When ethnographers collect poetry in the course of a fieldwork project, they are often looking for something in addition to a recitation of an entertaining poem. Poetry, like songs or stories, can tell us something about the culture in which it is found, the local ideas about what makes a good poem, information about languages …
A recent blog post at Londonist describes “Five London Nursery Rhymes Depicting Death and Ruin.” The rhymes in question have diverse origins and histories, but what seems incontrovertible from James FitzGerald’s work is that they describe dark and portentous matters from English history. Or do they? Looking closely at these rhymes, and at scholarship …
Last month, there were several sightings of a fox on and around the grounds of the Capitol complex, where the Library of Congress is located. Also, sadly, the wonderful American folksinger Pete Seeger died, and I wrote about him for this blog. These two events both made me think of the old folksong often just …
