In the oral tradition, the singer is more important than the song. Similarly, the story was important - the music was only an instrument or medium. Neil gave a fascinating insight into the last remaining remnants of oral tradition in Suffolk, through personal anecdotes and audio clips.
Neil referred to Walter Ong's Literacy and Orality heavily and produced the following list defining the differences between literate cultures and oral cultures.
Orality
- Spoken word
- Freedom of thought & language
- Learning by oral transmission observation and experience
- Traditional history seeking mindset
- Metaphorical truth
- Illustrative language of wit
- Seeking principles of understanding
- Seeking wisdom
- Social status through character largely created by the ability to handle everyday narrative
- Personal identity, community identity, locating self in community, time and place
- A love of home
- Inherited traditional oral culture in song, story, formulaic sayings
- An internal perception
- Written word
- Language restricted by the parameters of standard english
- Learning by academic study mainly from dominance of print
- Belief in modernism - 'the now'
- Romantic movement influence
- Contrived language
- Seeking information
- Seeking entertainment
- Social status through academic awards in the world of the written word
- Techno-literate mindset strong
- Media influences
- Delusions of grandeur in relocation and travel
- 'Colonial/civilsed' misconception of indigenous culture
- External perception
My thoughts
Well I don't really agree 100% with everything Neil said, but his enthusiasm for the singers and genuine affection for the agricultural tradition cannot be doubted. As Dick Leith commented, the divide between literate and oral doesn't have to be seen as a divide or opposition. They can be viewed as a continuum.
Is this mirrored through traditional storytelling and digital storytelling or is it all part of the same continuum?
What evidence is there of a new oral tradition? How are texts moving from oral-written-spoken again? Most stories tellers learn are from written sources, will this be the case in the future or do the texts remain in oral memory? Or, as is possibly more likely, will they be transmitted digitally (and so not neccessarily through text or visual media)?
Final note, a lovely phrase during the discussion afterwards:
"Tales do not recognise boundaries" - this reminded me of diffusionism and the power that stories have to transcend cultural lenses.
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