"Big 'Fraid and Little 'Fraid": An Afro-American folktale

by John Minton

Though devoted specifically to the life history of the anecdote folklorists know as Tale Type 1676A/Motif K1682.1, Big 'Fraid and Little 'Fraid, this study more generally assess the manner in which the circuitous epistemology of the tale indices compiled by, or in emulation of, Antti Aarne and Stith Thompson covertly subverted Richard Dorson's controversial conclusions concerning the origins of Afro-American oral narratives, as well as the arguments of those who have challenged his position. In rewriting the accepted account of a single story, then, this essay simultaneously discovers a more fundamental and far-reaching misunderstanding of type and motif indices as aids in identifying the provenience of folktales.

Paperback

Published January 1, 1993

About the author

Francis John Minton was an English painter, illustrator, stage designer and teacher. After studying in France, he became a teacher in London, and at the same time maintained a consistently large output of works. In addition to landscapes, portraits and other paintings, some of them on an unusually large scale, he built up a reputation as an illustrator of books.

In the mid-1950s, Minton found himself out of sympathy with the abstract trend that was then becoming fashionable, and felt increasingly sidelined. He suffered psychological problems, self-medicated with alcohol, and in 1957 died by suicide.