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Research Article: Folklore Collection and Social Investigation in Late-Nineteenth and Early-Twentieth Century England

This article compares the different, but related, activities of folklore collection and social investigation in an important period of English rural history. It is argued that the outputs of both activities reflected a complex series of social and cultural interactions in rural theatres of inquiry, and as such that the methods and concepts underpinning them can themselves illustrate important facets of the social history of the period. The article draws on the model of transition from an “informant” method of data collection—characterised by the consultation of elites rather than the investigated population itself—to a “respondent” method, which relied on first-hand contact with the subjects of inquiry. It is suggested that this model, devised to explain the history of social research, is also relevant to the history of folklore collection. The transition was not smooth, however: rather, it initiated intense methodological conflict between different investigators; and even where the “respondent” method was enthusiastically advocated, there were limits to the extent of empathy that was achieved by collectors and investigators with the population in which they were interested. The article draws on a variety of published sources from the period, including the 1890 and 1914 editions of The Handbook of Folklore.