The Crab House on Oyster Creek: Folkloristic Response to Vernacular Landscape and its Environmental Moorings

Résumé

La Maison du crabe Andersen, sur Oyster Creek (le « ruisseau aux Huîtres ») est située sur une voie d’eau faisant partie du large environnement estuarien qui s’étend de Great Bay à la rivière Mullica, au New Jersey. Ce type de bâtiment a longtemps servi aux pêcheurs d’huîtres, de palourdes, de crabes, de poisson et aux chasseurs de gibier d’eau sur les rives de l’océan Atlantique et de la baie Delaware. Cette maison, vieille de près de quatre-vingt-dix ans, est idéalement située pour que Phil Andersen puisse chercher des crabes dans les marais adjacents et préparer ses prises pour le marché. Ce bâtiment, de pair avec son bateau et son attirail de pêche, organise les contours de son paysage de travail ; ces outils ne définissent pas seulement l’adaptation de ce métier à l’environnement mais, en tant qu’assemblage, font continuellement progresser l’acquisition par Andersen d’un savoir écologique traditionnel. Bien que sa présence austère dans les marais salants signale son adaptation environnementale et son rôle d’aiguille de la boussole occupationnelle d’Andersen, le fait que sa fonction de paysage de travail perdure résonne fortement à travers la communauté. Le travail et la vie sociale qui se déroulent dans ce bâtiment évoquent sa capacité de s’attirer de nombreux affiliés, ses caractéristiques, son usage et sa situation ayant tous une qualité de profondeur esthétique et performative qui en font une pierre angulaire de l’expérience de l’environnement et du sens du lieu. Ces attributs – et en particulier leur rôle dans l’apaisement de la mémoire et l’affirmation des ancrages environnementaux de la communauté – montrent comment la maison du crabe Andersen, et les autres bâtiments similaires qui l’ont précédée, ont provoqué une réaction de folklorisation pendantplus de cent cinquante ans.

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