a branch of folkloristics that studies the essence of oral folk art, the characteristics of individual folklore genres, their place in the holistic genre system, as well as the internal structure of genres - the laws of their construction, poetics.

Folkloristics is closely connected, borders and interacts with many other sciences.

Its connection with history is manifested in the fact that folklore, like all humanities, is historical discipline, i.e. examines all phenomena and objects of study in their movement - from the prerequisites for emergence and origin, tracing the formation, development, flourishing to withering away or decline. Moreover, here it is necessary not only to establish the fact of development, but also to explain it.

Folklore is a historical phenomenon, and therefore requires a staged study, taking into account historical factors, figures and events of each specific era. The objectives of the study of oral folk art are to identify how new historical conditions or their changes affect folklore, which exactly causes the emergence of new genres, as well as in identifying the problem of historical correspondence of folklore genres, comparing texts with real events, historicism individual works. In addition, folklore can often itself be a historical source.

There is a close connection between folklore with ethnography as a science that studies the early forms of material life (life) and social organization of the people. Ethnography is the source and basis for the study of folk art, especially when analyzing the development of individual folklore phenomena.

The main problems of folkloristics:

Question about the need to collect

· The question of the place and role of folklore in the creation of national literature

· The question of its historical essence

· The question of the role of folklore in knowledge folk character

Modern collecting of folklore materials poses a number of problems for researchers that have arisen in connection with the peculiarities ethnocultural situation the end of the twentieth century. In relation to regions, these Problems the following:

Ø - authenticity collected regional material;

(i.e. the authenticity of the transmission, the authenticity of the sample and the idea of ​​the work)

Ø - phenomenon contextuality folklore text or its absence;

(i.e. the presence/absence of a condition for the meaningful use of a particular linguistic unit in speech (written or oral), taking into account its linguistic environment and the situation of verbal communication.)

Ø - crisis variability;

Ø - modern "live" genres;

Ø - folklore in context modern culture and cultural policy;

Ø - problems publications modern folklore.

Modern expeditionary work faces a major challenge authentication regional pattern, its occurrence and existence within the area being surveyed. Certification of performers does not bring any clarity to the question of its origin.

Modern mass media technology, of course, dictates its tastes to folklore samples. Some of them are regularly played by popular performers, others do not sound at all. In this case, we will record a “popular” sample simultaneously in a large number of places from performers of different ages. Most often, the source of the material is not indicated, because assimilation can occur through magnetic recording. Such “neutralized” options can only indicate adaptation of texts and fancy integration of options. This fact already exists. The question is not whether to recognize it or not, but how and why this or that material is selected and migrates regardless of the place of origin in some invariant. There is a risk of attributing to modern regional folklore something that in fact is not such.

Folklore how specific context has currently lost the qualities of a stable, living, dynamic structure. As a historical type of culture, it is experiencing a natural reincarnation within the developing collective and professional (author's, individual) forms of modern culture. There are still some stable fragments of context within it. On the territory of the Tambov region, these include Christmas caroling (“autumn clique”), the meeting of spring with larks, certain wedding rituals (buying and selling a bride), nurturing a child, proverbs, sayings, parables, oral stories, and anecdotes live in speech. These fragments of folklore context still allow us to judge quite accurately the past state and development trends.

Living genres oral folk art in the strict sense of the word remains proverbs and sayings, ditties, songs of literary origin, urban romances, oral stories, children's folklore, jokes, conspiracies. As a rule, there are short and succinct genres; the conspiracy is experiencing revival and legalization.

Encouraging availability paraphrase- figurative, metaphorical expressions that arise in speech on the basis of existing stable oral stereotypes. This is one of the examples of real reincarnations of tradition, its actualization. Another problem is aesthetic value such paraphrases. For example: a roof over your head (patronage of special persons); the tax inspector is not a dad; curly, but not a ram (a hint at a member of the government), just “curly.” From the middle generation we are more likely to hear variants of periphrases than variants of traditional genres and texts. Variants of traditional texts are quite rare in the Tambov region.

Oral folk art is the most specific poetic monument. It already exists as a grandiose recorded and published archive, folklore, again as a monument, as an aesthetic structure, “animated”, “comes to life” on stage in in a broad sense this word. A skillful cultural policy favors the preservation of the best poetic examples.

In the 20th century For several decades, creative thought was shackled by ideological dictates. Simplified sociological research was encouraged. For folkloristics, the ideas of Marxist theorists were recognized as mandatory. In Soviet science of the 30-50s. dogmatic concepts prevailed. The term “Marxist folklore studies” appeared, denoting a direction that developed the problems of history and theory of folklore, taking into account the works of Marx, Engels, Lenin, Lunacharsky and other Marxists. His followers were interested in the connection between folklore and the liberation movement, expressed in folk works class reflex, etc. The achievements of domestic and foreign “non-Marxist” science were hushed up, downplayed or denied. Outstanding scientists of the “pre-Marxist” period (F.I. Buslaev, A.N. Veselovsky, V.F. Miller, etc.) were criticized. Under these conditions, an experiment was undertaken to create general history Russian folklore1 and the history of Russian folklore2.

For a number of folklorists, formal research methods became an alternative to the vulgar sociological approach. In the field of studying narrative folklore, structural-typological analysis has developed. Its representatives began to identify invariant models of genres, plots, and motifs. They considered the phenomena of typological relationships in a synchronic way (from the Greek synchronos - “simultaneous”), i.e. characterized the state of a particular folklore system over one period of time. Later, structural-semiotic folkloristics appeared, which seeks to establish general patterns of construction of folklore texts as sign systems3.

With the liberation from dogmatism, science gradually began to return to full-fledged historical research. The historical-typological method has been developed, which considers the phenomena of folklore typology in diachronic terms (from the Greek dia - “across, through” and chronos - “time”), i.e. at different stages of the historical development of folklore, in its genesis and evolution . At the same time, folklore works are studied in a historical and ethnographic context1 This principle was consistently applied in a number of monographs: on ritual calendar and family folklore2, fairy tales3, non-fairytale prose4, epics5, etc.

Synchronic and diachronic approaches are dialectically interconnected, because folklore exists both in space and in time. We can say that in formal studies interest in the form of works predominates, and in historical studies - in their content. It should be noted, however, that form and content are unequal. “In folklore,” wrote the founder of structuralism, V. Ya. Propp, “with the unity or cohesion of content and form, the content is primary: it creates its own form, and not vice versa”6. The general task of folkloristics can be considered the search for a universal theory that can organically unite directions of formal and historical types. This is also expressed by discussions that periodically appear in the press: about the historicism of epics, about the place of folklore studies in the system of other sciences, etc.

The processes of the history of folklore are explored by historical poetics, created as a special direction by A. N. Veselovsky, and subsequently developed by V. M. Zhirmunsky, E. M. Mele-

Tinsky, V.M. Gatsak and other researchers1. Within its framework, poetic genera, genres, and stylistic systems are examined - both in general and in their specific manifestations. Historical poetics explores the connections between oral folk art and written literature, music, and visual arts.

In recent years, a trend has clearly emerged for the integrated study of folklore, language, mythology, ethnography and folk art as components of a single spiritual culture of the people. Here, in the field of reconstruction of Slavic paganism and mythology, the work of the staff of the Institute of Slavic and Balkan Studies is especially productive Russian Academy sciences (this work was headed by ethnolinguist N.I. Tolstoy for many years)2.

