I was just rereading the Twa Corbies lyric request thread. There is a great example of the folk process--depending on the version of the song you prefer, the outcome can be sad or cunning or political (or all three!).

I remember having a lot of conversations with my parents about the contents of these songs that my Dad was singing. I was a kid who learned a lot about history and politics through this kind of dialog. It probably made me even more "off the wall" than I might otherwise have been with my various obscure and/or archaic references that I no doubt tapped into in the classroom setting.

SRS