Folk hero

That hallowed American folk hero, the lean cowboy with six-gun at hip, swinging smoothly into the saddle—somehow he never had to go to school to learn that stuff.

Deuladeu Martins is a woman folk-hero dating from the 12th century; she is thought of as a hugely tall and strong woman whose actions were so feared by invaders that, because of her, the country of Portugal itself came into being.

The American folk hero Woody Guthrie will be honored at the Kennedy Center, but rabble-rousing, not respectability, was his goal.