John Shaw

Honorary Fellow

Biography

Background

  • Training in Celtic Studies and Linguistics
  • Extensive fieldwork on Gaelic oral tradition/folklore on Cape Breton Island, Nova Scotia
  • Gaelic language instructor
  • Civil servant and Gaelic Development Officer in the Highlands and Islands
  • Lecturer in Celtic, King's College, University of Aberdeen
  • Senior Lecturer in Scottish Ethnology, School of Scottish Studies, University of Edinburgh

CV

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Qualifications

BA, MA, PhD Harvard University

Undergraduate teaching

Lectures on request on Traditional Narrative and Emigrant Traditions for C&SS.

Research summary

  • Gaelic ethnology (oral narrative, song and traditional music)
  • Comparative mythology
  • Social contexts of storytelling and song
  • Native taxonomies
  • Emigrant Scottish traditions
  • The interface between academic research and language/culture maintenance and development including applications of digital technology to folklore materials.

Current research interests

All of the above.

Project activity

  • Principal Investigator: 'Reconnecting with Gaelic Scotland's Community Traditions: The Legacy of Calum Iain Maclean's Collecting'. AHRC Follow on Funding £95,792. 2012-
  • Principal Investigator: ‘A Searchable, Standards Based Catalogue of the Calum Maclean Collection of Gaelic Oral Narrative’. A research project funded by AHRC 2006-2009. Funding: £306,000. The Calum Maclean Collection Online Catalogue Project, funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC), aims to make a major collection of material central to Scottish Ethnology available in digital form as an accessible and flexible research resource. The project is based at the School of Scottish Studies in the Department of Scottish and Celtic Studies at the University of Edinburgh, and is partnered with University College, Dublin.
  • Tobar an Dualchais/Kist o’ Riches Project. Steering Committee and Advisory Board (a national digitisation project to provide wider access to Gaelic and Scots archived sound recordings. Funding: £2.8 m). 2004-

 

Joe Neil MacNeil. Tales until Dawn/Sgeul gu Latha: The World of a Cape Breton Gaelic Story‑Teller. Edited and translated by John Shaw.  Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press; Montreal: McGill‑Queen's University Press  1987. pp. 483.

MacLellan, Lauchie. Brìgh an Òrain/A Story in Every Song. The Songs and Tales of Lauchie MacLellan. Edited and translated by John Shaw. McGill Queen's University Press 2000. xvii + 432 pp.

The Blue Mountains and Other Gaelic Stories from Cape Breton/Na Beanntaichean Gorma. Agus Sgeulachdan Eile à Ceap Breatainn. Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press 2007. xxi + 216 pp.

'The Ethnography of Speaking and Verbal Taxonomies: Some Applications to Gaelic' in Celtic Connections. Proceedings of the 10th International Congress of Celtic Studies. Ed. Ronald Black, William Gillies and Roibeard Ó Maolalaigh. East Linton, East Lothian: Tuckwell Press 1997; 308-23.

"The Loathly Lady among the Féinn and her North Atlantic Travels". In Islanders and Water-Dwellers. Proceedings of the Celtic-Nordic-Baltic Folklore Symposium. Ed. Patricia Lysaght, Séamas Ó Catháin, Dáthi Ó hOgáin. Dublin: DBA Publications for the Department of Irish Folklore 1999: 299-316.

"Gaelic and Cape Breton English" in Tristram, Hildegard L.C. (ed and intro.); Bunsmann, Meinolf (bibliography). The Celtic Englishes. Heidelberg:Universitätsverlag C. Winter, 1997: 308-19.

"Brief Beginnings: Nova Scotian and Old World Bards Compared". Scottish Gaelic Studies 17 (Festschrift for Prof. D.S. Thomson [1994]): 342-55.

''Sa Chomann Ghrinn: Sùil air Seinn, Sluagh agus Coimhearsnachd' in Téada Dúchais. Aistí in ómós don Ollamh Breandán Ó Madagáin. In eagar aig Máirtín Ó Briain agus Pádraig Ó Héalaí. Indreabhán: Cló Iar-Chonnachta 2002: 499-520.

What Alexander Carmichael Did Not Print: The Cliar Sheanchain, 'Clanranald's Fool' and Related Traditions'. Béaloideas 70 (2002): 99-126.

‘The Collectors: John Francis Campbell and Alexander Carmichael’ in Edinburgh History of Scottish Literature vol. 2. Ed. Susan Manning and Ian Brown. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press 2007: 347-52.  ISBN 10 0 7486 2481 3.

