The price of glass slippers: Folklore, intellectual property, and neoliberalism

Abstract

This research presents a theoretical framework to illustrate the way that individualism facilitates the exploitation of communal goods, particularly in connection with the commodification of folklore present in neoliberal society. Although contemporary folklorists understand folklore as the product of mutually sharing traditions – a peer-to-peer and collaborative process which continuously evolves through community participation – the insertion and prioritization of the individual by historical folklore collectors, copyright law, and neoliberal ideology functions to transform the creation and dissemination of folklore into an individual’s intellectual property. The positioning of the individual above the community in the folklore process serves the purpose of copyright, a system designed to reward the author figure, the solitary and individual genius, and coincides with the ideology of neoliberalism, which places further emphasis on the individual, validating the increase of protection of physical and intellectual property through privatization and commodification.