Bedouin Folktales from the North of Israel

"Bedouin Folktales from the North of Israel is a unique and outstanding publication. Actually it includes much more than an anthology of 'folktales.' It provides the reader with almost everything needed to understand life, culture, history, and language of the Bedouin women, men, family, and tribe in Northern Israel of the last century. Folklorists used to emphasize the importance of the context. This book is, ostensibly, an exemplary contextual publication and study of a given body of folktales: the history and geography (including maps), the language – including the original Arabic texts (in transcription), their folkloristic comparative study and interpretation, as well as an array of indexes and bibliography. It puts in our hands a rare and important tool for understanding the importance not only of Bedouin folklore but also of folklore at large. In addition to its scholarly importance, this is also a collection of narratives that will be an exciting read for every person who still loves a good story."—Eli Yassif, Emeritus in Department of Literature, Tel Aviv University, Israel

"Bedouin Folktales from the North of Israel is an outstanding contribution to the presently scarce fresh folktale collections from the field. Perez and Rosenhouse present a well-crafted balance between tale texts and theories advanced by scholars concerning these international tale-types. Indiana University Press is to be complimented for reviving the authentic field collection tradition."—Hasan M. El-Shamy, Professor Emeritus, Department of Folklore and Ethnomusicology, Indiana University

"This splendid collection of Bedouin folk tales combines three elements: scientific transcriptions of audio recordings of the colloquial Arabic texts; accurate translations; and an extensive discussion, with rich comparative material, of each tale. These elements fit together in the most natural fashion—all, in fact, are essential to a serious study of the subject—and yet this is, to the best of my knowledge, the very first work on Arab folklore that actually combines them. The authors are to be congratulated on a fine achievement."—Frank H. Stewart, Professor Emeritus, Dept. of Islamic and Middle Eastern Studies, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem

"William Blake's metaphor 'to see the world in a grain of sand' acquires a new meaning in the study of Judith Rosenhouse, a linguist, and Yoel Shalom Perez, a comparative folklorist, who present with meticulous precision the performance of universally traditional tales as told by Galilean Bedouins. As two Israelis, they reveal in them the cultural bonding between Israelite and Arab traditions that go back to antiquity."—Dan Ben-Amos, author of Folklore Concepts

"When linguistic, dialectological and folkloristic approaches meet: 57 traditional stories recorded from Bedouins in Northern Israel (13 of them translated from Hebrew) provided in linguistic transcription, English translation, and commentaries to place the folktales within their social and historical context. This ideal interdisciplinary approach has hitherto been only rarely applied."—Veronika Ritt-Benmimoun, University of Vienna

"This collection of 57 traditional Bedouin folktales from the North of Israel is an unprecedented treasure for researchers in a wide range of fields ranging from sociolinguistics and dialectology to folklore, anthropology, cultural studies, history of the Near East, oral literature, gender studies, and more. Rare long-term collaboration between a linguist specializing in Arabic dialects and a folklorist has resulted in rich academic analyses of stories, recorded precisely as told by elderly men and women from 13 tribes, meticulously transcribed and translated, with many linguistic notes. Each story is followed by a chapter of folkloristic analysis. Rounding it all up and completing the picture are an additional chapter on the Galilean Bedouin dialects and another one on the history of Bedouin settlement in the Galilee, and indices on tale types, motifs, and subjects. Highly recommended for all interested in the traditional oral culture of this intriguing area."—Roni Henkin, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Beer Sheva, Israel