ABSTRACT
Jordan takes a feminist look at legends about animals in people’s insides and, rather more briefly, traditions about “La Llorona,” the Weeping Woman. She asks what attitudes, ideology and worldview might be encoded in these stories as told by Mexican-American women. She discusses field-collected texts in the context of conversation and social and sexual mores. Rosan Jordan’s other work includes: “Sex Education and the Horrible Example Stories.” Folklore Forum 3 (1970): 124–27; “Ethnic Identity and the Lore of the Supernatural.” Journal of American Folklore 88 (1975):370-$2; and “A Note about Folklore and Literature (The Bosom Serpent Revisited).” Journal of American Folklore 86 (1973):62–65). The essay below is reprinted from Women’s Folklore, Women’s Culture, eds. Rosan Jordan and Susan Kalcik. 26–44. Publications of the American Folklore Society, NS no. 8. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press. 1985.
