Ruth Finnegan's Oral Literature in Africa was first published in 1970, and since then has been widely praised as one of the most important books in its field. Based on years of fieldwork, the study traces the history of storytelling across the continent of Africa. This revised edition makes Finnegan's ground-breaking research available to the next generation of scholars. It includes a new introduction, additional images and an updated bibliography, as well as its original chapters on poetry, prose, "drum language" and drama, and an overview of the social, linguistic and historical background of oral literature in Africa. This book is the first volume in the World Oral Literature Series, an ongoing collaboration between OBP and World Oral Literature Project. A free online archive of recordings and photographs that Finnegan made during her fieldwork in the late 1960s is hosted by the World Oral Literature Project (http: //www.oralliterature.org/collections/rfinnegan001.html) and can also be accessed from publisher's website.

Quoting is all around us. But do we really know what it means? How do people actually quote today, and how did our present systems come about? This book brings together a down-to-earth account of contemporary quoting with an examination of the comparative and historical background that lies behind it and the characteristic way that quoting links past and present, the far and the near. Drawing from anthropology, cultural history, folklore, cultural studies, sociolinguistics, literary studies and the ethnography of speaking, Ruth Finnegan's fascinating study sets our present conventions into cross cultural and historical perspective. She traces the curious history of quotation marks, examines the long tradition of quotation collections with their remarkable cycling across the centuries, and explores the uses of quotation in literary, visual and oral traditions. The book tracks the changing defi nitions and control of quoting over the millennia and in doing so throws new light on ideas such as 'imitation', 'allusion', 'authorship', 'originality' and 'plagiarism'.

Treatments of human communication mostly draw on cognitive and word-centred models to present it as predominantly a matter of words. This, Finnegan argues, seriously underestimates the far-reaching multi-modal qualities of human interconnecting and the senses of touch, olfaction and, above all, audition and vision that we draw on. In an authoritative and readable account, Ruth Finnegan brings together research from linguistic and sensory anthropology, material culture, non-verbal communication, computer-mediated communication, and, strikingly, research on animal communication such as the remarkable gesture systems of great apes. She draws on her background in classical studies and her long anthropological experience, to present illuminating examples from throughout the world, past and present. The result is to uncover an amazing array of sounds, sights, smells, gestures, looks, movements, touches and material objects used by humans to interconnect both nearby and across space and time She goes on to explore, first, the extra-sensory modes of communication now being revealed in the extraordinary ‘new science’ research, and, then, in an incendiary conclusion, to deny the long-prevailing story of human history by questioning whether orality really came before literacy; whether it was really through ‘the acquisition of language’ that our prehistoric cave painting ancestors made a sudden leap into being ‘true humans’; and finally, astonishingly, to ask whether human communicating had its first roots not, after all, in verbal language but - something else. Not to be missed, this highly original book brings a fresh perspective on, among other things, that central topic of interest today - the dawn of human history - and on what being homo sapiens really means. This revised and updated edition has additional illustrations, updated chapters, and a new concluding chapter. A provocative and controversial account that will stir worldwide debate, this book is an essential transdisciplinary overview for researchers and advanced students in language and communication, anthropology and cultural studies.

Treatments of human communication mostly draw on cognitive and word-centred models to present it as predominantly a matter of words. This, Finnegan argues, seriously underestimates the far-reaching multi-modal qualities of human interconnecting and the senses of touch, olfaction and, above all, audition and vision that we draw on. In an authoritative and readable account, Ruth Finnegan brings together research from linguistic and sensory anthropology, material culture, non-verbal communication, computer-mediated communication, and, strikingly, research on animal communication such as the remarkable gesture systems of great apes. She draws on her background in classical studies and her long anthropological experience, to present illuminating examples from throughout the world, past and present. The result is to uncover an amazing array of sounds, sights, smells, gestures, looks, movements, touches and material objects used by humans to interconnect both nearby and across space and time She goes on to explore, first, the extra-sensory modes of communication now being revealed in the extraordinary ‘new science’ research, and, then, in an incendiary conclusion, to deny the long-prevailing story of human history by questioning whether orality really came before literacy; whether it was really through ‘the acquisition of language’ that our prehistoric cave painting ancestors made a sudden leap into being ‘true humans’; and finally, astonishingly, to ask whether human communicating had its first roots not, after all, in verbal language but - something else. Not to be missed, this highly original book brings a fresh perspective on, among other things, that central topic of interest today - the dawn of human history - and on what being homo sapiens really means. This revised and updated edition has additional illustrations, updated chapters, and a new concluding chapter. A provocative and controversial account that will stir worldwide debate, this book is an essential transdisciplinary overview for researchers and advanced students in language and communication, anthropology and cultural studies.

The study of oral traditions and verbal arts leads into an area of human culture to which anthropologists are increasingly turning their attention. Oral Traditions and the Verbal Arts provides up-to-date guidance on how to approach the study of oral form and their performances, treating both the practicalities of fieldwork and the methods by which oral texts and performances can be observed, collected or analysed. It also relates to those current controversies about the nature of performance and of 'text'. Designed as a practical and systematic introduction to the processes and problems of researching in this area, this is an invaluable guide for students, and lecturers of anthropology and cultural studies and also for general readers who are interested in enjoying oral literature for its own sake.

