Vol. 4 No.1 January 1985 The Centre for English Cultural Tradition and Language THE CENTRE FOR ENGLISH CULTURAL TRADITION AND LANGUAGE The Centre for English Cultural Tradition and Language is a research institution which acts as a national repository for material on all aspects oflanguage and cultural tradition throughout the British Isles. Located at the University of Sheffield, where it forms part of the Department of English Language, it has close links with the Department of Linguistics and the Division ofContinuing Education at the University and also the Departments ofFolklore, English and Linguistics at the Memorial University of Newfoundland The Centre aims to stimulate interest in language and cultural tradition, encourage the collecting and recording of traditional material through individual contributors, societies and organisations, colleges and schools, and provide a forum for discussion on all aspects oflanguage and tradition. Through its Archives, the Centre c~operates with local libraries, museums, record offices, societies and organisations, to draw attention to our traditional heritage through publications, courses, lectures, displays and exhibitions. Material gathered in the form of taperecordings, written reports, questionnaires, manuscripts, books and printed sources, and i terns of material culture, is deposited in the Centre's Archives, providing a basic resource for reference and research. The Archives include a reference library ofbooks, periodicals, original monographs, dissertations, pamphlets, and ephemera. In addition the Audiovisual section of the Archive includes photographs, slides and illustrations as well as some 2,000 audio-tapes and over 600 films and videotapes. The Archives include detailed information on regional and social dialects, slang and colloquialism, blason populaire, occupational vocabulary, proverbs and sayings. In the area of folklore studies the Centre holds a substantial body ofdata on childlore, custom and belief, traditional music, dance and drama. Special collections include: the Russell Wortley Collection (traditional dance and custom); the Edgar M Wagner Collection (European folkdance and topographical films); the Richard Blakeborough Collection (Yorkshire folklore and local history); the Geoffrey Bullough Collection (nineteenth century literature); microfilms of the Alex Helm, Maurice Barley and James Maddison Carpenter collections (traditional drama and custom); copies of the papers of Thomas Fairman Ordish (traditional drama); recordings and copies of field notebooks for the English and Welsh section of the Atlas Linguarum Europae; copies of the workbooks for the Survey of English Dialects. The Centre's Museum includes a wide variety of items representative of urban and rural traditional occupations, pastimes, arts and crafts. Special collections include basketmaking, knifegrinding, silversmithing and filecutting, in addition to handicrafts, costume and domestic equipment. A selection of exhibitions is available for hire. In association with colleges of education, schools and other interested groups and individuals throughout the British Isles, the Centre sponsors and directs numerous projects in the general field ofchildren's language and folklore such as the role oftradition in teaching linguistic and social skills to children. In addition a systematic investigation oftraditional verbal social controls is being conducted- attention being concentrated on the verbal constraints used by adults in controlling the behaviour of children. Material is being assembled for a wide range of projects in the field of traditional drama, with special reference to geographical distribution and textual variation, context of performance and the influence of chapbook texts. A close liaison with the Traditional Drama Research Group has also been established The Archives continue to gather information on occupational vocabularies and traditions, calendar and social customs and the rites of passage and on various aspects of belief, traditional health systems, and the lore of cosmic phenomena, plants and animals. Folk narratives, anecdotes and jokes are also well representated In the field offolklife the Centre is conducting a nationwide study of the traditional lore and language of food. Bibliographies and machine-readable files are being prepared on various aspects of English language and tradition. An extensive publication programme has also been developed, including a journal Lore and Language, a series of research guides, facsimiles, bibliographies, community studies and conference papers. There is also a series of occasional publications, and the recently inaugurated Folklore Research Register, which is published annually. The Centre contributes to both the postgraduate