Folklore is the body of expressive culture, including tales,
music, dance, legends, oral history, proverbs, jokes, popular
beliefs, customs, and so forth within a particular population
comprising the traditions (including oral traditions) of that
culture, subculture, or group. It is also the set of practices
through which those expressive genres are shared. The academic
and usually ethnographic study of folklore is sometimes called
folkloristics. The word 'folklore' was first used by the English
antiquarian William Thoms in a letter published by the London
Journal Athenaeum in 1846.1 In usage, there is a continuum
between folklore and mythology. Stith Thompson made a major
attempt to index the motifs of both folklore and mythology,
providing at outline into which new motifs can be placed, and
scholars can keep track of all older motifs. The concept of
folklore developed as part of the 19th century ideology of
romantic nationalism, leading to the reshaping of oral
traditions to serve modern ideological goals;