Marxist analysis, at least in folklore, isn't so much political as it is economic: in the case of folktales, for example, the writer would talk about how the Grimms' collection reflected and shaped the concerns of German bourgeoisie. Etc. But it, like Freudian analysis, tends unfortunately toward reductionism; EVERYTHING ends up being an expression of German bourgeois concerns. I would mind those two schools less if they were more willing to admit of other interpretations.
I ended up doing less research on folktales than I expected to, so I'm not the best source to consult, but you might try looking up Maria Tatar's work. Or, if you want to approach it more from a craft-ish side of what makes folktales go, Vladimir Propp's Morphology of the Folktale (Russian-specific, but its general point is more extendable) and Max Luthi's The European Folktale may both be of interest to you.
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Date: 2011-10-17 06:41 pm (UTC)I ended up doing less research on folktales than I expected to, so I'm not the best source to consult, but you might try looking up Maria Tatar's work. Or, if you want to approach it more from a craft-ish side of what makes folktales go, Vladimir Propp's Morphology of the Folktale (Russian-specific, but its general point is more extendable) and Max Luthi's The European Folktale may both be of interest to you.