Any method involves relying on facts. Electronic computing and other technology has entered the life of folklorists, which significantly increases the accuracy of records, simplifies mechanical operations for recording and systematizing material, and searching for necessary information. “Modern folkloristics,” noted N. I. Tolstoy, “continues to use primarily synchronous descriptive method, constantly improving it theoretically and technically.<...>Along with it, the comparative typological method and the old, tested and at the same time constantly updated and tested comparative historical method are widely used. This method was proposed and successfully applied more than a century ago by the remarkable Russian scientist A. N. Veselovsky..."3.

In the self-determination of modern folkloristics as an independent scientific discipline, significant events were the first dictionary collection of folkloristic terms and concepts (based on the material of three East Slavic peoples)4, as well as the book by V.P. Anikin “The Theory of Folklore”5.

Nowadays, the sections of folklore studies are: historiography of the science of oral folk art, theory and history of folklore, organization and methodology of field work, systematization archival funds, textual criticism.

There are centers for the philological study of Russian folklore, with their own archives and periodicals. These are the State Republican Center of Russian Folklore in Moscow (publishing the magazine "Living Antiquity"), the sector of Russian folk art of the Institute of Russian Literature (Pushkin House) of the Russian Academy of Sciences in St. Petersburg (yearbook "Russian Folklore: Materials and Research"), the Department of Folklore of the Moscow State University named after. M.V. Lomonosov (collections "Folklore as the Art of Words"), as well as regional and regional folklore centers with their archives and publications ("Siberian Folklore", "Folklore of the Urals", "Folklore of the Peoples of Russia", etc.).

LITERATURE ON THE TOPIC

Sokolov Yu. M. Historiography of folklore // Sokolov Yu. M. Russian folklore. - M., 1941. - P. 34-121.

Azadovsky M.K. History of Russian folkloristics: In 2 volumes - M., 1958 (vol. 1); 1963 (vol. 2).

Bazanov V. Russians revolutionary democrats and folk studies. - L., 1974.

Academic schools in Russian literary criticism / Rep. ed. P. A. Nikolaev. - M., 1975.

Putilov B. N. Methodology of comparative historical study of folklore. - L., 1976.

Toporkov A. L. Theory of myth in Russian philological science of the 19th century / Rep. ed. V. M. Gatsak. - M., 1997.

What do we mean by the term "folklore"? If we take the etymology of this word, then translated from English we get: “folk” - people, people, “lore” - knowledge (knowledge in any area). Therefore, folklore is folk knowledge. In the etymology of this word we see a deep meaning, very important for discussions about the nature of folklore. Actually, folklore itself is “the knowledge of the people,” as the American folklorist F.J. Childe (281, p.291).

The German philosopher I. Herder (see: 1, pp. 118-122; 91, pp. 458-467; 167, pp. 182-186) can be considered the founder of folklore as a science, although the term “folklore” that is familiar to us for He did not use the designation of folk art. I. Herder became not only one of the first collectors of folk poetry and songs, publishing the work “Voices of Peoples in Songs” in 1778, but also published scientific works “Fragments on German Literature”, “Critical Groves”, “On Ossian and songs of the ancients”, etc., in which he put forward the principle of a historical approach to the phenomena of folk culture. He paid attention to the collection and study of folk poetry and songs, considering them the source of poetry in general. He had the following external reasons for this.

In 1760-65. poet and collector of ancient Scottish ballads and legends J. Macpherson, based on them he wrote poems under common name"Songs of Ossian, son of Fingal." In the next century, the folk authenticity of the Songs of Ossian proved problematic, but in that century his works aroused enormous public interest in folk poetry and antiquity.

In 1765, the Englishman, writer and publisher T. Percy, using a folk handwritten collection of the 17th century, also published a book of ancient English songs, “Monuments of English Poetry,” accompanying it with three scientific articles about the work of ancient bards and medieval minstrels.

I. Herder, becoming interested in these publications, introduced into science the concept of “folk song” (Volkslied), as he called those preserved in folk life ancient and contemporary folk songs, as well as poetry that existed among the people at that time. Noting the historical role of the people in the creation of national culture, I. Herder wrote that the poetry of each people reflects its morals, customs, working and living conditions. I. Herder deserves great credit for defining folklore as a source for the creation of national literature and art, which was later developed by romantic artists.

The term "folklore" was proposed in the mid-19th century. by the English cultural historian William John Toms in the article “Folk-Lore”, in the magazine “The Athenaeum” in 1846 (published under the pseudonym A. Merton). In the article, W. J. Toms called for collecting folk art, and in the very title of the article he emphasized that folklore is “ folk knowledge"(2, pp. 179-180). Later, in 1879, in the magazine "Folk-Lore Record", W. J. Thoms emphasized that folklore is the oral history of a people, the remnants of former beliefs, traditions, customs, etc. In defining the meaning of the term "folklore" W. J. Toms has a noticeable connection with the ideas of I. Herder and the aesthetics of the German romantics (F. Schelling, J. and I. Grimm, etc.).

In 1870, the Folk-Lore Society was created in England. The magazine "Folk-Lore Record" gives the following meaning of the term: folklore is "ancient mores, customs, rites and ceremonies of past eras, turned into superstitions and traditions of the lower classes of civilized society", and in a broader sense - "the totality of forms of unwritten history people,” and further: “We can say that folklore covers the entire culture of the people, which was not used in official religion and history, but which is and which has always been its own work.” .

The spread of the term “folklore” and its introduction into scientific use is associated with the works of V. Mannhardt, E. Tylor, E. Lang and others.

Thus, the term “folklore” appeared in science as a designation for the totality of archaism, traditions and folk culture, with a clearly expressed “ethnographic” approach to folklore, and its boundaries were very wide.

In 1874, the American scientist F. J. Child published an article in Johnson’s Universal Encyclopedia “The Poetry of the Ballad”, where he did not use the terms “folk” and “folklore”, using others instead - “people” (people) and “popular” "(folk). With these themes he characterized folk culture as a whole. Expressing his attitude to the problem of the authorship of the ballad, he wrote that folk poetry “will always be an expression of the mind and heart of the people, as an individual, and never of the personality of an individual person” (281, p. 291).

F. J. Childe was the creator of the American school of folklore and separated his theory of folk poetry from the ideas of the German “romantic” school. In 1892, in Johnson's Universal Encyclopedia, a student of F. J. Childe, W. Nevel, developing the ideas of F. Childe, defined folklore as the formally universal customs and beliefs of an entire ethnic community, preserved through conservative and less educated classes. He noted as the main characteristics of folklore - “oral creativity”, “oral tradition”, an addition to literature.

In parallel, the term “folklore” in the science of Western countries was accompanied by other names - Poesie populaire, Traditions populaires, Tradizioni populari (folk traditions), Volkdichtung (folk poetry), Volkskunde (folk art). Only in the 20th century. the term "folklore" became commonly used. In its broad meaning, i.e. as “folk traditions”, “folk art”, it began to be used by the majority of scientists in Great Britain, France, Germany, Belgium, the USA, Latin America and other countries. In the science of the Scandinavian countries and Finland, folklore is defined as collective traditional knowledge transmitted through word and action.

