Or Words to That Effect: Orality and the writing of literary history(XXVIII Comparative History of Literatures in European Languages)

This volume raises questions about why oral celebrations of language receive so little attention in published literary histories when they are simultaneously recognized as fundamental to our understanding of literature. It aims to prompt debate regarding the transformations needed for literary historians to provide a more balanced and fuller appreciation of what we call literature, one that acknowledges the interdependence of oral storytelling and written expression, whether in print, pictorial, or digital form. Rather than offering a summary of current theories or prescribing solutions, this volume brings together distinguished scholars, conventional literary historians, and oral performer-practitioners from regions as diverse as South Africa, the Canadian Arctic, the Roma communities of Eastern Europe and the music industry of the American West in a conversation that engages the reader directly with the problems that they have encountered and the questions that they have explored in their work with orality and with literary history.

Table of Contents:
1. Introduction (by Chamberlain, Daniel F.); 2. Preliminaries (by Chamberlin, J. Edward); 3. Section I. Taking Up the Issues; 4. Histories of Literature and the Question of Comparative Oral Literary History (by Chamberlain, Daniel F.); 5. Levelling the Orality-Literacy Playing Field: Marcel Jousse's Laboratory of Awareness and the Oral-Literary Continuum (by Sienaert, Edgard); 6. Modes of Discourse, Modes of Rationality (by Olson, David R.); 7. Performing Writing and Singing Silence in the Anglo-Saxon Riddle Tradition (by Orchard, Andy); 8. Section II. Listening Performances; 9. In The Storyteller's House (by Yashinsky, Dan); 10. The Game of the Little Secrets or How to Learn (and to Teach) Mechanisms of Orality (by Diaz-Mas, Paloma); 11. Significant Spaces Between: Making Room for Silence (by Justice, Daniel Heath); 12. The Story of Story and a Canon of Story (by McHardy, Stuart); 13. Made for You and Me: Treaties with First Nations and the Settlement of Canada (by Asch, Michael); 14. Section III. Stories of Storytelling; 15. "Oral" in Literary History: The Case of Southern African Literatures (by Chapman, Michael); 16. Making Space for the Spoken Word (by Martin, Keavy); 17. Orality in Basque Literary Historiography (by Kortazar, Jon); 18. The Ladder Holds Up the World Above (by Haring, Lee); 19. Oral and Written Sukar Laviben of the Roma: The Beginning of a Romani Literary Historiography (by Eder-Jordan, Beate); 20. Section IV. Communities in Comparative Encounters; 21. Guaman Poma and His Traces: A Colonial Proposal to the Academic Debate Regarding Orality and Writing (by Viereck Salinas, Roberto); 22. The Study of the Elements of Literary History of the Khoekhoe and Khomani Languages of Southern Africa (by Namaseb, Levi); 23. The Stream of Khomani Stories (by Ten Kortenaar, Neil); 24. The Puzzle of Voice: Oral Poetry and Literary Studies (by Garcia Fernandes, Frederico Augusto); 25. Talking Technologies: Digital Poetry Meets Orality (by Vilarino Picos, Maria Teresa); 26. References; 27. List of Contributors; 28. Index

Review :
This is a formidable book which manages a broad range, sustains a high scholarly standard, and maintains a lucid ethical focus: a rare trifecta.