Folklore and the Internet: Vernacular Expression in a Digital World

by Trevor J. Blank

Overview

A pioneering examination of the folkloric qualities of the World Wide Web, e-mail, and related digital media. These stuidies show that folk culture, sustained by a new and evolving vernacular, has been a key, since the Internet's beginnings, to language, practice, and interaction online. Users of many sorts continue to develop the Internet as a significant medium for generating, transmitting, documenting, and preserving folklore.

In a set of new, insightful essays, contributors Trevor J. Blank, Simon J. Bronner, Robert Dobler, Russell Frank, Gregory Hansen, Robert Glenn Howard, Lynne S. McNeill, Elizabeth Tucker, and William Westerman showcase ways the Internet both shapes and is shaped by folklore

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780874217506
Publisher:	Utah State University Press
Publication date:	09/09/2009
Edition description:	1st Edition
Pages:	272
Product dimensions:	5.90(w) x 8.90(h) x 0.90(d)
Age Range:	18 Years

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments ix

Introduction Toward a Conceptual Framework for the Study of Folklore and the Internet Trevor J. Blank 1

Chapter 1 Digitizing and Virtualizing Folklore Simon J. Bronner 21

Chapter 2 Guardians of the Living: Characterization of Missing Women on the Internet Elizabeth Tucker 67

Chapter 3 The End of the Internet: A Folk Response to the Provision of Infinite Choice Lynne S. McNeill 80

Chapter 4 The Forward as Folklore: Studying E-Mailed Humor Russell Frank 98

Chapter 5 Epistemology, the Sociology of Knowledge, and the Wikipedia Userbox Controversy William Westerman 123

Chapter 6 Crusading on the Vernacular Web: The Folk Beliefs and Practices of Online Spiritual Warfare Robert Glenn Howard 159

Chapter 7 Ghosts in the Machine: Mourning the MySpace Dead Robert Dobler 175

Chapter 8 Public Folklore in Cyberspace Gregory Hansen 194

Appendix: Webography of Public Folklore Resources Gregory Hansen 213

References 231

About the Contributors 254

Index 257