FOLKLORE: MAPS & TERRITORIES

Editor: Joyce Bynum

PROVERBS

o DISCUSS PROVERBS in a short space is a difficult task, b u t . . . fools rush

in where angels fear to tread.
Proverbs appeal not only to folklorists but to students and scholars in many
fields, including semantics, art, anthropology, linguistics, literature, history,
law, business, advertising, psychology and religion.
Students of proverbs may concentrate on only one proverb or one type of
proverb. They may also collect or compare them, search for their history, translate them, describe their use, analyze their meaning and structure, or assemble bibliographies and collections. Fascination with the proverb is apparent
through the numerous articles on the subject: the journal Proverbium is devoted
solely to articles on the proverb, but many articles appear in other journals as
well. Two ofthe score of scholars who have devoted their entire careers to studying the proverb are Matti Kuusi of Finland and Wolfgang Mieder ofthe United
States.
The study of proverbs is called paremiology. Having defined the field of
endeavor, we might attempt to define a proverb, except that what constitutes
a proverb has been discussed and argued for years. Trying to distinguish
proverbs from aphorisms, cliches, slogans, adages, maxims and other sayings,
if indeed possible, would require a lengthy discourse probably unacceptable
to paremiologists; some have said that a definition ofthe proverb is impossible.^
Cervantes called proverbs "short sentences drawn from long experience."
Matti Kuusi calls them "monumenta humana." In English and American tradition they have been called "the wisdom of many and the wit of one" a version of "one man's wit and all men's wisdom" attributed to Lord John Russell,
who negotiated the end ofthe Seven Years War.2
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A definition based on an analysis of proverb structure is offered by Alan

Dundes: [a proverb] "appears to be a traditional propositional statement consisting of at least one descriptive element. . . consisting of a topic and a comment," thus making it impossible to have a one-word proverb. But there are
proverbs with just one descriptive element ("Money talks").^ There is also the
"equational proverb," which may take the form of A = A ("Business is business," "Boys will be boys"), or A =B ("Time is money," "Seeing is believing"),
and Dundes argues that other proverbs such as "He who laughs last laughs
best" and "Many men, many minds" are transformations ofthe A = B form.
Oppositional proverbs may take the form A 9^ B ("Two wrongs don't make a
right"); similarly, the formula may be A < BorA > B. The point is that "all
proverbs are potentially propositions which compare and/or contrast.'"* Interesting as this structural study is, the definition of a proverb as "topic and comment" isn't helpful in distinguishing it from other items such as riddles and
curses, or from slogans, aphorisms, and quotes.^
Although some folklorists stress the need to consider what the people believe
about an item of folklore and how they themselves classify and define it,^ one
scholar thinks an international "supercultural" definition is necessary, and has
offered this: "A proverb is a typically spoken, conversational form with didactic function and not associated with any particular source and necessarily in
relatively fixed form and fixed in meaning."^
Of course, many proverbs appear only in literature, but those in oral circulation are a part of folklore, and as such cannot be separated from their social
use; a folklorist has described them as ". . . short, traditional 'out-of-context'
statements used to further some social end."^
Proverbs are similar to poetry not only in their use of metaphor but also of
meter, rhythm, rhyme, parallelism and alliteration.^ Indeed, some common
proverbs are taken from poetic sources ("Fools rush in . . ." is from Essay on
Criticism by Pope), and others are poems in themselves:
Whistling girls and crowing hens
Will always come to some bad end.
OR
Girls that whistle and hens that crow
Will always have fun wherever they go.
Proverbs are very important in most societies in the world, particularly in
Africa; in a great many areas the feeling for imagery and for expressing ideas
poetically is apparent in Africans' use of proverbs. In oratory, legal cases, instruction and everyday conversation, proverbs and other metaphors are used very
frequently.^
Voiced in whole or in fragments, proverbs are widely used in America today,
representing perhaps the most active genre of folklore. Metaphorical proverbs
are used much more often than literal proverbs (aphorisms?) such as "Honesty

