Ulo Valk

Pahalla on yhtä monta nimeä kuin olomuotoakin. Voimme pukea sen sanoiksi puhumalla saatanasta, pirusta, paholaisesta tai perkeleestä. Paholaiselle ei ole vieras helvetin ruhtinaan viitta, muttei myöskään jäniksen nahka tai avaruusolion asu. Sielunvihollinen on väijynyt syntistä mieltä jo vuosisatojen ajan. Nimet ja naamiot vaihtuvat, mutta merkitys säilyy: ”Niin kuin yhteinen uskontunnustus, myös yliluonnolliset olennot voidaan käsittää suurten ja pienten ihmisryhmien identiteetin ilmentäjiksi”, kirjoittaa virolainen Ülo Valk esipuheessaan. Hän tarttuu pelättyä olentoa sarvista ja selvittää kiehtovassa tutkimuksessaan, millaisia uskomuksia kansanperinteen rikkaimpaan ja arvoituksellisimpaan hahmoon on historian saatossa liittynyt. Pirullinen tutkimus, oikea kirjapaholainen. Uskalla tietää!

This collection of articles addresses the narrative construction of places, landscapes and their supernatural dimensions, the relationship between tradition communities and their environments, and the spatial conditions for encounters with the supernatural as they are manifested in European folklore and in early literary sources, such as the Old Norse sagas. Articles in the book discuss places cursed and sacred, churches, graveyards, haunted houses, cemeteries, grave mounds, hill forts, and other tradition dominants in the micro-geography of the Nordic, Baltic and Baltic-Finnic peoples. It emerges that places accumulate meanings as they are layered by stories and memories about personal experiences. In addition to the local dimension of place-lore, the book scrutinizes the history of folklore studies, its geopolitical dimensions and its connection with nation building. It also sheds light on the social base of folklore and examines vernacular views of legendry and the supernatural.

Vernacular religion is religion as people experience, understand, and practice it. It shapes everyday culture and disrupts the traditional boundaries between 'official' and 'folk' religion. The book analyses vernacular religion in a range of Christian denominations as well as in indigenous and New Age religion from the nineteenth century to today. How these differing expressions of belief are shaped by their individual, communal and national contexts is also explored. What is revealed is the consistency of genres, the persistence of certain key issues, and how globalization in all its cultural and technological forms is shaping contemporary faith practice. The book will be valuable to students of ethnology, folklore, religious studies, anthropology, and religious studies.

Vernacular religion is religion as people experience, understand, and practice it. It shapes everyday culture and disrupts the traditional boundaries between 'official' and 'folk' religion. The book analyses vernacular religion in a range of Christian denominations as well as in indigenous and New Age religion from the nineteenth century to today. How these differing expressions of belief are shaped by their individual, communal and national contexts is also explored. What is revealed is the consistency of genres, the persistence of certain key issues, and how globalization in all its cultural and technological forms is shaping contemporary faith practice. The book will be valuable to students of ethnology, folklore, religious studies, and anthropology.