O mačkama – poređenje predstava u japanskoj i srpskoj kulturi
On Cats – A Comparison of Ideas in Japanese and Serbian Cultures

Summary/Abstract: As far as the diversity of cat symbolism is concerned, Japanese folk culture bears certain similarities to Slavic cultures, including the culture of Serbia. These similarities are primarily related to genre coding, as both Japanese and Serbian (i.e., Slavic by extension) cats have predominantly demonic features in their folk beliefs. This is also true of Japanese folktales (mukashibanashi). In the other group of folktales, the cat generally takes on the role of a helper. Such tales in Japanese and Serbian folklore mostly originate from the international repository. Complicating matters further, not only does cross-genre interweaving occur within the context of Japanese oral literature, but attempts to draw parallels with European prose genres have also proven difficult. Folktales that feature a cat/tomcat as hero show that the term “mukashibanashi” encompasses plots which correspond to different (European) prose genres depending on their characteristics: fairy tales, etiological legends, or animal stories, combined with inevitable mythological elements.

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