Thomas Mckean
Biographic Data
| ID | 709212 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Thomas Mckean |
| GIVEN NAMES | Thomas |
| FAMILY NAME | Mckean |
| SIGNATURE | MCKEAN T |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Aberdeen |
| VERIFIED | No |
| TOTAL WORKS | 14 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 3 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 14 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1998 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2025 |
| H-INDEX | 1 |
Privilege, Power, and Accountability
This 15-part forum challenges the Journal of American Folklore's readership to contemplate explicitly and publicly what we should do about the professional legacies of colleagues in our field who are known to or alleged to have harmed others through sexual harassment and gender discrimination. An introduction by the forum's curator Lisa Gilman is followed by 14 essays representing a diversity of viewpoints from members of the American Folklore So…
A multi-tiered mentoring community approach to research experiences for local students from disadvantaged and underrepresented minority backgrounds
Introduction A research and mentoring program was developed to provide local first-generation students, students returning to school after a professional experience, and underrepresented minority students resources and relationships to guide them toward a STEM degree from a four-year university. Methods A multi-tiered mentoring community was formed including direct mentoring from graduate students and faculty advisors, peer mentoring among underg…
Elizabeth Campbell Stewart (1939–2022)
Multi-Layered Communication and Function in Scottish Traveller Cant
Scottish Traveller Cant, a secret cover language used for communication in small groups and families, has changed in both context and function over the last century. From being a cryptolect used entirely within the culture it has now received exposure through Traveller performance and publications. Throughout these developments, the Cant continues to be a way for Travellers to control the narrative of who they are and who they wish to be. Using s…
Willie Mathieson and the Primary Audience for Traditional Song
Focusing on the song notebooks of William Mathieson (1879–1958), a farmworker in North-East Scotland, this essay examines the role of tradition in one man’s life, proposing that people learn, preserve, and perform folklore largely for themselves. Mathieson’s material is preserved as handwritten and typed texts, along with cylinder and tape recordings, made across more than half a century by three collectors: James Madison Carpenter, Hamish Hender…
Stories beyond the Text
This paper looks at the relationship between sung and spoken narrative in a present-day Scottish Traveler family, focusing on a series of family stories about King James V (1512–1542). The stories are told in relation to a pair of ballads, “The Jolly Beggar” and “The Gaberlunyie Man” (Child 279 and 279 Appendix) and through them I explore the function, meaning, and continued relevance of contextualizing narratives, which fill in gaps in plot, anc…
Stewartship and Evolving Fidelity in a Scottish Fire Festival
This paper looks at a Scottish fire festival, the “burning of the Clavie” at Burghead in the North East of Scotland, and its practitioners in relation to external authorities, particularly the police and regional political administrators. Internal and external pressures for change and stability are examined and author explores the negotiation between insiders and outsiders that co-create the ritual as it is practiced today. *** V razpravi avtor n…
Fragments and Meaning in Traditional Song
Reviewed by: Fragments and Meaning in Traditional Song: From the Blues to the Baltic Thomas A. McKean Fragments and Meaning in Traditional Song: From the Blues to the Baltic. By Mary-Ann Constantine and Gerald Porter. Fwd. by Barre Toelken. (Oxford: Oxford University Press for the British Academy, 2003. Pp. xiii + 261, preface, index.) What are we to make of a novelist's use of a single line of a song, or a singer's performance [End Page 119] of …
Fragments and Meaning in Traditional Song
Book Review| January 01 2007 Fragments and Meaning in Traditional Song: From the Blues to the Baltic Fragments and Meaning in Traditional Song: From the Blues to the Baltic, Mary-Ann Constantine and Gerald Porter. Thomas A. McKean Thomas A. McKean Search for other works by this author on: This Site Google Journal of American Folklore (2007) 120 (475): 119–121. https://doi.org/10.2307/4137891 Cite Icon Cite Share Icon Share Facebook Twitter Linked…
The Flowering Thorn. International Ballad Studies
The flowering thorn expresses the dual nature of the ballad: at once a distinctive expression of European tradition, but also somewhat tricky to approach from a scholarly perspective, requiring a range of disciplines to illuminate its rich composition. Most of this latter quality has to do with the very features that characterize ballads...or narrative songs. These include an appearance of fragmentation; a wide range of cultural and social refere…