In 1949-50 In the USA, the two-volume encyclopedic “Standard Dictionary of Folk Mythology and Legends” was published. It contains more than 20 articles about folklore, belonging to scientists from different countries and scientific fields, who gave different definitions of folklore and methods of its research.

The Mexican scientist M. Espinoza defines that “folklore consists of beliefs, customs, superstitions, proverbs, riddles, songs, myths, legends, tales, ritual ceremonies, magic, both of primitive and illiterate people, and of the masses of people in a civilized society... Folklore can be called a direct and true expression of the memory of primitive man" ["Standard dictionary of folklore...", p. 399].

Similar views are held by other authors in the mentioned “Dictionary”. Thus, M. Barbier includes in folklore everything that relates to “ traditional culture» - right down to culinary recipes; B. Botkin writes that “in a purely oral culture, everything is folklore” [ibid., p. 398].

In 1960, Argentine folklorist K. Vega published the work “Folkloristics. Subject and notes for its study in Argentina." K. Vega called folklore such manifestations of folk culture: myths, legends, fairy tales, fables, riddles, songs, games, rituals, beliefs; peculiarities vernacular, housing, furniture, utensils, etc.

K. Vega speaks of the presence of two different levels of culture, which correspond to the conditionally “enlightened classes” and the “people” itself. Folklore acts as a cultural “relic”, which 50-100 years ago was widespread among the “enlightened” classes, but was gradually forced out among the masses, especially rural ones, where it is preserved and continues to function (176, pp. 174-192 ).

We believe that the above-mentioned authors, firstly, take fairly broad boundaries to define folklore and connect it with folk studies; secondly, they underestimate the essence of the folklore-historical process, which ensures both the continuity of traditions and innovation, updating the system of types and genres of folklore.

In domestic science in the 18th-19th centuries. concepts such as “folk poetry” and “oral folk literature” were used. The concept of “folklore” was introduced only in the 1890s. - beginning XX century E. Anichkov, A. Veselovsky, V. Lamansky, V. Lesevich, which expanded the subject of research itself.

But even later, in Soviet folkloristics, the designation “oral folk art” was used for a long time, which limited the very subject of research. Along with the importance of the oral transmission of folklore, the collective nature of its creation (or anonymity of authorship) and variability have always been emphasized.

A common belief is that folklore is "folk art". It is possible that such an interpretation is appropriate in cases where we are talking about concert performances of folklore. But this type of “folk art” is almost always presented in the processing and arrangements of professionals, but is also “taken out” of the context of folk life.

Note that back in 1938-41. in the work “Russian Folklore” by Yu.M. Sokolov wrote about the impossibility, due to the close connection of folklore with folk culture, genetic connection with myth, etc., of its interpretation only as art and the application of the term “oral folk poetic creativity” to it (216, pp. 7-8) .

A recognized authority in world science, V.Ya. Propp called folklore verbal creativity and music and song genres. He wrote: “What is meant by folklore in Western European science? If we take the book of the German folklorist I. Meyer “Deutshe Volkskunde”, then we see the following sections there: village, buildings, courtyards, plants, customs, superstitions, language, legends, fairy tales, folk songs. This picture is typical for all Western European science. We call folklore what in the West is called folk traditions, folk poetry. And what is called folklore in the West can be called “popular scientific homeland studies” [V.Ya. Propp. "Folklore and reality", 1976, p. 17-18].

V.Ya. Propp wrote: “By folklore we mean only spiritual creativity, and even already, only verbal, poetic creativity. Since poetic creativity is almost always associated with music, we can talk about musical folklore and separate it into an independent scientific discipline" [ibid., p. 18].

The works of domestic researchers of the 20th century reflect ideas about folklore as part of traditional peasant culture, the remaining layers of culture in the peasant environment throughout subsequent periods in the history of society. (3. Chicherov V.I. Winter period Russian folk agricultural calendar of the 16th-19th centuries. Essays on the history of folk beliefs. M., 1957; Propp V.Ya. Russian agricultural holidays. M., 1963; Rozhdestvenskaya S.B. Russian folk artistic tradition in modern society. M., 1981; Nekrasova M.A. Folk art as part of culture. M., 1983; Chistov K.V. Folk traditions and folklore. Essays on theory. L., 1986. Gusev V.E. Russian folk artistic culture. (Theoretical essays). St. Petersburg, 1993, etc.).

M.S. Kagan associated folklore primarily with peasant creativity and therefore spoke about the extinction of folklore, considered it as pre-art, etc.

V.E. Gusev in the article “Folklore as an Element of Culture” and others writes that at present three main aesthetic approaches to folklore have been identified:

1 - folklore is only oral folk art,

2 - folklore is a complex of verbal, musical, dance and entertainment-game types of folk art,

3 - folklore is folk art culture in general, including fine and decorative arts.

The disadvantages of the first approach to folklore lie in the severance of multifunctional connections that actually exist in culture; its correlation only with the word, without noticing its non-verbal syncretic manifestations; studying the specifics of folklore only from the side of language, connections with literature, etc.

The second approach is based on highlighting the artistic specificity of folklore, differentiation between “fine” and “expressive” types artistic activity. In “Aesthetics of Folklore” V.E. Gusev classified folklore into epic, dramatic and lyrical types of art; verbal, musical, dance, theatrical types etc. He determined the genre specificity of folklore by artistic form, poetics, everyday use, connection with music, etc. .

In the third approach to folklore, we see the desire to unite in the concept of “folklore” all folk culture as a whole, blurring its specific and genre boundaries. Undoubtedly, folk costume (clothes, shoes, jewelry), ritual objects, musical instruments and even the manner of playing them also play a big role in folklore; folk architecture, for example, as a “visual and decorative background” against which the action takes place (Russian wedding, etc.). In this regard, we note that there is such a concept as “plastic folklore,” that is, folk decorative and visual creativity (see: 236, 237).

The essential characteristics of folklore by domestic researchers were mainly determined, first of all, by its artistic characteristics, its comparison with literature, which aimed researchers at characterizing it as a specific type of art - “folk art”. indeed, its like art. But in such an approach to folklore, it must have all the specific features of art, as well as the fullness of its characteristics as a form of social consciousness.

This leads to an underestimation of folklore, which has a specific connection with both the material, everyday, and spiritual and artistic spheres of the historical and cultural process. First of all, folklore is a folk everyday and artistic tradition with a variety of sociocultural functions. K.S. Davletov writes about the most important social function of folklore - “the function of folk history, folk philosophy, folk sociology” (65, p. 16).

Characterizing its sociocultural functions in the past, K.V. Chistov notes that folklore then satisfied not only the artistic needs of the people. “In modern language, it was an oral book, an oral journal, an oral newspaper, a form of amateur performance, and a way of consolidating and transmitting historical, legal, meteorological, medical and other knowledge” [K.V. Chistov. Folklore and modernity //S.I. Mints, E.V. Pomerantseva. Russian folkloristics. Reader. M.: High. school 1965. p. 453].

We see the reasons for the above approaches in defining folklore in the differences in methodological, ideological and professional principles of researchers.

Folklore is characterized by a complex interweaving of artistic and non-artistic principles: with some properties it enters the sphere of art, with others it leaves it. Folklore is genetically related to myth in many ways. In addition, the cognitive, aesthetic, ritual and everyday functions in it constitute one syncretic whole, enclosed in a figurative and artistic form.

