Folklore 5.1

"English Riddles from Oral Tradition" (1951)
-One of the leading scholars of proverbs
-Concerns with texts and a little bit with texture
-Largely worked with collection of text riddles.

the expectation of the audience and the performer is different depending on genres.

"Children's Riddling" (1979)
-Classical collection about text and context
-Child of "Ethnography of Speaking" because Bauman was his teacher.
-Thesis (his first work)

"The Language of riddles: New Perspectives" (1984).
-Looked at a linguistic perspective of ridding.

-Short fixed-phrase text example of folklore.
-Implied question-and-answer structure
-Solution reachable through information contained in the question.
-What riddle refers to is in doubt.
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-A slot within a interactional context or performance context .
-we don't always have interactional context these days due to the increase in internet-interaction, a different kind of interaction.

-Interaction: power in the riddler over the riddlee, vice versa.

During riddling interaction, the power dynamic is as such: riddler has power over the riddlee, and the riddlee may have power over the riddler.
-Competency is important in power dynamics: competency in performer and the audience.

Competency is in question;
-who has the upper hand in the battle of wit--the riddler or the riddlee?
-The riddle is not always professional, meaning that the answer may not be contained within the question posed --> Joking riddles
-So the question is, whether or not the riddlee would be able to guess the answer to the riddle posed.
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The performer (riddler) has more power over the riddlee.
-Riddler is able to fool the riddlee to reverse things interactionally: making the respondent think of something entirely different from what the answer is. Misleading.

All the information needed to answer the riddle is provided in the riddle.
-The respondent has more chance of answering correctly.
-As opposed to joking riddle

1) Riddle act initiation "I got a riddle for you"
2) Riddler's statement: the riddle itself.
3) Riddlee's initial response: first shot correct or not?
4) riddler-riddlee's interaction during contemplation period: "guessing period" throwing back and forth guesses on what the answer could be. Not rigid. Quite a lot of interaction going on.
5) Riddle answer sequence

-Power in the interaction: usually reverse of power from the riddler to the riddlee
-Collective activity: performance and interactive
-Interactional contemplation, again about collective participation.

-Banter

-True riddles
-Reverse riddles or joking riddle/questions

-Opposition: between the human and vegetable. Comparing 2 things that are totally different but yet have something in common.
-Incomplete detail: "a house full, a yard full, couldn't catch a bowl full" --Smoke
-Excessive detail: misleading to think about all the aspects of the looonnng riddle when the answer is simple. "What do folks call little gray cats back in tennessee? "Kittens"
-False Gestalt: give you a sort of a overall picture that seems to lead you to a specific direction to the answer...but it's wrong. False obscene riddle that leas you to think about obscene answers, but that answer is wrong--> reveals the psyche of the riddlee. "What does in hard and comes out soft and pink?" "Gum"

-Special knowledge riddles
-Catch riddles or "catches" (setting up expectation and shot it down)
-Dialogue riddles
-Paradoxes = puzzles. (question-answer format)
-Neck Riddles: used to save one's life.
-Joking Riddles: popular with children; knowledge secret from the adults. "elephant joke"

-"A mixed genre" (riddle, tale, and narrative combined)
-Features of the text, texture, and implied context seeped into the narrative.
-The entire narrative is constructed around the telling of the riddle.

-Doubling of texts, textures, and contexts--this interaction within interaction heightens attention to power in interactional settings.
-heighten communicative device

1) following the tale
2) answering the riddle