Siberian Federal University

Issue

Journal of Siberian Federal University. Humanities & Social Sciences. 2023 16 (11)

Authors

Bulgakova, Tatiana D.

Contact information

Bulgakova, Tatiana D.: Institute of Linguistic Research of the Russian Academy of Sciences Saint Petersburg, Russian Federation;

Keywords

Nanai traditional culture; shamanism; shamanic folklore; genesis of fairytale plots

Abstract

Personal tales are stories of shamans concerning the events experienced by each of them in the space of the spiritual world, the obstacles they overcome in that space and their relationship with the helper spirits. Personal tales have a ritual function, as they are targeted, according to the narrator, who identifies himself with the hero, to influence reality. This effect is carried out due to fictional episodes woven into the “authentic biographical narrative”, which tell about the allegedly successful resolution of critical circumstances that the narrator has been facing. However, such a favorable result can be achieved, according to shamans’ explanations, only with the involuntary support of a misinformed audience that perceives the narrative as generally accepted and traditional one and does not guess the true attitude of the narrator to its content. That support ensures the further collective existence of the text and contributes to its transition from the status of a personal tale to the status of an epic. Such narratives are then being desacralized over time are fixed in the tradition, replenishing the fund of epic folklore plots that are gaining collective existence

Pages

1878–1890

EDN

PRXIAY

Paper at repository of SibFU

https://elib.sfu-kras.ru/handle/2311/151818

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC 4.0).