It is clearly insufficient to look at folklore as merely an oral tradition. The first recorded literature was always or almost always folklore, wrote V.Ya. Propp. These are the ancient Greek “Iliad” and “Odyssey”, the Indian epics “Mahabharata” and “Ramayana”, etc. Medieval writers wrote down the ancient German epic “Song of the Nibelungs”, the ancient English “Beowulf”, Celtic folk tales about King Arthur, Icelandic sagas; the fruit of knightly creativity are the epic “Song of Cid”, “Song of Roland”, etc. With the spread of literacy, “folk” handwritten books appeared, which were distributed and revised (“The Romance of the Fox”, “The Tale of Doctor Faustus”, etc. ).

The first Russian chronicles are associated with folklore stories and legends. One can note the use of folklore symbols, images, etc. in chronicle sources. Such is the epic “The Tale of Igor’s Campaign,” discovered in a manuscript in 1792. Count Musin-Pushkin in one of the monasteries. (For Russian culture, the problem of his authorship is no less important than the famous question about the author of the Iliad and Odyssey).

The writing of medieval Rus' (“the golden age of folklore”) was represented mainly by Christian literature, and only chronicles and folklore performed secular cultural functions. The chroniclers included both historical legends and folklore, even buffoons (for example, “The Prayer of Daniel the Imprisoner”). The Moscow chronicle of Photius (15th century) included epics from the Kyiv cycle.

In Rus', popular popular prints were signed, for example, depicting the performance of buffoons: “a bear and a goat are chilling, having fun with their music,” etc. By the 17th century. include handwritten stories “The Tale of the Mountain of Misfortune”, “The Tale of Savva Grudtsyn”, “Shemyakin’s Court” and others, which did not retain the names of the authors, and are essentially handwritten folklore. In Russia, such a genre of folklore as spiritual poetry was written down, and this tradition was preserved until the 20th century. Old Believers. Thus, in addition to oral transmission, the first recordings of Russian folklore arose.

This is especially true for the content of Russian folklore of the 18th-19th centuries, for, starting from the second half of the 18th century, peasant folklore was not only recorded, but also published, thanks to which it became widespread in the urban environment. Without limiting folklore to the peasant tradition, it should be recognized that at this time the genres of urban, soldier, etc. folklore were intensively developing.

In Russian folklore, along with oral tradition, the collective nature of its creation was emphasized. However, talking about both the collective and individual nature of folklore creativity, or the lack of authorship, is a rather complex problem. “The concept of collectivity, if we take into account real facts,” writes K.S. Davletov, can only be applied to the content of folk art, to its quality, specificity, while the question inevitably arises about the dialectic of the individual and the collective, characteristic of folklore.”

Collective nature folklore creativity does not exclude the personal creativity of ancient rhapsods, bards, akyns, ashugs, storytellers, such Russian epic storytellers as T.G. Ryabinin and others. Entire families of folk storytellers were found by M.K. Azadovsky in the 20-30s. XX century in the villages of Siberia.

M.K. Azadovsky considered folklore creativity not a relic of antiquity, a tradition of the past, but as a process of living individual creativity developing within the framework of a folk collective. He noted that the literacy of storytellers is not an obstacle to the development of folklore, but, on the contrary, is a new stimulus for creativity for them: “We are breaking with impersonal ethnography and entering the circle of master artists, where the overall work is marked by the stamp of the bright individuals who create and lead it.” . Likewise K.S. Davletov writes that folklorists have established the existence of very specific authors for a number of songs, ditties, etc., “the nationality of which cannot be denied by any theoretical bias.”

The problem of collective authorship in folklore is manifested as follows. In folk art, the personal, authorial principle dissolves in the general flow of folk art, when the individual creativity of a singer, poet, etc., which is passed on as folk art to subsequent generations. The essence of the folklore creative process is that the new, most often, merges into traditional forms as processing, alteration of old material and then varied by other performers. In this way, folklore reflects the collective consciousness of the people. Collective national consciousness, as a community of “spirit” and subconscious artistic and creative impulses, prevail and therefore in the process of creativity are not divided into the personal and the general. The personality of the author, due to this, is anonymous, and his creation expresses the very “spirit of the people.”

V.Ya. Propp noted that the historical development of folklore shows that there is folklore that arose in prehistoric times in the system of some ritual and has survived in oral transmission to the present day, and has variants on an international scale, and folklore that has arisen in modern times as individual creativity , but circulating as folklore.

Of course, there is a significant difference between ritual folklore, which dates back to pagan times, and tourist songs, literally transmitted by ear. In the first case, we see the earliest genres of folklore in genesis, associated with mythological culture; in the second case, we see modern folklore of amateur poets.

There are examples of collective creativity, such as fairy tales, in which the individuality of the author is expressed in the skill of the storyteller, his ability to vary, improvise, and perhaps even present its content to listeners in a new way.

Calendar-agricultural songs of Russian folklore are an example of collective creativity, historical songs are an example of the anonymity of the author or group of authors, and lyrical songs and ditties are an example of the author’s emerging creative individuality.

Today, many popular songs among the masses, which we call and consider “folk” (folklore), can often turn out to be adaptations of the poems of one of the little-known (and even famous) authors of the 19th century, which were set to music by the people and circulated as folklore, and they are followed by being.

Genres such as art song, which clearly gravitate towards folklore, reveal their authors when searching. For example, in the 40-60s. XX century The songs “Brigantine” (the poems were written by the young poet P. Kogan, who died in the war) and “Globe” (in which only the first three stanzas belong to M. Lvovsky, the rest - by anonymous authors) spread among students. The music for these songs was composed by amateur musician G. Lepsky. These songs were closely associated with self-awareness and, of course, became folklore of the 20th century. They are not forgotten even today. (“When the soul sings.” The most popular songs of the twentieth century. Compiled by Yu.G. Ivanov. Smolensk, 2004).

The very idea of ​​the descent into folklore of “higher” cultural layers is not new. At one time, the idea of ​​Vs. was criticized in Russian folkloristics. Miller about the creation of epics by princely druzhina singers and supporting this idea in the 20-30s. XX century V.A. Keltuyalu. However, this process still takes place in folklore, both European and domestic. P.G. also paid great attention to this circumstance. Bogatyrev in the article “Folklore as a special form of creativity” (27, pp. 369-383). We would call this cultural process “folklorization” of everyday cultural material, as V.Ya. also wrote about. Propp.

One of the specific features of folklore is its connection with everyday culture and national professional art.

The problem of traditions in the folklore process and innovation in folklore means that an unambiguous solution to this issue is impossible.

As we see, the problem of the specificity of the “orality” of folklore, as well as the “collectivity” of creativity, has a close connection with both the problem of authorship and the problem of “folklorization” of literary and other sources. Literary works can also be included in the sphere of folklore circulation. For example, children can tell and “act out” the fairy tale “Cinderella” by C. Perrault, which the children read, and perhaps saw in the movies. The authorship of N.A.’s poems has almost been lost. Nekrasov, on which the people composed the song “Korobochka”, etc. But as soon as such fairy tales, songs, etc., begin to change among the people, are performed differently, variants are created, they already become folklore if they are fixed in folk practice. A characteristic feature of Russian folklore in the 20th century. became the “folklorization” of mass choral songs (M. Zakharov, I. Dunaevsky, B. Mokrousov, M. Blanter, etc.), which were sung by the whole people.