Equating traditional singers' terms with melodic adaptation
This paper addresses the difficult question of musical aesthetics, analysing how singers describe melodic qualities in a textually conservative ballad tradition. Drawing on fieldwork in the North East of Scotland, it begins to compile a basic vocabulary for melodic description from within the tradition
The Fieldwork Legacy of James Macpherson
Discussions of James Macpherson and his work largely overlook his fieldwork techniques. Drawing on his own writings and the testimonies of his contemporaries, this article examines how motive, expectations, and early collecting work came together to form a pioneering fieldwork methodology for Gaelic culture. Macpherson's initial processing of material is also discussed, raising issues relevant today: the merits of different recording methods, tra…
You Make Me Dizzy Miss Lizzie’
Naturally, any folklorist goes into the field with a notion of what he or she wants to find and therefore neglects a good deal of what else is there and sometimes we even miss what is most important to the contributors themselves. The contributors are often just as predisposed to a certain kind of material as the fieldworker, especially in a patch as well worked over as the North East of Scotland where they know what is wanted. Folklorists have b…
Celtic Music and the Growth of the Feis Movement in the Scottish Highlands
Traditional music has been a part of Highland life for centuries, long before current marketability of term Celtic. In recent years, however, there has been a major revival of social and commercial interest in genre of tradition that is demonstrably Celtic: song tradition. Through influence of commercial groups like Capercaillie and Altan, and before them Runrig, Clannad and 0 Domhnaill family, for instance, song has made a striking comeback. Cap…
Celtic Music and the Growth of the Feis Movement in the Scottish Highlands
Traditional music has been a part of Highland life for centuries, long before current marketability of term Celtic. In recent years, however, there has been a major revival of social and commercial interest in genre of tradition that is demonstrably Celtic: song tradition. Through influence of commercial groups like Capercaillie and Altan, and before them Runrig, Clannad and 0 Domhnaill family, for instance, song has made a striking comeback. Cap…
Privilege, Power, and Accountability
This 15-part forum challenges the Journal of American Folklore's readership to contemplate explicitly and publicly what we should do about the professional legacies of colleagues in our field who are known to or alleged to have harmed others through sexual harassment and gender discrimination. An introduction by the forum's curator Lisa Gilman is followed by 14 essays representing a diversity of viewpoints from members of the American Folklore So…
Celtic Music and the Growth of the Feis Movement in the Scottish Highlands
Traditional music has been a part of Highland life for centuries, long before current marketability of term Celtic. In recent years, however, there has been a major revival of social and commercial interest in genre of tradition that is demonstrably Celtic: song tradition. Through influence of commercial groups like Capercaillie and Altan, and before them Runrig, Clannad and 0 Domhnaill family, for instance, song has made a striking comeback. Cap…
You Make Me Dizzy Miss Lizzie’
Naturally, any folklorist goes into the field with a notion of what he or she wants to find and therefore neglects a good deal of what else is there and sometimes we even miss what is most important to the contributors themselves. The contributors are often just as predisposed to a certain kind of material as the fieldworker, especially in a patch as well worked over as the North East of Scotland where they know what is wanted. Folklorists have b…
The Fieldwork Legacy of James Macpherson
Discussions of James Macpherson and his work largely overlook his fieldwork techniques. Drawing on his own writings and the testimonies of his contemporaries, this article examines how motive, expectations, and early collecting work came together to form a pioneering fieldwork methodology for Gaelic culture. Macpherson's initial processing of material is also discussed, raising issues relevant today: the merits of different recording methods, tra…
Equating traditional singers' terms with melodic adaptation
This paper addresses the difficult question of musical aesthetics, analysing how singers describe melodic qualities in a textually conservative ballad tradition. Drawing on fieldwork in the North East of Scotland, it begins to compile a basic vocabulary for melodic description from within the tradition
