{"product_id":"9781604738186","title":"Recentering Anglo\/American Folksong: Sea Crabs and Wicked Youths","description":"\u003cp\u003e A wealth of texts of British and Anglo\/North American folksong has long been accessible in both published and archival sources. For two centuries these texts have energized scholarship. Yet in the past three decades this material has languished, as literary theory has held sway over textual study. In this crusading book Roger deV. Renwick argues that the business of folksong scholars is to explain folksong: folklorists must liberate the material's own voice rather than impose theories that are personally compelling or appealing. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e To that end, Renwick presents a case study in each of five essays to demonstrate the scholarly value of approaching this material through close readings and comparative analysis. In the first, on British traditional ballads in the West Indies, he shows how even the best of folklorists can produce an unconvincing study when theory is overvalued and texts are slighted. In the second he navigates the many manifestations of a single Anglo\/American ballad, \"The Rambling Boy,\" to reveal striking differences between a British diasporic strain on the one hand and a southern American, post--Civil War strain on the other. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e The third essay treats the poetics of a very old, extremely widespread, but never before formalized trans-Atlantic genre, the catalogue. Next is Renwick's claim that recentering folksong studies in our rich textual databanks requires that canonical items be identified accurately. He argues that \"Oh, Willie,\" a song thought to be a simple variety of \"Butcher's Boy,\" is in fact a distinct composition. In the final essay Renwick looks at the widespread popularity of \"The Crabfish,\" sung today throughout the English-speaking world but with roots in a naughty tale found in both continental Europe and Asia. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e With such specific case studies as these Renwick justifies his argument that the basic tenets of folklore textual scholarship continue to yield new insights. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e Roger deV. Renwick, a professor of English at the University of Texas at Austin, is the author of \u003ci\u003eEnglish Folk Poetry: Structure and Meaning\u003c\/i\u003e and of the supplement to \u003ci\u003eThe British Traditional Ballad in North America\u003c\/i\u003e. He has been published in \u003ci\u003eJournal of American Folklore\u003c\/i\u003e and \u003ci\u003eSouthern Folklore Journal\u003c\/i\u003e. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"University Press of Mississippi","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47158465396976,"sku":"9781604738186","price":25.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0737\/7593\/9824\/files\/9781604738186_p0.jpg?v=1763829151","url":"https:\/\/shop-qa.barnesandnoble.com\/products\/9781604738186","provider":"Barnes \u0026 Noble (DEV)","version":"1.0","type":"link"}