“The Devil Was with Her”: Othered Social Identity of a Finland-Swedish Ostrobothnian Cunning-Woman
2023; University of Pennsylvania Press; Volume: 18; Issue: 1 Linguagem: Inglês
10.1353/mrw.2023.a906602
ISSN1940-5111
Autores Tópico(s)Folklore, Mythology, and Literature Studies
ResumoAbstract: There was a strong Lutheran and revival movement presence in rural Swedish-speaking Ostrobothnia in Finland at the turn of the 20th century. Gendered roles affected how members of the community were expected to act and work. People with a reputation for witchcraft transgressed these communal norms and were exceptional informants for the folklore collectors. This article studies how an othered social identity was constructed and maintained in a premodern rural community by taking narratives collected and published between 1912–2012 about a certain cunning woman as a case study. This article analyses with close reading the othering themes contained by these narratives and how they reflect various expectations regarding normative life in a rural village community. The results show that the othering of a person with a reputation of being a witch was not only harmful for social identity but could also be a social coping mechanism.
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