The Flowering Thorn. International Ballad Studies
The flowering thorn expresses the dual nature of the ballad: at once a distinctive expression of European tradition, but also somewhat tricky to approach from a scholarly perspective, requiring a range of disciplines to illuminate its rich composition. Most of this latter quality has to do with the very features that characterize ballads...or narrative songs. These include an appearance of fragmentation; a wide range of cultural and social refere…
Fragments and Meaning in Traditional Song
Reviewed by: Fragments and Meaning in Traditional Song: From the Blues to the Baltic Thomas A. McKean Fragments and Meaning in Traditional Song: From the Blues to the Baltic. By Mary-Ann Constantine and Gerald Porter. Fwd. by Barre Toelken. (Oxford: Oxford University Press for the British Academy, 2003. Pp. xiii + 261, preface, index.) What are we to make of a novelist's use of a single line of a song, or a singer's performance [End Page 119] of …
Fragments and Meaning in Traditional Song
Book Review| January 01 2007 Fragments and Meaning in Traditional Song: From the Blues to the Baltic Fragments and Meaning in Traditional Song: From the Blues to the Baltic, Mary-Ann Constantine and Gerald Porter. Thomas A. McKean Thomas A. McKean Search for other works by this author on: This Site Google Journal of American Folklore (2007) 120 (475): 119–121. https://doi.org/10.2307/4137891 Cite Icon Cite Share Icon Share Facebook Twitter Linked…
Stewartship and Evolving Fidelity in a Scottish Fire Festival
This paper looks at a Scottish fire festival, the “burning of the Clavie” at Burghead in the North East of Scotland, and its practitioners in relation to external authorities, particularly the police and regional political administrators. Internal and external pressures for change and stability are examined and author explores the negotiation between insiders and outsiders that co-create the ritual as it is practiced today. *** V razpravi avtor n…
Stories beyond the Text
This paper looks at the relationship between sung and spoken narrative in a present-day Scottish Traveler family, focusing on a series of family stories about King James V (1512–1542). The stories are told in relation to a pair of ballads, “The Jolly Beggar” and “The Gaberlunyie Man” (Child 279 and 279 Appendix) and through them I explore the function, meaning, and continued relevance of contextualizing narratives, which fill in gaps in plot, anc…
Willie Mathieson and the Primary Audience for Traditional Song
Focusing on the song notebooks of William Mathieson (1879–1958), a farmworker in North-East Scotland, this essay examines the role of tradition in one man’s life, proposing that people learn, preserve, and perform folklore largely for themselves. Mathieson’s material is preserved as handwritten and typed texts, along with cylinder and tape recordings, made across more than half a century by three collectors: James Madison Carpenter, Hamish Hender…
Multi-Layered Communication and Function in Scottish Traveller Cant
Scottish Traveller Cant, a secret cover language used for communication in small groups and families, has changed in both context and function over the last century. From being a cryptolect used entirely within the culture it has now received exposure through Traveller performance and publications. Throughout these developments, the Cant continues to be a way for Travellers to control the narrative of who they are and who they wish to be. Using s…
Elizabeth Campbell Stewart (1939–2022)
A multi-tiered mentoring community approach to research experiences for local students from disadvantaged and underrepresented minority backgrounds
Introduction A research and mentoring program was developed to provide local first-generation students, students returning to school after a professional experience, and underrepresented minority students resources and relationships to guide them toward a STEM degree from a four-year university. Methods A multi-tiered mentoring community was formed including direct mentoring from graduate students and faculty advisors, peer mentoring among underg…
Privilege, Power, and Accountability
This 15-part forum challenges the Journal of American Folklore's readership to contemplate explicitly and publicly what we should do about the professional legacies of colleagues in our field who are known to or alleged to have harmed others through sexual harassment and gender discrimination. An introduction by the forum's curator Lisa Gilman is followed by 14 essays representing a diversity of viewpoints from members of the American Folklore So…
Art (11 works) · History (10 works) · Literature (8 works) · Sociology (6 works) · Ballad (5 works) · Folklore, Mythology, and Literature Studies (5 works) · Historical Studies of British Isles (5 works) · Scottish History and National Identity (5 works) · Aesthetics (4 works) · Law (4 works)