‘Indo-European Dragon-Slayers and Healers, and the Irish Account of Dian Cécht and Méiche.’ JIES  34: 153-82.

‘Storytellers in Scotland: Context and Function’.  Oral Literature and Performance Culture. A Compendium of Scottish Ethnology. Vol 9 Ed. John Beech et al. Edinburgh: John Donald 2007: 28-41.

‘Scottish Narrative Overseas’. Oral Literature and Performance Culture. A Compendium of Scottish Ethnology. Vol 9 Ed. John Beeech et al. Edinburgh: John Donald 2007: 58-63.

‘(E)migrating Legends and Sea-Change’.Folklore: Electronic Journal of Folklore 37: 43-58.

‘Between Two Waves: The Mythological Origins of the Kantele and How Music First Came to the Western Isles’. In Emily Lyle: The Persistent Scholar. Ed. Francis J. Fischer and Sigrid Rieuwerts. Trier: Wissenschftlicher Verlag Trier 2007: 258-67.

‘Gaelic Oral Poetry in Scotland: Its Nature, Collection and Dissemination’. FFN 33 (December 2007): 3-11.

‘A Gaelic Eschatological Folktale, Celtic Cosmology and Dumézil’s “Three Realms”’: JIES 35 3/4 (2007): 249-74.

‘Gaelic/Norse Folklore Contacts’ and Oral Traditions from the West of Scotland. In Proceedings of the Celtic-Nordic-Baltic Folklore Symposium. Ed. Terry Gunnell.  Reykjavik:  University of Iceland Press, 2008: 235-72.

'What Gaels Communicate through Song and Singing'. In Pekka Huttu-Hiltunen Song as Cultural Communication. Runolaulu-Akatemian julkaisuja nro. 16. Finland 2011: 21-33.

‘Dà Exempla à Ceap Breatainn’. Atlantic Currents. Essays on Lore, Literature and Language. Essays in Honour of Séamas Ó Catháin. Ed. Bo Almqvist et al. Dublin: UCD Press, 2012.

‘On Indo-European Cosmic Structure: Models, Comparisons, Contexts’. Cosmos 28 (2012): 57-76.

 ‘Scottish Traditional Tales: Distributions and Prehistory.  Cosmos 32 (2016): 39-62.

 ‘Fashioner Gods in Ireland and India: the Dagda and Tvaṣṭr’. Celtic Myth in the 21st Century. Ed. Emily Lyle. University of Wales Press, 2018: 149-62.

‘The Dagda, Thor and ATU 1148B: Analogues, Parallels, or Correspondences?’  Temenos - Nordic Journal of Comparative Religion, 2019:  97-120.      

‘Mythological Aspects of the “Return Song” Theme and their Counterparts in North-western Europe. Nouvelle Mythologie Comparée 6, 2021: 5-30.

‘An Interpretation of “how the Wran come out of Ailssay” (Gavin Douglas,

The Palice of Honour, l. 1713) as a Version of the Cumulative Tale “Henny Penny”. (Co-authored with Emily Lyle). Scottish Studies 39, 2022:  221-227.

‘The Grimms, Scotland and “This New Science of ‘Storyology’”. In Grimm Ripples. Ed Terry Gunnell, Reykjavik. In Grimm Ripples: The Legacy of the Grimms’ Deutsche Sagen in Northern Europe. Ed. Terry Gunnell. Brill, Leiden, 2022: 288-315.

Dhá Leagan Déag: Léargais Nua ar an Sean-Nós. Philip Fogarty, Tiber Falzett and Lillis Ó Laoire, eds. An Spidéal, Co. na Gaillimhe: Cló Iar-Chonnacht, 2022. Pp. 405.  Reviewed in Scottish Studies 40 (2024): 135-136.

WEBSPINNER: Songs, Stories, and Reflections of Duncan Williamson, Scottish Traveller. John D. Niles. Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 2022. Reviewed in Scottish Studies 41 (2025): 131-134.

‘” A Very Jolly Lot of Fellows”: More on the visit of JF Campbell and GW Dasent to Iceland 1861 and 1862’.  Trivent Publishing, 2025: 62-72.

CDs:

Cruinneachadh Chaluim. Ed. John Shaw and Andrew Wiseman. Scottish Tradition 26. School of Scottish Studies. Greentrax Recordings, 2015.

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