LYCOS RETRIEVER 
Trickster Tales: Cultures
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To the civilized reader, perhaps the most incongruous feature of the trickster tales is the frequent identification of the buffoon with the culture hero. Such identification is found over a large part of the continent. In one set of tales, for example, Manabozho is a beneficent being, bringing culture and light to his people (No. iv); in another (No. xxiv), he is the incarnation of greediness, lust, cruelty, and stupidity. As Professor Boas has shown, even the acts of benevolence of such trickster demigods are often mere accidental by-products of baser motives.
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This lesson plan from EDSITEment introduces students to folktales, such as fables and trickster tales, from around the world. Students become familiar with different folklore traditions and genres, as well as the process of the oral transmission of culture and history. This lesson plan comprises a series of activities that include reading, writing, and literary analysis. Also included is an internet research activity, as well as a list of links to related resources.
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In the Northwestern tribes there is a popular trickster figure, mostly known as Raven, Blue Jay or Mink. He is not only a buffoon but ... a "transformer," that is, a person who modelled the earth after its creation. Of course this brings in the religious aspect. However, the pioneer of anthropological work among the North Pacific groups, Franz Boas, while acknowledging the features of a culture hero, prefers to see the Raven etc. as a joker and caricature of man with a strong libido. He writes:
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Drawing from the most influential scholarship on Native American tricksters, Ballinger shows how many critics have failed to consider both the specifics of trickster stories and their cultural contexts. Each chapter concentrates on a particular aspect of the trickster theme, such as the trickster’s ambiguous personality, the variety of trickster roles, and the trickster’s role as social critic. Ballinger further considers issues of sex, gender, and humor, the use of trickster tales as instructions on social values and community control, and the trickster as an emblem of modern Indian survival.
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It was in these days that the breadth of the trickster and culture hero concept was determined. The trickster is to a large extent formed by the stories about him. Although Stith Thompson, a non-anthropological folklorist, has stated that we cannot "with any strictness" speak of a trickster cycle it is apparent that in most areas of North America there is a tendency to group the same series of narratives around the trickster (Thompson 1946:319, 1966:294). Most stories evidently portray him as both a clever deceiver and a numbskull. The question is, where does the benevolent culture hero come in?
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ANANSI The spider, Anansi (Anancy) is perhaps the most famous trickster among young children. He originated in West Africa and was brought to western culture because of the slaves and is found in tales from the Southern U.S. and Jamaica.
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