Renowned as the scholar who has made a whole generation of Africanists realise the singular importance of oral literature, Ruth Finnegan asks whether Africa can still be considered 'the oral continent'. Africa has long been known as the oral continent, at once the home of oral literature, orature and orality, the oral background to the postcolonial literatures of today, and the inspirer of the voiced traditions of the diaspora. But does this image of Africa and orality still stand up to scrutiny? In this new synthesis of her earlier and most recent work Ruth Finnegan illustrates the continuing interest of African verbal arts and performances and reflects on the related development of 'orality' studies through the decades since the 1960s. Her provocative conclusion is that it is time to abandon the long-entrenched image of Africa as 'the oral continent' and to adopt a more critical comparative perspective on 'the oral'. RUTH FINNEGAN, FBA is Visiting Research Professor and Emeritus Professor in the Faculty of Social Sciences at the Open University and is the author of the classic study Oral Literature in Africa North America: University of Chicago Press; South Africa: University of KwaZulu-Natal Press

Language is central to human experience and our understanding of who we are, whether written or unwritten, sung or spoken. But what is language and how do we record it? Where does it reside? Does it exist and evolve within written sources, in performance, in the mind or in speech? For too long, ethnographic, aesthetic and sociolinguistic studies of language have remained apart from analyses emerging from traditions such as literature and performance. Where is Language? argues for a more complex and contextualized understanding of language across this range of disciplines, engaging with key issues, including orality, literacy, narrative, ideology, performance and the human communities in which these take place. Eminent anthropologist Ruth Finnegan draws together a lifetime of ethnographic case studies, reading and personal commentary to explore the roles and nature of language in cultures across the world, from West Africa to the South Pacific. By combining research and reflections, Finnegan discusses the multi-modality of language to provide an account not simply of vocabulary and grammar, but one which questions the importance of cultural settings and the essence of human communication itself.

Language is central to human experience and our understanding of who we are, whether written or unwritten, sung or spoken. But what is language and how do we record it? Where does it reside? Does it exist and evolve within written sources, in performance, in the mind or in speech? For too long, ethnographic, aesthetic and sociolinguistic studies of language have remained apart from analyses emerging from traditions such as literature and performance. Where is Language? argues for a more complex and contextualized understanding of language across this range of disciplines, engaging with key issues, including orality, literacy, narrative, ideology, performance and the human communities in which these take place. Eminent anthropologist Ruth Finnegan draws together a lifetime of ethnographic case studies, reading and personal commentary to explore the roles and nature of language in cultures across the world, from West Africa to the South Pacific. By combining research and reflections, Finnegan discusses the multi-modality of language to provide an account not simply of vocabulary and grammar, but one which questions the importance of cultural settings and the essence of human communication itself.

The study of oral traditions and verbal arts leads into an area of human culture to which anthropologists are increasingly turning their attention. Oral Traditions and the Verbal Arts provides up-to-date guidance on how to approach the study of oral form and their performances, treating both the practicalities of fieldwork and the methods by which oral texts and performances can be observed, collected or analysed. It also relates to those current controversies about the nature of performance and of 'text'.
Designed as a practical and systematic introduction to the processes and problems of researching in this area, this is an invaluable guide for students, and lecturers of anthropology and cultural studies and also for general readers who are interested in enjoying oral literature for its own sake.

eBook available with sample pages: 020339321X

How do we picture urban life and formulate our experience of it? Tales of the City, first published in 1998, brings together the academics' abstract tales with the vivid stories about a particular city, Milton Keynes, and the often moving self-narrations of its residents. It explores the role of story-telling processes for the creative constructing of experience, with particular attention to personal narrations. The story that is now emerging, told by many individual actor narrators, is of the city as a natural setting for human life, in stark contrast to the pessimistic anti-urban tales of many academic narrators. Drawing on narrative studies, cultural and linguistic anthropology and social theory, Professor Finnegan skilfully examines the narrative conventions and cultural implications of our multiple tales of the city, and relates them to profound mythic themes about urban life, community, and to the creative role of the active, reflecting individual.

How do we picture urban life and formulate our experience of it? Tales of the City, first published in 1998, brings together the academics' abstract tales with the vivid stories about a particular city, Milton Keynes, and the often moving self-narrations of its residents. It explores the role of story-telling processes for the creative constructing of experience, with particular attention to personal narrations. The story that is now emerging, told by many individual actor narrators, is of the city as a natural setting for human life, in stark contrast to the pessimistic anti-urban tales of many academic narrators. Drawing on narrative studies, cultural and linguistic anthropology and social theory, Professor Finnegan skilfully examines the narrative conventions and cultural implications of our multiple tales of the city, and relates them to profound mythic themes about urban life, community, and to the creative role of the active, reflecting individual.

A stunning account of how things that seem just part of everyday life, are in fact extraordinary once we notice them. As anthropologists do when they stop to listen. As poets do when they see the world in a grain of sand. When we see how things that are not normally defined as special, perhaps because studied or practised by 'amateurs' rather than 'specialists', are often truly special. How as we go through our daily round our lives are surrounded by splendour. After you read this then world will never look the same.