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Et cetera SPRING 1987

is the best policy". . . "The customer is always right". . . "Experience is the

best teacher."
Proverbs provide a ready-made answer, thus rescuing the speaker from thinking of an original phrase or course of action; personal opinions or advice are
usually not appreciated, in any case. In their use they are similar to superstitions, since both try to control anxiety situations, either actively to recommend
a specific, immediate course of action, ox passively to provide consolation.i 1
Archer Taylor, often called "the father of paremiology," said of proverbs, "As
a guide to life's problems, the proverb summarizes a situation, passes a judgment, or offers a course of action."i2 I have observed that not only proverbs
and superstitions but also quotes from printed sources and folk belief derived
from hearsay are used to control anxiety situations, and all may be introduced
with the same phrase, "Well, you know what they say . . ." However, proverbs
are received quite differently, and usually are conversation stoppers, whereas
other forms invite fiirther comment.
The introductory phrases used with proverbs are very important because
not only do they signal the listener to prepare for a certain type of information, but they also change the meaning of the proverb itself Whether the
speaker uses one ofthe common introductory phrases, such as: "My father
always used to d a y . . . , " "Well, you know what they say . . . , " "Well, you know
what /always say! . . .," or uses a proverb without an introduction, each would
change the meaning and impact ofthe proverb. The most common introduction to a proverb in the United States seems to be "Well, you know what they
say . . . , " the use of "they" providing an impersonal quality, a generalization.
The meaning of proverbs depends not only upon the words themselves but
also upon tone, stress, tempoi, pitch, gesture and mien ofthe speaker, the social
roles of both speaker and listener, and the context in which the proverb is used,
all of which are difficult to record.
All of us know proverbs which state opposite truths: "Absence makes the heart
grow fonder" but "Out of sight, out of m i n d " . . . and "Look before you leap"
but "He who hesitates is lost." The point is that the proverb doesn't have to be
true, it merely has to sound taxe.. Also, an individual proverb can have different meanings to more than one listener. "A rolling stone gathers no moss" is
often used as illustration. One informant, an editor ofEt cetera, interprets this
proverb to mean that if people move around too much and change jobs too often,
they won't be able to accumulate the comforts oflife. Another interprets this
proverb to mean that people should keep busy and active, thus preventing rust
and stagnation. To strengthen his claim that moss is undesirable, he points to
our use of "moss back" and "mossy" in an undesirable way. Both of these
interpretations illustrate the English and the Scottish versions; it is claimed
that in England the allusion is to the desirable qualities ofthe moss foimd draped
over stones in a peaceful brook, whereas in Scotland it is to a stone roller, which
cannot be left idle or it will accumulate undesirable moss.^3
As you can see, a discussion of proverbs can be almost never-ending. In the

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next issue, we will discuss: Proverbs in contemporary life; Collections and collecting of proverbs; Examples and ideas from our readers.
Your comments are welcome, because, after all, two heads are better than
one, and there is safety in numbers. . . but, then again, could too many cooks
spoil the broth?

NOTES AND REFERENCES

1. Archer Taylor, The Proverb, (Hatboro, Pennsylvania, 1962), p. 3.
2. Archer Taylor, "The Wisdom of Many and the Wit of One." In: Mieder and Alan Dundes,
Eds., (New York & London: Garland Publishing, Inc., 1981), p. 3.
3. Alan Dundes, "On the Structure ofthe Proverb." In: W. Mieder and A. Dundes, ibid.,
p. 43-64.
4. Alan Dundes, ibid., p. 53.
5. Neal R. Norrick, How Proverbs Mean: Semantic Studies in English Proverbs. Trends in
Linguistics: Studies and Monographs 27, Werner Winter, Ed. (Berlin, New York,
Amsterdam, Mouton, 1985), p. 57.
6. Dan Ben-Amnos, "Analytical Categories and Ethnic Genres," Genre 2(1969), 275-301.
7. Neal R. Norrick, op. cit., p. 79.
8. Peter Seitel, "A Social Use of Metaphor." In: W. Mieder and A Dundes, op. cit., p. 124.
9. S. J. Sackett, "Poetry and Folklore: Some Points of Affinity," Journal of American Folklore 77 (1964), pp. 143-153.
10. Ruth Finnegan, "Proverbs in Africa." In: W. Mieder and A. Dundes, op. cit., pp. 10-42.
11. Roger D. Abrahams, "A Rhetoric of Everyday Life: Traditional Conversational Genres,"
Southern Folklore Quarterly 32 (1968), p. 47.
12. Archer Taylor, "The Study of Proverbs," Proverbium 1 (1965), p. 7.
13. G. B. Milner, "What is a Proverb?" New Society 6, 332 (1969), pp. 199-202. See also G.
Kirshenblatt-Gimblett, "Toward a Theory of Proverb Meaning," in Mieder and Dimdes,
op. cit., pp. 111-121.