Syroid O. The Spiritual Song in the Ukrainian Oral Tradition of the First Half of the 19th c.: Issues of Functioning and Interpretation

The paper attempts at a special research into the spiritual song in Ukrainian Folklore Studies. It accentuates some historical moments of the edition practice as incipient in the studies of the Ukrainian spiritual song from the folk repertoire. The research presents the history of recording, printing, and studying the texts of spiritual songs of the Ukrainian oral tradition in the earliest period of its history. Systematization is made of the material containing information on the distribution of individual samples of spiritual songs in the Ukrainian oral tradition. Some theoretical generalizations on genre features, terminology, genesis, periodization, classification are attempted. The work emphasizes the expediency of parallel study of folklore and book folklorized specimens. Certain problems of research into the Ukrainian spiritual song as a complex and multifaceted phenomenon of the oral tradition are determined.