It is obvious that Russian historical songs, based on factual material and having many specific historical names (including Pugachev, Suvorov, Ataman Platov and many others), initially had their own authors. It is possible that when composing a song, these authors wrote down their lyrics. But later, as a result of oral transmission, acquiring changes and variations, such a song became folklore. However, the self-awareness of the authors of these songs is characterized by the use of the plural - “we will stand up”, “we will win”, etc., and in relation to a historical figure - “he said”, etc. Collectivity is reflected in the very nature of the consciousness of folk authors .

So, the problem of the collectivity of creativity in folklore should be considered not so much as a problem of personal authorship, but as a problem of the collectivity of national consciousness. The collective nature of consciousness in folklore in no way excludes the presence of personal creativity of individual storytellers and singers; on the contrary, it presupposes it. Ancient legends speak of the creative power of Orpheus, Ossian, Boyan and other singer-poets.

At the same time, creative power folklore lies precisely in its collectivity. For example, unlike any theatrical performance, where on the one hand there is the author of the text, actors - performers, etc., and on the other - the audience, in such a folklore act as a traditional wedding ceremony, such a division does not and cannot have such differentiation . Despite the obvious distribution of social and everyday roles of the groom, the bride, matchmakers, groomsmen, numerous relatives, as well as the villagers present, they are not spectators, but participants in one traditional folk ritual. There, songs, dances, etc. are usually performed on a massive scale.

The French scientist Arnold van Genner noted that folklore is a universal object with a specific element, which lies in the definition of “folk” (Le folrlore. Paris, 1924, p. 21). The national image of the world reflects the national mentality, which is the result of the heredity of an ethnic group (genetic inclinations in the psyche) and the development of culture (established folk traditions, customs, preferential choice of a particular religion), which include historical experience ethnic group, formed in the process of its long formation.

We do not deny the role of the development of social relations, material factors in the formation of the social psychology of the masses, the emergence of differentiated forms of social consciousness as culture develops, because even in relation to “archetypes” and “symbols” that lie as the “collective unconscious” at the very foundation of culture, K. Jung believed that “only social experience reveals them, makes them visible” (270, p.92).

K. Jung spoke about “archetypes” and “symbols” that give rise to myth, as a single psychobiological foundation that arose at the dawn human history. The origin of such genres of folklore as fairy tales, folk rituals and some other genres goes back to the problems of myth, magic and the preservation of the rudiments of mythological consciousness in folklore, paganism, which determine the design features of these folklore forms.

We note a long period of cultural development, and a significant difference in the manifestations of the national character of culture, noted already by ancient thinkers. Given the similarity of myths among many peoples of the world (in particular, among the Indo-European peoples), we note that the most characteristic manifestation of the national principle in folklore is music, songs, dances, etc., since each ethnic group differs only in its one inherent combination of temperament, such as thinking and worldview.

It seems to us that the entire people, in the totality of their classes, estates, etc., are the bearer and custodian of their language, their folklore and original artistic culture, for only in the “ethnic field” does a constant process of folklore artistic creativity take place, which is preserved in the historical memory of the people as having the specific features of its language, which differs from the folklore language of other peoples.

At the same time, musical and other non-verbal components of folklore do not remain historically unchanged. Over several centuries, the black population of America has so transformed and synthesized both European and African elements in music, singing, and dance that this folklore began to be perceived as nationally significant for each of the peoples of the countries of America where they live.

V.Ya. Propp genetically brings folklore closer not to literature, but to language, “which was also not invented by anyone” and has no authors. It arises and changes completely naturally and independently of the will of people, wherever appropriate conditions have been created for this in the historical development of peoples” (186, p. 22). We can talk about the metaphorical nature, artistic imagery of folklore language (A.N. Afanasyev, A.N. Veselovsky, etc.), the specificity of the reflection of folklore and fairy-tale time and space in the language (D.S. Likhachev).

It should be noted that the artistic language of folklore in many cases, to one degree or another, is syncretic and has not only a verbal (verbal), but also a non-verbal sphere of its “I”, which reflects the specificity folk spirit within the boundaries of artistic reflection of the world.

The concept of “language” cannot in any way be reduced only to the oral and written speech of a person, to the word. It includes other various methods and forms of receiving, recording and transmitting non-verbal information (for example, the languages ​​of music, dance, facial expressions, gestures, colors, etc. in folklore), as well as the human ability to reproduce it. In the language of folklore, we note both the verbal sphere (word) and non-verbal (music, dance, game, ritual, folk holiday, etc.). A particularly striking ethnic dominant in folklore is its non-verbal language sphere, which reflects the characteristics of national temperament, etc., as a result of the subconscious-sensory exploration of the world. There is even a sensory-unconscious feeling of the Motherland, and a person’s stay in a foreign land causes “nostalgia”, including due to the absence of the usual sound of folk music, songs, dances, etc.

E. Sapir and B. Whorf, who put forward the hypothesis of linguistic relativity, spoke about the conditioning of perception and thinking by the specific structuralization of language (107, p. 163). They believe that language skills and norms of the unconscious determine the images (pictures) of the world inherent in speakers of a particular language. The further the languages ​​are separated from each other, the greater the difference between these images. The grammatical structure of a language imposes a way of dividing speech and describing the surrounding reality. The role of language here is formative. The absence in the language of words to express a number of concepts does not mean the impossibility of their presence in consciousness. G.D. also writes about national images of the world. Gachev (42).

Thus, in the communicative and information sphere of folklore, ethnic features manifest themselves in a noticeable and recognizable shell, and one can note not only the verbal side of folklore, but also the specificity of the non-verbal. Therefore, it is impossible to translate folk dance and music into “another” language (they can only be reproduced, stylized), just as the translation of the verbal text of a folk song into another language, which will change its national specificity, will be inadequate.

In connection with the above, the interpretation of folklore as oral folk art, given the syncretism of artistic elements and everyday functions of folklore, seems to us illegitimate. In folklore, the word appears in synthesis with other elements; the word itself is poetic-rhythmic, musical-intonation, even if it is a narrative (epic recitative, fairy tale, etc.). In historical, drawn-out, lyrical Russian folk songs, the word is combined with a musical melody, a clear rhythm, and often instrumental accompaniment. In fast and dance songs, ditties, the word is even more connected with motor rhythm, movement, dancing, and active facial expressions. The artistic syncretism of folklore is also present in the ornamentation of folk clothing, the symbolism of the color scheme, and in jewelry that is associated with traditional national psychological attitudes. At the same time, syncretism should not be considered a specific feature of the artistic sphere of folklore, the combination of verbality and nonverbality of its language. The syncretism of folklore should be understood in a special “totality” of folklore phenomena with folk traditions, holidays, and rituals, in which it manifests itself fully as a cultural and aesthetic phenomenon. However, in a folk holiday, the folklore “aimed” word is the leading component of the action. This is both a proverb and a saying spoken in time. The word is also organically combined with music in song genres, ditties, which are certainly associated with dance, and in game genres. In addition to words, expressive facial expressions and a successful gesture are just as important as adherence to traditions.