and undergraduate programmes in the Department of English Language at the University ofSheffield. The Department offers undergraduate courses in Folklore and Contemporary English, and postgraduate students may read for the degrees ofM.A in Modem English Language and English Cultural Tradition (by examination and dissertation) and M Phil and Ph.D. in Language and/or Folklore (by dissertation). The Centre is also actively involved in the MA. Course in Mrican Studies offered by the Department ofEnglish Literature, and has responsibility for the University Certificate Course in English Cultural Tradition offered by the Division of Continuing Education. Each year a variety of conferences is sponsored by the Centre. In addition to hosting the annual Traditional Drama Conference, it has hosted conferences on Fieldwork in Folklore and Oral History; Language Varieties; Perspectives on Contemporary Legend; 13th Meeting of the European Ballad Commission. WORKING WITH AND THROUGH CECTAL The Centre relies greatly on voluntary help at all levels. Ifyou are interested in any aspects ofthe Centre's activities you are invited to write for further information to: The Director, Centre for English Cultural Tradition and Language, The University of Sheffield, Sheffield, SlO 2TN. (Tel: 0742-78555, Ext.6296). FEB 13 1- ....... EMORIAL UNIVERSITY , EWFOUNDLAN[) DEPA TMENI 01: fOLKLOR Vol. 4 No.1 January 1985 Contents Gujerati Proverbs: An Analytical Study R Doctor 1 The Folktale Structure in Amos Tutuola's The Palm-Wine Drinkard 0 A Asagba 31 Solihull: A Note on a Placename Pronunciation C S Upton 40 Further thoughts on the Labovian Interview Graham Shorrocks 46 The Lost Slinfold Bell: Some Functions of a Local Legend Jacqueline Simpson 57 A Selection of Proverbial Material from "Tail Corn" J B Smith 68 The Lady on the Mountain: A Century of Play Rhyme Tradition Nigel G N Kelsey 78 Letters to the Editor 86 Notes and Queries 89 Reviews 90 The Centre for English Cultural Tradition and Language © The Centre for English Cultural Tradition and Language, University of Sheffield, 1985 ISSN 0307 - 7144 No part of this journal may be reproduced in any form or by any means without permission from the Editor. Gujerati Proverbs: An Analytical Study R. Doctor Introduction This paper aims to give a brief analytical survey of Gujerati folksay with specific reference to proverbs used in Standard Gujerati and also in its non-standard forms, especially Parsi Gujerati. Gujerati, a language of the Indo-Aryan family, is the official language of the State of Gujerat in the North-West region of India. It is also spoken in Bombay where the Gujeratis, businessmen by nature, have settled down. Parsi Gujerati is spoken in the coastal regions of Gujerat, where the Parsis first settled in the eighth and ninth century A.D. after the Muslim conquest of Iran; and also in Bombay, Poona, Nasik and Hyderabad: towns to which the Parsis emigrated in due course of time. The data (amounting to around 5000 proverbs) was collected in Bombay, Poona, Hyderabad, Surat, Baroda and Ahmedabad. In addition data was also obtained from informants hailing from other towns and villages of Gujerat who had emigrated to the above-mentioned towns in search of employment (see map). Collection and collation was done with the help of a collection-slip which not only incorporated the name, the age, the sex and the place of origin of the informant, but also the context in which the specific proverb or saying was used, since the proverb is best studied within the frame of reference of its occurrence in a specific situation of discourse. In the cases in which the informant had spontaneously furnished a series of proverbs (which generally did not exceed eight to ten), he was asked to visualise the situation in which he would normally use them. Gujerati possesses a specific word for the proverb: kehavat, derived from the verb kehavu: to say; the proverb being taken as a directed activity. Interestingly, it is the verb to say from which the word for a proverb is derived and not from bolvu: to speak, since for the Gujerati speaker a proverb is a specific directed activity and not just a passive speech act. In this paper no specific definition of the proverb will be supplied at the outset. However the term will be treated as being co-terminous with a " Complex linguistic argumentative 1 structure used in a certain frame of reference". This loose definition, based simultaneously on the structure of the proverb and its context of occurrence, permits the paremiologist to better encompass the reality of the proverb. In other words, Gujerati proverbs will be treated at two specific levels: - the Structural i.e. the inner structure of the proverb. - the Argumentative i.e. the outer application of the proverb