Folkloristics and Cultural Geography - Estonian Roots: Centre of Excellence

Folklore accumulates and constantly reinterprets knowledge, values, attitudes, and experiences from different times and origins. The research group is focused on the study of areal and diachronic variation of folkloric phenomena in different genres, and the transmission processes of folklore relying mostly on the voluminous data collections of the Estonian Folklore Archives. The analysis of large data allows the researchers to trace the historical communication pathways and structures, as well as the reflections of various cultural contacts in the material. One main focus of the research group is the Finnic poetic-musical tradition runosong, which is considered to have emerged before the final divergence of Finnic peoples and developed along with language and population. Due to the complex poetic system the texts have resisted quick changes, while conserving archaic language forms, poetic figures, and content elements. 

The other part of the work group focuses on the study of narrative folklore and beliefs which are more flexible and also cross language barriers more easily. The place-lore collections and methodology of collecting place-lore are unique in combining folkloristic narrative research with geographical and archaeological methods. The research on vernacular religious and folk medical knowledge about the ways of disease spread and healing rituals reveals the development of such knowledge in Estonia and its role in general mental coping over time. The research group has profound expertise in the Estonian folklore collections and their formation history. This ensures that the research adequately takes into account the biases in the research material as a result of selectivity and preferences in the long process of data collection. Collaboration with the other work groups in the framework of the center of excellence helps on the one hand to explain and date the development of various regional phenomena in folklore, and on the other hand, folkloric knowledge offers cultural interpretations to the material finds analysed by other work groups. 

The Head of Folkloristics and Cultural Geography Group is Mari Sarv.

Further links:

The Collegium for Transdisciplinary Studies in Archaeology, Genetics and Linguistics, University of Tartu

Estonian Roots page

Estonian Roots Facebook page