For folklorists of the 19th and early 20th centuries, as mentioned above, it is typical to contrast a certain “pure” peasant folklore, patriarchal folk culture with the “pernicious and corrupting” urban influence of folklore. They sought to record such disappearing genres as epics and ritual folklore. They considered the folk theater "Petrushki", folk booths, bourgeois ballads, everyday, gypsy and "cruel" romances, ditties to be phenomena of the "degeneration" of folklore. Recognizing the aesthetic value of only peasant traditional folklore, folklorists declared historically inevitable connections with urban creativity and literature “destructive” for it. However, the people loved both the booths and the puppeteers’ nursery rhymes, as the return of the “buffoonery”.

Folklore, despite long-term contacts with literature and other types of art, exists as a type of mass creativity quite independently, forming through its specificity, reflecting through the characteristics of folk psychology the “core” of artistic forms and traditions, which also constitutes its specificity, distinguishing it from other forms of social consciousness, including art. Let us note that the development of folklore artistic consciousness reproduces not only the previous forms and genres of folklore, closely associated with folk life, but it also gives rise to new creativity as a reflection of changing forms of worldview.

Currently, there are several forms of existence of folklore. There is a living form, and there is a historical form of its existence (what functioned traditionally in the recent past) and remains for us in the form recorded by folklorists - records, books, notes, objects of material and artistic culture. There is also such a form of today’s functioning of folklore as reproduction, which has passed into concert halls, processed by professionals, including in folk choirs, etc.

Less noticeable is the study of folklore of the 20th century itself: the development of amateur creativity of the masses - amateur poetry and song (for example, student, army folklore), new ditties, amateur laughter festivals, for example, humorins, KVN, April 1 holiday, etc., anecdotes, fables - about poltergeists, drummers, folklorization of bard and mass songs, tourist songs, historical legends-memories of the heroes of the Civil and Great Patriotic War, etc. Obviously, in this case it should be said about a certain time distance necessary for so that this or that new genre, the plot of folklore, enters organically into the people's consciousness as blood-related, and is artistically polished among the masses.

Folklore exists as an unshakable foundation of the people's mentality, a collective cultural and aesthetic experience, which is characterized by a special, sensory knowledge of the surrounding world and nature. The artistic specificity of folklore allows us to consider it in the context of key categories of folk ethics and aesthetics.

All of the above allows us to draw the following preliminary conclusions about the phenomenon that we see behind the concept of “folklore”:

Folklore is a manifestation of everyday artistic consciousness and is characterized by the following level features: syncretism (connection with other forms of social consciousness - myth, religion, art, etc.), active and practical nature, close connection with collective social psychology, widespread mass existence, traditionality of basic images and forms.

In this regard, it is necessary to see, first of all, the national originality of folk art consciousness as a whole, which distinguishes it from other forms of social consciousness, including from art as a specialized professional, supranational, “reference” form of social consciousness. If in art the forms of artistic expression (creating and reading a text) are secondary and subordinate to aesthetic comprehension, then in folklore these two sides are more equivalent, and inversion in their semantic interaction is possible.

The main features of the difference between folklore and art as a form of everyday consciousness are the ethnic origin, its qualitatively higher level of artistic and everyday syncretism, etc. In folklore, an aesthetic rethinking of many aspects of everyday consciousness and life is carried out, all of them are presented in the form of a traditional specific folklore text. In part, this circumstance makes folklore similar to ritual-ritual, syncretic forms of magic and myth. Speaking about folklore consciousness, it is important to emphasize the special, transformative, formative role of the aesthetic function.

The specificity of folklore consciousness is determined by the laws of the everyday level of social consciousness. The identification of folklore artistic consciousness as a special form of social consciousness is possible only in connection with the recognition of ordinary consciousness the multiplicity of its sides.

The question of the undifferentiation of folklore as a form of social consciousness should be reconsidered in connection with historical development society, the emergence of class states, etc., therefore, the development of differentiated levels and forms of social consciousness among which it exists. Folklore actually emerged in a clan-patriarchal society (as evidenced by the creation of myths, fairy tales, heroic-epic genres, etc.), gradually differentiated from myth, and then from other forms of social consciousness, maintaining connections with them. It continues to develop and exist in new sociocultural conditions (for example, antiquity, the Middle Ages, modern times and the present day).

Speaking about the specifics of folklore, it is worth dwelling on such a feature of it as social consciousness, in which collective consciousness prevails over the personal and individual. This allows us to include in the methodological aspect of the study such a phenomenon of social psychology as collective consciousness.

The essence of folklore can be considered not only as a social phenomenon (public consciousness), but also through knowledge of the individual human psyche, in which there is a layer of the subconscious and the “collective unconscious”. This may explain his genetic connection with myth and some unconscious impulses in folklore activity.

It seems to us that folklore consciousness is a broader phenomenon than folklore itself (with its system of types and genres). Folklore consciousness as artistic consciousness manifests itself in all other forms of folk art: arts and crafts, folk crafts, folk architecture, etc.

Folklore is not only “cultural texts” (forms, genres), but also a way of creative folk activity for their creation, existence (traditions, rituals, etc.), mechanisms for their transmission from generation to generation (peculiar singing “schools” , craft cooperatives, etc.). Folklore should be considered in the context of folk culture as an integral system, comprehended and regulated by folklore artistic consciousness as a whole.

Folklore in the “broad” sense is all folk traditional peasant spiritual and partly material culture. In the “narrow” sense - oral peasant verbal artistic tradition, “oral literature”, “oral folk literature”. Folklore has specific features, which fiction does not have - the art of words.

The international term "folklore" appeared in England in the mid-19th century. It comes from English. folk-lore ("folk knowledge", " folk wisdom") and denotes folk spiritual culture in various volumes of its types.

a) folklore - orally transmitted common experience and knowledge. This refers to all forms of spiritual culture, and with the most expanded interpretation, also some forms of material culture. Only a sociological limitation (“common people”) and a historical and cultural criterion are introduced - archaic forms that dominate or function as relics. (The word “common people” is more definite than “folk” in sociologically and does not contain an evaluative meaning (“ National artist""national poet");

b) folklore - common people artistic creativity or more modern definition « artistic communication" This concept allows us to extend the use of the term “folklore” to the sphere of musical, choreographic, visual, etc. folk art;

c) folklore - a common folk verbal tradition. At the same time, from all forms of common people’s activity, those associated with the word stand out;

d) folklore - oral tradition. In this case, orality is given paramount importance. This makes it possible to distinguish folklore from other verbal forms (first of all, to contrast it with literature).

That is, we have the following concepts: sociological (and historical-cultural), aesthetic, philological and theoretical-communicative (oral direct communication). In the first two cases, this is a “broad” use of the term “folklore” and in the last two – two variants of its “narrow” use.

The unequal use of the term “folklore” by supporters of each of the concepts indicates the complexity of the subject of folklore studies, its connections with various types of human activity and human life. Depending on which particular connections are given particular importance and which are considered secondary peripheral, the fate of the main term of folkloristics within the framework of a particular concept is formed. Therefore, in a certain sense, these concepts not only intersect, but sometimes do not seem to contradict each other.

Thus, if the most important features of folklore are verbality and orality, then this does not necessarily entail a denial of connections with others. artistic forms activities, or even more so, a reluctance to take into account the fact that folklore has always existed in the context of folk everyday culture. That is why the dispute that flared up more than once was so meaningless - is folkloristics a philological or ethnographic science. If we are talking about verbal structures, then their study must inevitably be called philological, but since these structures function in folk life, they are studied by ethnography.

