Abstract: Since the mid-1980s, literary folkloristics has become one of the new methods in literary study for its focus on the interdisciplinary study of literature and folklore. The theoretical interpretation and research practice have since taken two different academic orientation and theoretical approach. One emphasizes on the instrumentality of folklore theory in study of literary text, analysing the styles in literary works and exploring the folklore materials in them. The other has its theoretical foundations from the concepts such as "the cultural existence of man" and "literary study as the study of man," and it is more concerned with the understanding of the deep relationships within the internal mechanism of folklore from the perspective of literary gestation. the genealogical perspective, and the problems of the possible methods of literary study and so on. This paper takes these two approaches as its objects of examination, emphasizing on the interpretation of the generative agency behind the latter approach of literary folkloristics and the methods, outcomes and limitations of this approach.

Key words: literary folkloristics, interdisciplinary study, academic reflection