Speaking for myself I am trying to have a conversation, though it does seem difficult for it not to turn into an argument. However, I have read and absorbed what Jim has said, to please take it that from herein on none of my remarks are addressed to Jim. I can see when I'm not wanted!

Again, speaking for myself, I have expressed interest in the investigation suggested by Steve Gardam. As a point of information I also consulted the Mustrad page linked to some CDs about Walter Pardon and earlier posts on this thread.

Jag: as I understand it, Jim Carroll's main objection to the book by Steve Roud is that it adopts a 'use' definition of what folk song is, whereas Mr Carroll believes that we should use the term to apply only to songs that originate with what he sometimes calls 'the folk' and sometimes as 'traditional singers','ordinary people', 'working people', 'the people'.   

Jim also argues that the 'origin' definition has been the orthodoxy for more than one hundred years. My own view is that this is not the case, on the basis that a defition internationally agreed in 1954 gives a 'use' plus subsequent oral transmission definition, which is the one presented and discussed by Roud. Jim refers to A L Lloyd, whose view of English history was heavily influenced by a Marxist historian called A L Morton who wrote a book about England framed largely in terms of class struggle. Lloyd's book on Folk Song in England is, for me, something of a patchwork of ideas, drawing partly on Morton and also drawing heavily on the work of folklorists from behind the iron curtain as well as other sources. (NB Arthur's biography of Lloyd had some interesting information on the uses made of the old communist regimes of folklore)

On Walter Pardon, this appears to be a contentious subject as scrolling back through this thread, some discussion took place last November. Jim provided a list of songs which, he says, Walter Pardon did not regard as 'folk songs'. Jim's argument there appears to have been that even if Walter did include material in his repertoire that was not 'folk', then Walter himself did not claim it to be folk.

Naughty Jemmy Brown
Old Brown?s Daughter
Marble Arch
One Cold Morning in December
Peggy Band
Ship That Never Returned
Skipper and his Boy
Suvlah Bay
The Steam Arm
Traampwoman?s Tragedy
Two Lovely Black Eyes
The Wanderer
We?ve Both Been Here Before
When The Fields Were White With Daisies
When You Get Up in the Morning
Wreck of the Lifeboat
Write Me a Letter from Home
All Among the Barley
As I Wandered by the Brookside
Balaclava
Black Eyed Susan
Bright Golden Store
British Man of War
Cock a Doodle Doo
A Country Life
Faithful Sailor Boy
Generals All
Grace Darling
Grandfather?s Clock
Help one Another Boys
The Huntsman
I Traced Her Footprints
I?ll Come Back to you Sweetheart
I?ll Hang my Harp
I?m Yorkshire, Though In London
Irish Molly
I Wish They?d Do It
Shamrock Rose and Thistle
Lads in Navy Blue
Miner?s Return
Mistletoe Bough
More Trouble in my Native Land