In this sense, folkloristics is at the same time component of both sciences at every moment of its existence. However, this does not prevent it from being independent in a certain respect - the specificity of the research methods of folkloristics inevitably develops at the intersection of these two sciences as well as musicology (ethnomusicology), social psychology and so on. It is characteristic that after debates about the nature of folklore (and not only in our country), folklore studies became noticeably philologized and, at the same time, ethnographicized and moved closer to musicology and the general theory of culture (works of E.S. Markaryan, M.S. Kagan, theory of ethnos Yu.V. Bromley, semiotics of culture, etc.).

So, folklore is the subject of study of various sciences. Folk music is studied by musicologists, folk dances by choreographers, rituals and other spectacular forms of folk art by theater scholars, folk arts and crafts by art historians. Linguists, historians, psychologists, sociologists and other scientists turn to folklore. Each science sees in folklore what interests it.

Folklore - the art of words, a set of oral works of art of different genres created by many generations of people; traditional everyday artistic creativity for the people and its result, reflecting the self-awareness of the people, formed as a result of centuries of history and manifested in oral form and in a large number of variants of works.

Let's imagine the general evolution of folklore from ancient times to the present day.

About availability primitive forms of folklore among our distant ancestors is evidenced by many data. Already during the formation of the Eastern Slavic tribes, peculiar games and rituals were common, which were accompanied by round dances, singing, playing the simplest musical instruments, dancing, games, a complex of ritual actions.

Household and labor items and simple artistic instruments found today by historians and ethnographers give grounds to speak about fairly developed forms of folklore (in the current understanding) of human practice on the territory of pre-Christian and early Christian Rus'. This can probably be described as forms early traditional folklore One of the first documents of Ancient Rus' - “The Tale of Bygone Years” says that “games were organized between villages, and they gathered at these games, dances and all sorts of demonic songs, and here they kidnapped their wives in agreement with them.”

This document reflects its time - the time of early Christianity - and bears its signs. In particular, it evaluates folklore as a demonic activity bearing pagan influence. It is important to note something else: the development, social organization and practical meaning of such games, which could not appear overnight, and therefore had a long prehistory.

The Christianization of Rus' is far from an unambiguous phenomenon for folk culture, which was rooted in paganism and retained its powerful influence, gradually being included in a new religious and spiritual system. Pagan roots are the first and main sign in the development of early traditional folklore. Folk tales, round dances and songs, epics and thoughts, colorful and deeply meaningful wedding rituals, folk embroidery, artistic wood carvings - all this can be historically meaningful only taking into account the ancient pagan worldview.

Paganism determined the special flavor of Slavic folklore. Pagan romance gave a special colorfulness to Russian folk culture. All heroic fairy tales turn out to be fragments of ancient Slavic myths and heroic epics. The ornamentation of peasant architecture, utensils and clothing is associated with paganism. Complex, multi-day wedding rituals are imbued with pagan motifs. A significant part song repertoire imbued with a pagan worldview. A living, unfading form of ritual dance, accompanied by music and singing, is colorful village round dances.

The main pagan rituals, holidays and songs are associated mainly with agriculture. The folk calendar, which we are trying to revive today and adapt to new conditions, is an agricultural calendar, which means that all ritual folklore bears features of a pagan character.

One cannot ignore or underestimate the fact that early traditional folklore, which dates back to pagan times, was subject to constant pressure from Christian ideology, the spokesman of which was the church. This was most clearly manifested in the fight against buffoonery, some rituals and customs, and musical instruments in Rus' in the 15th-17th centuries.

We can say with a certain degree of convention that folk musical instruments, singing, elements of dramatic play and dance were widespread in all groups of the population, as well as applied creativity and crafts (in the current sense). Everyday life, life, and work practice were permeated with myths, rites, rituals, and celebrations.

At the initial stages of culture, folklore in its diverse forms and manifestations captured a vast sphere of life, and its specific gravity in the artistic culture of the Middle Ages was more significant than in the art system of modern times. Folklore filled the vacuum created by the absence of written forms of secular musical creativity. Folk song, the art of folk "players" - performers on musical instruments - were widespread not only among the lower working classes, but also among the upper strata of society, right up to the princely court.

Until the era of Peter I, folklore remained dominant artistic system in Rus'.

At the same time, it is necessary to note another important pattern - the gradual expansion of the layer of peasant folklore due to the growth of the mass of the peasantry.

Folklore has a specific historical coloring and a specific historical meaning: sacred, ritual, aesthetic, pragmatic. Within the boundaries of historical eras, various folklore waves arose, associated with specific historical events. Moreover, each folklore genre has its own patterns of emergence, flourishing, decay, and inclusion in culture. Its development does not coincide in its time frame with the boundaries of the phenomenon that caused it. Historical songs, legends about the Pugachev or Razin uprisings were born by them, but remained in culture even after their suppression.

Over a long historical period, peasant folklore remained the most powerful and holistic ideological and cultural system. The traditional centuries-old culture of the Russian village is not only a source of information about its roots that interests us. At the same time, she is the roots on which the mass of the working peasantry stood for a thousand years, the roots that fed not only the village, but also the urban settlement.

Due to the peculiarities of the social development of Russia, which entered the capitalist path of development only in the second half XIX century., peasant folklore remained the dominant form of folk art until the beginning XX V. At the same time, we should talk about the emergence of new ones, and the attenuation and disappearance of previous genres of folklore. Behind these changes are objective historical prerequisites that ensure the adequacy of folk art to the fundamental requirements that were associated with the social, economic, and political situation in Russia.

Under the influence of powerful social factors, starting from the second half of the 19th century. Peasant folklore is undergoing a transformation and is moving to the periphery of artistic culture. This could not but radically affect the nature of his existence, development, and inclusion in the general context of life.

The emergence and development of other social groups, each of which developed its own specific forms folklore creativity (today we talk about folklore of students, intelligentsia, bourgeois, workers), led to its complication and differentiation.

The folklore of a certain group performs specific functions in relation to this group and has its own tasks, features and characteristics. Folklore, transferred from the peasant environment to the princely court or adopted by the working environment, becomes a different phenomenon, from an aesthetic point of view, because it begins to fulfill a different role. The creativity of different groups naturally comes into contact, and border borrowings arise. However, the specificity of each of the flows is always expressed quite clearly, even in the case of deep transformations. This applies to all genres and types of folklore of peasants, intelligentsia, workers, etc. without exception.

With the complication of the forms of social and spiritual life of society, folklore forms of peasant creativity were perceived and actively developed by representatives of the newly emerging classes and groups. The formation of the working class in Russia in the middle of the 19th century, its entry into the historical arena, its increase in numbers, and the growth of political consciousness - all this was accompanied by the formation of a specific ethno-folklore environment. Forms of artistic creativity that corresponded to the spirit and tasks of the proletariat appeared, called workers' folklore.

We can talk about the existence in Russia XIX V. folk culture of landowners and noble estates, the Russian intelligentsia, which has declared itself loudly since early XIX c., and then students, workers and the city as a whole. Despite certain differences in forms of creativity, genre composition, and artistic imagery, the folklore of all social groups had a lot in common. Only over time, gradually, did each social group develop its own features in the folklore.

Since the end of the 19th century. folklore, under the influence of objective geopolitical and economic processes taking place in the country, experienced increasing pressure from other layers of culture, and lost its most stable peasant origins. Mass de-peasantization, the destruction of the natural way of life of the peasantry, accompanied by the physical destruction of a significant part of it, led to the global destruction of the peasant layer of culture. Its erosion, which has been observed for more than half a century, has turned into an irreversible process.

