Diss.--München--Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität, 1990. / Bibliogr. p. 341-388. Notes bibliogr.

La question du trickster a toujours été posée en regard de l'autre (Alter) jamais du même (Ego). Même les recherches les plus contemporaines insistent pour reconnaître au trickster un certain archaïsme que seules les sociétés «primitives» ou les minorités visibles du monde occidental peuvent encore exprimer. Notre mémoire de maîtrise se conçoit comme une analyse conceptuelle dont les objectifs visent à poser la problématique du trickster dans le champ des recherches folkloriques contemporaines. On ne vise pas tant à découvrir les formes du trickster qu'à reconnaître le mouvement dont il est l'expression dans un contexte de modernité. Pour y parvenir, nous utilisons la notion d'objet traditionnel dans une perspective vivante et dynamique en regard du milieu qui le définit. Nous montrons que le trickster se présente comme une figure du passage, de la transition, à la frontière de la vie et de la mort, de l'ordre et du désordre. U s'agit d'un travail d'ordre épistémologique. / Québec Université Laval, Bibliothèque 2013

In the past few decades, Indian art has been available to the mainstream under the supervision of Western science and art history. For the sake of cultural survival and identity, countless Native artists, curators, critics, and writers have objected to these often wrongful and discriminating art histories and scientific classifications. Indian artists are re-writing their history from Native perspective, and as a result, the misrepresentation of Indian art has begun to be recognized by those working in contemporary art galleries and museums. Today many contemporary spaces support and give control of exhibitions to those who share in the Native perspective. However, these changes did not take place overnight; this was an exhausting battle for many contemporary First Nations artists and curators. Native reality is best understood through the trickster, who has always been known to First Nations people through oral traditions, and who is best described as a creator that is constantly transforming and shape-shifting. In using trickster strategies, Native artists are able to deconstruct and reconstruct ideas about Native people and their culture. According to many Native artists, this new discourse, called the “trickster shift,” has been around since the beginning, seeded in oral traditions, and it requires the Native perspective to decode these trickster undertakings properly. / xi, 161 leaves ; 29 cm.

Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Delaware, 2008. / Principal faculty advisor: Mary Jean Pfaelzer, Dept. of English. Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (M.A.)--Oregon State University, 2010. / Printout. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 72-75). Also available on the World Wide Web.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Wisconsin--Madison, 2002. / eContent provider-neutral record in process. Description based on print version record. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 262-275).

Whereas scholarly malcontents and naifs in late Renaissance drama represent the actual notion of university graduates during the time period, scholarly tricksters have an obscure social origin. Moreover, their lack of motive in participating in the plays' events, their ambivalent value structures, and their conflicting dramatic roles as tricksters, reformers, justices, and heroes pose a serious diffculty to literary critics who attempt to define them. By examining the Western dramatic tradition, this study first proposes that the scholarly tricksters have their origins in both the Vice in early Tudor plays and the witty slave in classical comedy. By incorporating historical, cultural, anthropological, and psychological studies, this essay also demonstrates that the scholarly tricksters are each a Jacobean version of the archetypal trickster, who is usually associated with solitary habits, motiveless intrusion, and a double function as selfish buffoon and cultural hero. Finally, this study shows that their ambivalent value structures reflect the nature of rhetorical training in Renaissance schools.

Thesis (M.A.)--Université de Sherbrooke, 1999. / Includes bibliographical references.

