New instance, new #Introduction !
My name is Jürgen, and I translate old German folk tales into English - not just tales from the Brothers Grimm, but from the hundreds of other 19th century German folklorists out there.
To date, I have translated more than 600 tales. You can learn more about my project here (and you can get a free ebook version of my first book if you subscribe to my newsletter there):
I should point out that my interest is less in traditional "fairy tales" than in local local legends. The former tend to be more universal in their narratives, while the latter are deeply embedded in local geography, history, and culture.
I've even put most of these tales on an interactive map - either the town where they come from, or the actual place where the legend supposedly took place. You can see them for yourself on this interactive map!
Apart from that, one of my major interests are tabletop role-playing games - another form of oral storytelling which IMO is a worthy successor to the oral storytellers of old.
(And I would appreciate it if people spread this post to TTRPG spaces. My old account was on Mastodon.social, and I lost several hundreds of followers from dice.camp when the admins there temporarily defederated that instance...)
@stickydoodler Sadly, my academic background is in an entirely different field - I am strictly an amateur enthusiast when it comes to folklore. Some of the other regulars at thefolklore.cafe could probably tell you more.
But from my understanding, memes _are_ a type of folklore.
Jürgen Hubert
Matthew Blasi
Christer Enfors
StickyDoodler ⏭️ PAXU