The inculcation in the mass consciousness of the ideology of intolerance towards traditions and folklore culture led to the fact that they were actually driven out of life, allegedly because of their patriarchy and non-modernity. Folklore fell out of the field of attention of the powerful and extensive system of state and public assistance to folk art. All pre-revolutionary mass publications on traditional culture and folklore were closed and repurposed (for example, the magazine “Living Antiquity”, etc.). The practice was focused on the creation of folklore forms of amateur performances. This approach was dominant and defining. Some experts provided a “scientific” basis for the process of dying out of folklore and considered it necessary to pay increased attention to the creation of “novins”—Soviet folklore.

The idea of ​​using folklore opportunities to praise the victories and achievements of socialism, the personalities of Lenin and Stalin, and other leaders of the state has spread in folk art.

Meanwhile, the participants scientific expeditions noted the presence of strong foundations for the development and existence of folklore. The village remained largely archaic. Previous traditions and customs were maintained by the artificial “freezing” of the village (its residents could not change their place of residence without special permission until the 60s). Many rituals remained in active use - weddings, christenings, funerals, folk singing, playing the harmonica, balalaika. There were still alive truly outstanding folk performers, whose skill, knowledge of folklore, and ability to create it developed at a time when traditions were actively in existence. They formed a folklore environment around themselves. In general, the intra-village way of life retained the features of the pre-revolutionary one. New phenomena did not lead to fundamental changes in the cultural way of life.

Folklore in the pre-war decades had not yet been destroyed as an integral aesthetic phenomenon. In its depths, the most complex events took place, often latently. evolutionary processes, affecting primarily the qualitative aspects of its future existence.

The pace of destruction of the cultural and everyday way of life accelerated significantly after collectivization, and then during the Great Patriotic War. If collectivization marked the beginning of this process, then the war, having displaced hundreds of millions of people from their original places of residence, destroyed the folklore environment essentially throughout the entire European part of the USSR.

Folklore of the second half of the 40s - early 70s is folklore that exists, as it were, outside the socio-spiritual framework that has developed in society. Not only did he not fit into them, but he was also artificially taken outside the framework artistic life masses. A situation arose when, despite the fact that the folklore tradition remained life-giving and retained its vibrant forms, it did not receive proper support and found itself suppressed and opposed to amateur artistic activity. Neglect of folklore traditions took sharp forms of rejection of traditional forms of folk life.

Inculcation among the masses, both in the city and in the countryside, of the values ​​of pseudo-folk culture or culture that is not perceived by them (in particular, opera, symphonic music, visual arts, classical ballet etc.), led to the erosion of accessible, traditional culture close to the people. The goal of introducing everyone to the heights of musical, choreographic, dramatic, and visual arts came into conflict with the needs of the vast majority of the population, which could not for the most part perceive these values.

Today, folklore is actively collected and studied by researchers, as modern society has come to understand its value and enormous educational significance.

Folk verbal creativity was kept in the memory of people; in the process of communication, works passed from one to another and were not written down. For this reason, folklorists must engage in so-called “field work” - go on folklore expeditions to identify performers and record folklore from them. Recorded texts of oral folk works (as well as photographs, tape recordings, diary notes of collectors, etc.) are stored in folklore archives. Archival materials can be published, for example, in the form of folklore collections.

Folklore has its own artistic laws. The oral form of creation, distribution and existence of works is that main feature, which gives rise to the SPECIFICITY of folklore, causes its difference from literature.

1. Traditionality.

Folklore is mass creativity. Works of literature have an author, works of folklore are anonymous, their author is the people. In literature there are writers and readers, in folklore there are performers and listeners.

Oral works were created according to already known models, and even included direct borrowings. The speech style used constant epithets, symbols, comparisons and other traditional poetic devices. Works with a plot were characterized by a set of typical narrative elements and their usual compositional combination. In images folklore characters the typical also prevailed over the individual. Tradition required the ideological orientation of the works: they taught goodness and contained the rules of human behavior in life.

Storytellers (performers of fairy tales), singers (performers of songs), storytellers (performers of epics), voplenits (performers of lamentations) sought, first of all, to convey to the listeners what was in accordance with tradition. The repeatability of the oral text allowed for its changes, and this allowed an individual talented individual to express himself. A multiple creative act took place, co-creation, in which any representative of the people could be a participant.

The oral artistic tradition was the common fund. Each person could select for himself what he needed.

Not everything newly created was preserved in oral history. Repeatedly repeated fairy tales, songs, epics, proverbs and other works passed “from mouth to mouth, from generation to generation.” On this path, they lost what bore the stamp of individuality, but at the same time they identified and deepened what could satisfy everyone. The new was born only on a traditional basis, and it had to not just copy tradition, but complement it.

In folklore it constantly flowed creative process, who supported and developed the artistic tradition.

2. Syncretism.

The artistic principle did not immediately win in folklore. In ancient society, the word merged with the beliefs and everyday needs of people, and its poetic meaning, if it existed, was not realized.

Residual forms of this state were preserved in rituals, conspiracies and other genres of late folklore. For example, a round dance game is a complex of several artistic components: words, music, facial expressions, gesture, dance. All of them can only exist together, as elements of a whole - a round dance. This property is usually denoted by the word “syncretism” (from the Greek synkretismos - “connection”).

Over time, syncretism has historically faded away. Different types the arts overcame the state of primitive indivisibility and stood out on their own. Their later connections—synthesis—began to appear in folklore.

3. Variability.

The oral form of assimilation and transmission of works made them open to change. There were no two completely identical performances of the same work, even in the case when there was only one performer. Oral works had a mobile, variant nature.

Variant (from Latin variants - “changing”) - each single performance of a folklore work, as well as its fixed text.

Because the folklore work existed in the form of multiple performances, it existed in the totality of its variants. Each version was different from others told or sung in different time, in different places, in different environments, by different performers or by one (again).

Oral folk tradition sought to preserve and protect from oblivion what was most valuable. Tradition kept changes to the text within its boundaries. For variants of a folklore work, what is important is what is common and repeated, and what is secondary is how they differ from one another.

4. Improvisation.

The variability of folklore could practically be achieved through improvisation.

Improvisation (from the Latin improviso - “unforeseen, suddenly”) - the creation of the text of a folklore work, or its individual parts, in the process of execution.

Between acts of performance, the folklore work was stored in memory. As it was voiced, the text seemed to be born anew each time. The performer improvised. He relied on knowledge of the poetic language of folklore, selected ready-made artistic components, and created their combinations. Without improvisation, the use of speech “blanks” and the use of oral-poetic techniques would be impossible.

Improvisation did not contradict tradition; on the contrary, it existed precisely because there were certain rules, an artistic canon.

An oral work was subject to the laws of its genre. The genre allowed for one or another mobility of the text and set the boundaries of fluctuation.

In different genres, improvisation manifested itself with greater or lesser force. There are genres focused on improvisation (lamentations, lullabies), and even those whose texts were one-time (fair cries of traders). In contrast, there are genres designed for precise memorization, therefore, as if they did not allow improvisation (for example, conspiracies).

Improvisation carried a creative impulse and generated novelty. It expressed the dynamics of the folklore process.