The Child and Childhood in Folk-Thought: Studies of the Activities and Influences of the Child Among Primitive Peoples, Their Analogues and Survivals in the Civilization of To-DayChamberlain, Alexander Francis
Science
The Child and Childhood in Folk-Thought: Studies of the Activities and Influences of the Child Among Primitive Peoples, Their Analogues and Survivals in the Civilization of To-Day
Chamberlain, Alexander Francis
Child rearing; Children -- Folklore; Folklore and children
"Izar and Lanoa were two orphan children; the first was seven years of
age, and the latter nine. These poor children, true wandering bards,
frequented the mountains, earning a livelihood by singing ballads and
national airs in sweet, infantile voices, in return for a bed of straw
and a cupful of meal. Throughout the district these children were known
and loved on account of their sad state, as well as for their graceful
forms and winning ways."
Mr. Chatelain, in his recent work on African folk-tales, says of the
natives of Angola: "No Angola child finds difficulty at any time in
producing extemporaneous song."
Dr. Gatschet, in his study of the Klamath Indians, gives examples of
many songs composed and sung by young people, especially girls; and many
other Indian tribes, Algonkian, Iroquois, etc., possess such as well.
When Darwin reached Tahiti, his arrival was "sung by a young girl in
four improvised strophes, which her fellow-maidens accompanied in a
pretty chorus"; and among the song-loving people of the islands of the
South Sea, the poetic talent develops quite early in both sexes. Among
the aborigines of Peake River, in Australia, when a youth--at
puberty--has undergone the ceremony of tattooing, and, his wounds having
healed, is about to return to his fellows, "a young girl selected for
the purpose, sings in her own way a song which she has composed, and,
amid dancing, merriment, and feasting, the youth is welcomed back to his
family and his kin" (326. 11. 241). Throughout the Orient woman is a
dancer and a singer. India has her bayaderes and nautch-girls, whose
dancing and singing talents are world-known.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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