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The Real American Legend
| Article
# : |
11264 |
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Section : |
CULTURE
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| Issue
Date : |
5 / 1986 |
5,287 Words |
| Author
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Roger L. Welsch
Plains folklorist Roger L. Welsch is professor of English and
anthropology at the University of Nebraska. |
There is no more distinctive part of folklore than the legend or belief tale. In twentieth century America we live in a culture that prides itself on being high-tech, rational, and cynical. Yet there is no segment of our society that does not listen to, remember, and retransmit stories of wonder and surprise. The tales are thought to be "rumors," "gossip," "myths," "old wives' tales," or "dirt." But most importantly, they are understood to be "truth."
In conversation we learn that a friend of a friend has found empty dogfood can in a garbage can outside a popular pizza shop--part of a major chain. We, in turn, tell the story to someone else. Suddenly, all who hear the "rumor" find that the pizza doesn't taste so good--and certainly not quite so ordinary! The "gossip" has it that one of the biggest of the international hamburger chains maintains a complex of earthworm farms in Mexico, and then we "understand" why they protest so much about the purity of their beef! A Southeast Asian restaurant opens in any town and rumors circulate that the community's dogs and cats have begun to disappear. The logo of a major American food manufacturer is revealed to have satanic interpretations. A popular bubble gum contains spider eggs!
Somewhere we are told that if we save wrappers from cigarette packages, or collect pull tabs from soft drink cans, we can turn them in somewhere to buy time for a cancer victim on an "iron lung" or for a sufferer of a kidney disease on a dialysis machine. It is obvious that the tobacco industry is not about to associate itself, even positively, with lung disease nor the soft drink industry with kidney problems. Nevertheless, such legends persist without suffering the slightest effect from such jarring
... (1997 of 29566 Characters)
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