Haunting experiences : ghosts in contemporary folklore / Diane E. Goldstein, Sylvia Ann Grider, Jeannie Banks Thomas.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Goldstein, Diane E.

Contributor:

Thomas, Jeannie B.

Grider, Sylvia Ann.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Haunted places.

Supernatural.

Ghosts.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (ix, 270 pages) : illustrations

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

Utah State University, University Libraries 2007

Logan, Utah : Utah State University Press, 2007.

Language Note:

English

Biography/History:

Diane E. Goldstein is associate professor of folklore at Memorial University of Newfoundland and is cross-appointed to Memorial University's School of Medicine. She is editor of Talking AIDS: Interdisciplinary Perspectives, one of the earliest anthologies on AIDS, and has extensive experience working on AIDS policy-making initiatives with the Canadian government. She serves on the editorial boards of the Journal of American Folklore, Folklore, Ethnologies, Contemporary Legend, and The Journal of Applied Folklore.

Summary:

"Ghosts and the supernatural appear throughout modern culture, in any number of entertainment, commercial, and other contexts. Popular media's commodified representations of ghosts can be quite different from what people believe about them, based on tradition or direct experience. Belief and tradition and the popular or commercial nevertheless continually feed off each other. They frequently share space in how people think about the supernatural. In Haunting Experiences, three well-known folklorists broaden the discussion of ghost lore by examining it from multiple angles in various modern contexts. Diane E. Goldstein, Sylvia Ann Grider, and Jeannie Banks Thomas take ghosts seriously. They draw on contemporary scholarship that emphasizes the basis of belief in experience and the usefulness of ghost stories. And they look closely at the narrative role of such lore in matters such as socialization and gender. Together, they unravel the complex mix of mass media, commodification, and popular culture that today puts old spirits into new contexts."--Publisher's description

Contents:

Contents; Acknowledgments; Illustrations; Introduction: Old Spirits in New Bottles; Part I: Taking Ghosts Seriously; One: The Usefulness of Ghost Stories; Two: Scientific Rationalism and Supernatural Experience Narratives; Part II: Narrating Socialization and Gender; Three: Gender and Ghosts; Four: Children's Ghost Stories; Part III: Old Spirits in New Contexts; Five: Haunted Houses; Six: The Commodification of Belief; Conclusion: The "Spectral Turn"; Notes; Bibliography; Filmography; Index

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (p. 234-249), filmography (p. 250-252) and index.

This eBook is made available Open Access under a Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0

Description based on print version record.

Description based on publisher supplied metadata and other sources.

ISBN:

9781457174834

1457174839

9780874216813

0874216818

OCLC:

476175527