From Genre Poetics to Structure: Nada Milošević-Djordjević's Contribution to Serbian Structural Folklore Studies

Abstract

This paper looks at the structural analyses of the composition of several oral literary genres in Serbian literature performed by Prof. Nada Milošević-Đorđević. By analyzing romantic tales, religious tales, tales of fate and sagas, Milošević-Đorđević, a renowned Serbian folklore scholar, has made original contributions to narrative semiotics and syntagmatic analysis. Taking as her starting point the morphology of Vladimir Propp but also of some other semioticians, she revised his narrative scheme, adapting it to the specific characteristics of these literary genres and also proposing an entirely original scheme for religious tales and tales of fate, thus becoming one of the first literary folklorists in Serbia to apply structural analysis.