Since the collapse of socialism, Bulgaria’s population has been on the move—out of rural regions and into cities, or out of the country altogether. Yet today there is a countermovement of young, urban Bulgarians, born after 1989, seeking to repopulate rural villages and reclaim traditional Bulgarian folklife. Though many of these young Bulgarians have no direct experience with a rural lifestyle nor personal nostalgic memories of thriving village life, their actions and movements are inspired by a nostalgic vision of the past. And so, beyond a spatial return, this rural revitalization movement speaks to visions of an alternate future, one inspired by dismay with the conditions of contemporary life.

Using ethnographic and folkloristic methods, Sarah Craycraft paints a complex, detailed picture of Europeanization on the ground, carried out through neoliberal folklife projects as they collide with ongoing efforts to build a revitalized civil society in the ruins of the past. Contextualized within a particular Southeast European nation, the study speaks to broader questions of rural revival, public-facing culture work, intergenerational folklore, and the imbrication of folklore with politics and culture.
 

Volcanoes in Old Norse Mythology details how Viking Age Icelanders, migrating from Scandinavia to a new and volcanically active environment, used Old Norse mythology to understand and negotiate the hazards of the island. These pre-Christian myths recorded in medieval Iceland expound an indigenous Icelandic theory on volcanism that revolves around the activities of supernatural beings, such as the fire-demon Surtr and the gods Odin and Thor. Before the Icelanders were introduced to Christianity and its teachings, they formulated an indigenous theory of volcanism on basis of their traditional mythology much like other indigenous peoples across the world.

This volume presents a collection of the Faroese ballads about the Völsung hero Sjúrður, the pre-eminent dragon-slaying hero of the Germanic Middle Ages, in English translation accompanied by the Faroese original. The ballads show that far from being culturally isolated, the Faroe Islands were an integral part of the Germanic storytelling tradition in the Middle Ages and later. The in-depth introduction explores the Faroese storytelling tradition as preserved in the ballads, which are still danced and performed today, and highlights the vibrancy of the tradition in contemporary culture. The publication and research history of the Faroese ballads is outlined, and summaries of each ballad are provided. These translations are an essential resource for anybody interested in medieval heroic literature.