"Beyond Oedipus reveals the existence of The Brother-Sister Syndrome, a pivotal psychological core that has been eclipsed by the presumption of the existence of an Oedipal complex among Arab and neighboring peoples. In essence the Syndrome is manifested through brother-sister love that strongly affects other nuclear family relationships as well as the structure of sentiments in the larger kinship groups. In addition to being a case study of "Folkloric Behavior" founded on verifiable evidence, Beyond Oedipus re-introduces and redefines the psychology of 'cognitive systems' to folklore scholarship. In its unique treatment of 39 variants of an Arab-world folk narrative, and a host of interconnected folk, popular and elite sociocultural expressions, this ground-breaking study accounts for aspects of performing a tale in a style and structure characteristics of ethnic, age, and gender groups"--Back cover.