Important issues in the contemporary study of folktales and fairy-tales.

What is it about?

Over the course of the last forty years, the Enzyklopädie des Märchens (EM) has changed the landscape of folktale and fairy-tale studies. Parallel developments complemented the EM's agenda to promote historical and comparative folk-narrative research. The history of these developments not only illuminates the vitality and interdisciplinary importance that contemporary folktale and fairy-tale studies have achieved; it also helps to identify and explain the challenges we face as we contemplate current research and imagine the field's future. This paper reviews critical developments of the last forty years and then considers how we might come to grips with the ensuing challenge of sustaining, in a responsible way, the comparative study of folktales and fairy tales in a global context.

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