The Powers of Genre: Interpreting Haya Oral Literature
The Powers of Genre describes a method for interpreting oral literature that depends upon and facilitates dialogue between insiders and outsiders to a tradition. Seitel illustrates this method with lively examples from Haya proverbs, folktales, and heroic verse. He then focuses on a single epic ballad to demonstrate, among other things, why stanzas need not rhyme, and how significance needs time in oral poetry and narrative. Making a controversial claim that an heroic age, similar to that of Ancient Greece, existed in Sub-Saharan Africa, this work will intrigue anyone who works in oral literature and narrative.
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The Powers of Genre: Interpreting Haya Oral Literature
The Powers of Genre describes a method for interpreting oral literature that depends upon and facilitates dialogue between insiders and outsiders to a tradition. Seitel illustrates this method with lively examples from Haya proverbs, folktales, and heroic verse. He then focuses on a single epic ballad to demonstrate, among other things, why stanzas need not rhyme, and how significance needs time in oral poetry and narrative. Making a controversial claim that an heroic age, similar to that of Ancient Greece, existed in Sub-Saharan Africa, this work will intrigue anyone who works in oral literature and narrative.
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The Powers of Genre: Interpreting Haya Oral Literature

The Powers of Genre: Interpreting Haya Oral Literature

by Peter Seitel
The Powers of Genre: Interpreting Haya Oral Literature

The Powers of Genre: Interpreting Haya Oral Literature

by Peter Seitel

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Overview

The Powers of Genre describes a method for interpreting oral literature that depends upon and facilitates dialogue between insiders and outsiders to a tradition. Seitel illustrates this method with lively examples from Haya proverbs, folktales, and heroic verse. He then focuses on a single epic ballad to demonstrate, among other things, why stanzas need not rhyme, and how significance needs time in oral poetry and narrative. Making a controversial claim that an heroic age, similar to that of Ancient Greece, existed in Sub-Saharan Africa, this work will intrigue anyone who works in oral literature and narrative.

Product Details

ISBN-13: 9780195117004
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Publication date: 03/25/1999
Series: Oxford Studies in Anthropological Linguistics , #22
Edition description: New Edition
Pages: 264
Product dimensions: 8.84(w) x 6.82(h) x 0.86(d)
Lexile: 1280L (what's this?)

About the Author

Smithsonian Institution

Table of Contents

1Introduction3
Part IStyle, Theme, and Composition in Genre
2The Logic of Proverbs35
3Emergent Complexities and Complex Emergencies in Folktales49
4Heroic Society in Interlacustrine Africa83
Part IIA Genre-Powered Reading of Kachwenyanja
5Stanzas Need No Rhyme177
6Significance Needs Time196
7Summary and Conclusion222
Appendix A227
Appendix B233
References237
Index241
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