Join us this year on Tuesday 7th November for a virtual talk with internationally acclaimed folklorist Sadhana Naithani, as she delves into the world of the folk narrative. As a published author and professor of folklore and literature, Sadhana has explored and documented the deeper cultural, social, and political facets of the folklore genre.
Recently, we met with Sadhana to learn more about both her work as a folklorist, as well as her upcoming YFOS presentation ‘Justice in the World of Folk Narrative’.
Click here to book your FREE ONLINE ticket for this event.
So let’s hear what Sadhana had to say.
Could you tell us more about your virtual event taking place as part of this year’s Yorkshire Festival of Story?
My event will be a conversation with Sita Brand about the topic of justice in folk narrative. And by folk narrative, we mean folk tales, fairy tales, wonder tales, etc. Quite often they are understood as being old story forms, coming from another time. However, they are not actually old, and new stories are being generated all the time. And we find that folk narrative today exists in all kinds of mediums — not only in print, film, cinema, etc. — but it is also very much present in the digital world.
But also, what’s important is the way that old stories have in certain cases for a very long time gone through a process of being told and retold again and again. In that sense, folk narrative is not copyrighted intellectual property, which gives a chance for all storytellers to retell those stories.
The theme of this year’s Yorkshire Festival of Story is ‘Speaking Truth to Power’. How would you say your talk for the festival speaks to this year’s theme?
The moment we say ‘folk narrative’, we often think of tropes such as ‘Once upon a time…’ and ‘Happily ever after’. But this is not a rule, and there are other routes and endings to the stories.
As a scholar of folk narrative, I have seen that this genre often contains stories of a simple format but touches on deep issues of justice and injustice — be it gender, human, animal, or ecological injustice. If we stand back and look at these stories, we will see that they are actually addressing very deep issues, some of which are very long-standing issues of history.
My conversation will be focused on the idea of justice — and you can’t think of justice without thinking of injustice. And the moment you address injustice, you are speaking truth to power.
We have also seen historically that folk narrative broadly understood comes from the wider sections of society — the non-ruling sections of society. Therefore, it has often beenembedded in several societies, in several points in time, and in the way ordinary people have expressed their opinions on the societal state of affairs. So, the very fact that folk narrative is the narrative of the folk often addresses issues through its stories.
What inspired you to become a folklorist and what do you enjoy most about the work that you do?
Well, what inspired me to become a folklorist is my love of stories. The fact that stories continue to be told for such a long time shows the power of these stories. And in terms of folklore, it’s the whole power of this simple genre. Despite the simplicity, there is a depth of meaning to it. But not only does it contain so much meaning, but it also marches across time.
I enjoy what I do very much — studying and writing about folk narrative. And I have learnt to see the world through it. I’ve studied folk narrative from across the world and therefore I have been able to see and make sense of the world — as both clusters of unique expression, as well as how we are interconnected as humans.
In my talk, I will discuss several stories, primarily from the Indo-European traditions, that deal with the issues of justice and injustice. Across the world you see similar themes and similar plots, as well as similar and dissimilar resolutions. There is a unique language of culture to stories, but also many common issues and concerns of human beings — and that is what I think is a fascinating aspect of folk narrative. It both reflects cultural uniqueness and also ideational similarities between cultures.
How would you describe your own storytelling style?
The study of folk narrative has impacted my academic writing, view of the world, and especially my feeling for the marginalised in society, their struggles, as well as their view of the world.
As an academic writer, I aim to show the relevance of stories to our times and our lives today. But I am also a novelist and have published a novella called ‘Elephantine’, which is based on some factual information about a real-life female elephant working in British India. It’s a modern tale in a modern style, which plays on folk beliefs, However, unlike the folk narrative model, I did not give a human voice to the elephant. Instead, I found other ways to show her cognition and what she was perceiving. She is the central character of the story, rather than the human beings. However, I differentiated it from the conventional folk-narrative style in the way that I gave a voice to her experiences and emotions.
What has been your favourite project so far, or one that you have felt the proudest of?
One is the novella ‘Elephantine’. I feel happy that I was able to tell that story to the wider world and to be able to show how an elephant can find its life entangled in mega historical events like colonialism and the independence of India. And I hope that in some ways it impacts the way we think about elephants.
The other one that I am happy to have done is a book called ‘In Quest of Indian Folktales’. It is the story of an Indian folk story collector and translator who worked with a British administrator called William Crooke.
William Crooke collected folk tales of Northern India. It was a famous collection, but I could not find it when I started looking for it in the libraries of India or England. And then finally, when I found the unpublished and uncatalogued manuscripts of the collection in the archives in London, all the manuscripts were in the handwriting of a man named Ram Gharib Chaube— who was not to be found in the catalogue and not been acknowledged.
And so, I then spent the next five years trying to piece together the story. But when the story finally emerged, it was actually a story that challenges colonial stereotypes — as it was a story of a very strong friendship and great collaboration, and one that broke boundaries of its own time.
Could you share with us a little bit about any projects that you are currently working on?
It’s a booklet manuscript that I’m just putting the final touches to at the moment.
The booklet is a study of the British writings of Indian wildlife, and it will be coming out in 2024. There are different kinds of writers that I have selected, and it will feature very different kinds of storytelling. It’s full of many different kinds of works and it shows how different writers have very different takes and perspectives — therefore showing how to an extent we are determined by our times, ethnicities, and nationalities.
Finally, is there a message that you would like audiences to take away from your event at this year’s festival?
That message would be to listen to ever more stories, because stories really do speak truth to power. And as folk narrative is concerned, that’s one way that everyday people can speak truth to power — which is then how we can make sense of the world.
