This study examines how the classification system is accepted as something with an order and how folk tales related to women and folk tales as a whole are perceived. The ultimate purpose of this study is to review the order of the discourse on which t...
This study examines how the classification system is accepted as something with an order and how folk tales related to women and folk tales as a whole are perceived. The ultimate purpose of this study is to review the order of the discourse on which the preexisting folk tale classification is based and to seek methods of categorizing women-oriented folk tales. Duk-Soon Chang’s Study on Korean Folk Tale Literature (1970) is a representative example of realistic classification. In this classification system, folk tales are perceived as something that reflects life. Dong-Il Cho’s Comprehensive Collection of Korean Folklore Literature (1985) categorization is a typical illustration of the idealistic classification. Here, folk tales are understood not as products of society, but as autonomous objects with innate reasoning. The order of distinct discourses allows the same object to be recognized in different ways.
The Study on Korean Folk Tale Literature classification contains an image of a categorized linkage or a chain of reality. Such a linkage or chain is bound to reveal a world where connection does not occur, and women-related folk tales are located at the disconnected points of such a linkage or chain. In this classification model, women’s various experiences and richness in character are omitted or downsized. In the Comprehensive Collection of Korean Folklore Literature classification, folk tales are zoned into certain sizes according to their own logics. However, with the absence of a separate section for gender, folk tales related to women are dismantled and arranged randomly into different sections. The production and acceptance of a folk tale classification have followed a long path in the direction of planning and approving the omission and dismantlement of women folk tales.
Women-related folk tales are often scaled down or posited in the periphery, depending on the patriarchal ideology. At times, they seem degenderized due to myths related to objectivity and neutrality. There is a need for a method of classifying women-related folk tales without being indicated by or easily declaring freedom from patriarchal ideology. Lastly, for classification, this study questions the type of fiction of which we are in need, instead of something that is non-fiction.