Memory in Oral Traditions
The Cognitive Psychology of Epic, Ballads, and Counting-out Rhymes
Cognitive science applied to oral tradition: how rhyme, rhythm and imagery carried the Iliad before writing.
Rubin applies cognitive psychology to material carried for centuries without writing: epics, ballads and counting-out rhymes. He shows how rhyme, rhythm, imagery and formula constrain what can be remembered, and how the ancients understood things about memory only rediscovered recently.
Recommended by 1 Person
Joshua Foer
This is such a good book. He applies learning from cognitive science to help us understand oral traditions, stories passed down by word of mouth, including The Iliad and The Odyssey. He takes a cross-disciplinary approach. One of the things he writes about is that the ancients understood things about cognition that have only been rediscovered recently.
Interview · October 2012
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