Tricksters and Trickery in Zulu Folktales is a research on one of the central themes in African, and particularly Nguni/Zulu folklore, in which the trickster figure plays a pivotal role. The Zulu form part of the Nguni group of the Kintu speaking populations in sub-Saharan Africa. Their oral traditions are based on those of the whole sub-continent, but also constitute significant innovations due to the Nguni's contacts with the Khoisan peoples and to the history that has shaped their reasoning processes. Folktales are an artistic reflection of the people's culture, history, way of life, attitudes to persons and events, springing from the observation of nature and of animal and human, behaviour, in order to create a "culture of the feelings" on which adult decisions are based. The present research is based on the concept of a semiotic communication system whereby folktale "texts" are considered as metaphors, to be de-coded from the literary, cultural and behavioural points of view. The system is employed to produce comic entertainement, as well as for education. A careful examination of the sources reveals the central role that observation of the open book of natural phenomena, and especially the observation of animal life, plays in the formulation of thought patterns and of the imagery bank on which all artistic expression is based, be it in the form of proverbs, or tales, or poetry. Animal observation shows that the small species need to act with some form of cunning in the struggle for survival. The employment of tricks in the tales can be either successful or unsuccessful, and this constitutes the fundamental division of the characters who are constantly associated with trickery. They apply deceiving patterns based on false contracts that create an illusion enabling the trickster to use substitution techniques. The same trick pattern is however widely employed, either successfully or unsuccessfully, by a score of other characters who are only "occasional tricksters", such as human beings, in order to overcome the challenge posed by external, often superior, forces, or simply in order to shape events to their own advantage. The original mould for the successful trickster figure in Kintu speaking Africa is the small Hare. The choice of this animal character points to the bewildered realization that small beings can only survive through guile in a hostile environment dominated by powerful killers. The Nguni/Zulu innovation consists of a composite character with a dual manifestation: Chakide, the slender mongoose, a small carnivorous animal, whose main folktale name is the diminutive Chakijana; and its counterpart Hlakanyana, a semi-human dwarf. The innovation contains a double value: the root ideophone hlaka points to an intelligent being, able to outwit his adversaries by "dissecting" all the elements of a situation in order to identify weaknesses that offer the possibility of defeating the enemy; and to "re-arrange" reality in a new way. This shows the ambivalent function of trickery as a force for both demolition and reconstruction. Chakijana, the small slender mongoose, is like the pan-African Hare in most respects, but with the added feature of being carnivorous, therefore a merciless killer. He makes use of all its powers to either escape larger animals, or to conquer other animals for food in order to survive. Hlakanyana, being semi-human, can interact with both humans and animals; Chakijana is mostly active in an animal setting. The unsuccessful trickster figure in Kintu speaking Africa is Hyena, an evil and powerful killer and scavenger, associated in popular belief with witches by reason of his nocturnal habits and grave digging activities. The Nguni/Zulu innovation is Izimu, a fictional semi-human being, traditionally interpreted as a cannibal, a merciless and dark man eater. Izimu is another composite figure, prevalently corresponding to Hyena, from which he draws most of his fictional characteristics. The figure further assimilates features of half-human, half-animal man-eating monsters known in the folklore of many African cultures, as well as the ogre figure prevalent in European tales. The anthropophagous aspect, taken as its prevalent characteristic by earlier researchers, is a rather secondary feature. The innovation from a purely animal figure (Hyena) to a semi-human one allows this character to interact mostly with human beings, thus expressing deeply felt human concerns and fears. Trickery is the hallmark of comedy, the art of looking at life from an upside-down point of view, to portray not the norm but the unexpected. Thus the metaphors contained in trickster folktales, as expressions of comedy, are rather difficult to decode. The ambivalence, so common in many manifestations of African culture, becomes prevalent in these tales. Human tricksters, who try to imitate the trick sequence, are successful if their aims can be justified in terms of culture and tradition; but are unsuccessful if their aims are disruptive of social harmony. Ambivalence is also predominant in "modern" trickster folktales, and in some manifestations of the trickster themes in recent literature. The trickster tradition is an important aspect of the traditions of the Zulu people, permeating social, educational and literary aspects of life and culture. The Nguni/Zulu innovations of Hlakanyana/Chakijana and of Izimu point to the dynamic and inner stability of the culture, a precious heritage and a force on which to build a great future. / Thesis (Ph.D.)-University of Natal, Durban, 1995.

Thesis (Ph.D.)--Tufts University, 1994. / Submitted to the Dept. of English. Adviser: Elizabeth Ammons. Includes bibliographical references (leaves [198]-209). Access restricted to members of the Tufts University community. Also available via the World Wide Web;