Oral Traditions as Memory Systems

这项研究通过研究记忆中没有扭曲或改变的材料来研究人类记忆；它询问哪些属性为这些刺激提供了它们的稳定性。这些知识不仅将推动理论的发展，还将为如何准备更准确地回忆材料提供指导，特别是在无法使用书面记忆辅助工具的情况下使用。这项研究将专注于口述传统，这些传统已经在没有书写或其他外部记忆辅助的情况下传承了几代人。例如，目前在北卡罗来纳州海岸和山区演唱的民谣与数百年前不列颠群岛民俗学家收集的民谣只有很小的区别。这项研究将测试那些不会通过写下旧民谣并引用它们来保持其传统稳定性的歌手；相反，这些歌手会将民谣保留在记忆中，并通过口口相传来传播。歌手们不会死记硬背、单调乏味地学习民谣，而是利用好民谣的规则和局限性来减轻他们的记忆负担。总而言之，这项研究将在自然环境中研究记忆，在这种环境中，记忆似乎以一种近乎最佳的方式工作。这项研究将采用几种方法。一种是对北卡罗来纳州现有收藏和先前研究中收集的民谣和民间故事进行分析，从歌曲的意义、诗意和音乐方面进行限制。这些约束将被用来研究历史上发生的位置和种类的变化，以及单个歌手或讲故事的人的变化。这项研究将调查每个约束对记忆整体稳定性的贡献，无论是单独使用还是与其他限制组合使用。对这一传统知之甚少或一无所知的本科生将被要求学习几首民谣，看看他们的学习技能如何随着经验的提高而提高。通过这种方式，将研究在学习新的、高度结构化的材料方面的专业知识的发展。这项研究将探索由于口头和书面材料在理论和实践上的重要性而产生的差异。本科生将被要求在不同的条件下用口头或书面解释一个复杂的情况，研究将分析这两种情况下在句法、选词和整体组织方面的差异。生产方式造成的生产差异已被证明是巨大的。该研究项目将开始研究这些差异的机制。

This research approaches the study of human memory through the study of materials that are not distorted or changed in memory; it asks what properties afford these stimuli their stability. Such knowledge will not only advance theory, but will also provide guidance on how to prepare materials to be recalled more accurately, especially for use in situations where written memory aids cannot be used. The research will focus on oral traditions which have been handed down for generations without the aid of writing or other external memory aids. For instance, ballads currently sung on the coast and in the mountains of North Carolina differ only in minor ways from the ballads folklorists collected in the British Isles hundreds of years ago. This research will test singers who do not maintain the stability of their tradition by writing down the old ballads and referring to them; rather, these singers keep the ballads in memory and transmit them by word of mouth. The singers do not learn the ballads in a rote tedious fashion, but rather use the rules and limitations of a good ballad to ease their memory load. In sum, this research will study memory in a natural context where it appears to be working in a near-optimal fashion. The research will employ several methods. One is analysis of ballads and folktales from existing North Carolina collections and those collected in previous research in terms of the meaning, poetic, and musical constraints operating on the songs. These constraints will be used to study the location and kind of changes that occur over historical time as well as within a single singer or story teller. The research will investigate the contribution to the overall stability of memory of each constraint, taken individually or in combination with other constraints. Undergraduates who know little or nothing of the tradition will be asked to learn several ballads to see how their skills at learning imporve with experience. In this way, the development of expertise in learning new, highly structured material will be studied. The research will explore differences that are due to the material being produced orally as opposed to in writing, both for their theoretical and practical importance. Undergraduates will be asked to explain a complex situation either in speech or in writing under various conditions, and the research will analyze differences in the syntax, word choice, and overall organization in these two situations. Differences in production caused by the mode of production have been demonstrated to be substantial. The research project will begin to look at mechanisms for these differences.