2018-19

The course examines the various forms of Greek folk handicraft, such as pottery, wood carving, copper working and the work of silver- and goldsmiths, weaving, painting and architecture. The course also examines folk theatre and the popular cinema, in terms of context, technique, subject and form and its products. Particular reference is made to traditional technology, to workshops and to their economic relations, to the social position of skilled workmen, product distribution networks and their contribution to the formation of popular taste.

The subject of the course is the study of religious folklore and, in particular, of the forms of popular religiousness and the traditional religious behavior of the Greeks. The course also examines forms of custom and ritual over time and in their contemporary manifestations. It places particular stress upon customs associated with the life cycle, the yearly festival calendar and on new forms of custom and ritual that define the life of contemporary man.