Oral Lore
Oral Lore is that part of folklore that is transmitted orally. It is the stories, legends, myths of a people. The key things are the fact that the narrative is transmitted from person to person (as opposed to in a medium such as film or paper), but there are some other common factors as well. In order for it to be folklore, it has to be of the folk and not part of elite culture or pop culture. That means that generally the author is not known, although there are exceptions to this rule in cases such as memorates and personal experience narratives. The truth is that every definition has problems. The best way to understand oral lore is to dive in and see the categories of folklore that fall under oral lore, and some examples of oral lore, as best as they can be reproduced in this medium. According to a class handout of mine by Genelle Morain, some of the categories of oral lore are: