A new approach to the classification of Gaelic song
Abstract
"A good deal of water has flowed under the bridge since James Ross published “A
Classification of Gaelic Folk-Song” in 1957.1 Ross’s study was typical of a time when scholars
favored a clinical and taxonomical approach to oral traditional culture, before modern theories
about text, context, and genre began to raise good questions about the application of scientific
methods to the analysis of cultural activity. The search for answers to these questions has greatly
advanced the way ethnographers and ethnomusicologists understand culture, including the
cultures of the Gael.2 After six decades, it seems fitting to revisit Ross’s classification system,
and to examine whether the effort of constructing such a system is still worthwhile or not."--Page71.
Citation
Oral Tradition, 32/1 (2018):71-140
Rights
OpenAccess.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 License.