Author Archives: Brianna

Step on A Crack, Break Your Mama’s Back

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M: Me, I: Informant

I: I don’t walk on cracks on sidewalks

M: You don’t walk on the sidewalks. How come you don’t walk on sidewalks?

I: If I walk on a gridded

M: On the cracks on the sidewalk. Yeah why don’t you walk on the cracks

I: I don’t know. Step on a crack, break your momma’s back. You’ve never heard that saying?

M: I have but for the purpose of this I need it *laughing*

I: I think that’s why. I don’t know is the answer. I really don’t know. It’s bad luck. It’s bad luck.

M: It’s bad luck. But to you, is that actually going to happen or no? Do you believe it to be true or is it just that not that your mom’s back will be broken but that something bad is going to happen.

I: I think I do it half for entertainment. 

M: Uh-huh (agreeing)

I: I don’t think deep down inside I believe something bad is going to happen, but I don’t want to take the chance so I just step over the crack.

Context: My informant learned this as a child and while he may have taken it more seriously back then, it still is a part of his life many years later, just in a slightly different way.

Analysis: I think that it is significant to note that he says deep down he does not believe anything bad is going to happen and yet he still avoids sidewalk cracks to ‘not take the chance.’ This is very common with American superstitions as coming from a country that values science and logic so much, you’d think these would all be rejected giving their lack of evidence. However, we must remember that these aren’t based on science or evidence, but rather group belief. While many people would admit that they don’t truly believe in the superstition, they still choose not to run the risk And may even be entertained by it. This is how I think the logical side of our brain makes peace with the emotional side of our brains. Asserting that you don’t believe it appeases the logical side, but still avoiding the cracks just in case appeases the emotional side.

Offer Children to Aunts for Inheritance

M: Me, I: Informant

I: another interesting fact children because they had so many children because the life expectancy was shorter, if you wanted your child to inherit a home or do better and you have so many other, they would often gift a child to like an aunt or uncle who had a home so your {insert name} was raised by {insert name}

M: Oh so he was a ‘gifted’ child

I: Yeah, I don’t know if ‘gifted’ is the word, but he was turned over to {insert name} to raise even though his own mom and dad were right down the street. Kind of like an heir for her.

M: Gotcha, now does he, so he was raised by his aunt or the child is raised by the aunt or whoever they are turned over to, so that he can inherit. Um… what does that do to the relationship between the kid and the parents. Are they just the equivalent of an aunt to him?

I: Um.. no he knew

M: or those are still his parents?

I: he knows who his parents are, but he is raised by somebody, I guess it just kind of like common in the mountains you know. Not like in the city area, but like more in the rural areas

M: Rural Peruvian traditions. I’ve never heard of that one

Context: My informant was born in Peru and immigrated to the US as a child. Her parents grew up in a very poor, rural town in Peru. Practically all her family was from Peru. An important thing to note is that big families with lots of children were common because of the high infant And child mortality rate.

Analysis: Out of all my collections, this one definitely shocked me the most. This is probably due to the fact that this custom is so starkly different from anything in the US. Given how many children families would have oftentimes the younger siblings weren’t going to inherit anything. Thus, parents would ‘gift- more like offer-’ a child to a ’spinster’ aunt, uncle, or relative who does have property to raise so that they could inherit something. The child still knew who their parents were and knew their situation, but I think what startled me the most was how casually this was talked about and how I knew people who were ‘offered’ and never knew. I was really interested to find out the dynamics of the parent, child, relative relationship, however that wasn’t truly the focus so I’ll have to investigate some more at a later date. This was a custom only in the rural, mountainous parts of Peru, which tended to be less well off, financially speaking. This just shows the stark contrast between US culture and Peru’s rural culture, as much of the value of ‘parenthood’ in the US comes from raising and growing close to the children, whereas in rural Peru the focus was more on providing for them. However, I don’t think this would function in the US because of how difficult it would be having to deal with the legality of making the custom work in the US. This ultimately would prevent it from being spread and widely accepted in the United States. This custom, as many others, will only work in a particular, given environment.

Sitting at the Corner of the Table

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M: Me, I: Informant

Corner of the Table 

I: Never sit in the corner of a table if the table is square because um because if you are in the corner you won’t get married, things like that.

M: Oh no, that’s really good! How come? What was the background of that? How come?

I: Oh, I don’t know

M: you can’t sit on the corner of a table

I: Yeah I don’t know what the background was, that’s just what they always told us.

M: Is it only for unmarried girls or is it for unmarried boys too?

I: It was just, well it was only told to us girls. I don’t remember it being told to the boys

M: Gotcha. Did you believe that? Did you believe that one?

I: Um.. you know because we were growing up in the United States, not so much, and at that age I really wasn’t interested in getting married. *Laughs*So. But I remember her saying it

Context: She was taught this by her Peruvian family, but she had immigrated to the U.S. so she didn’t really believe this one as her new environment affected her beliefs.

Analysis: While she herself may have not believed it, others in her family did. This is reflective of the views of marriage and gender. This was geared towards girls as back then much value came from being married and thus the fear of not getting married was prevalent, which is why some of the people in her family didn’t sit in the corners of tables, ‘just in case.’ Additionally, there may be some phallic reference (protrusion of the table) here as marriage and loss of virginity are often very linked and that’s possibly a consideration as to why this was only geared towards girls. With the phallic imagery, this folklore could also be a result of the culture’s importance of virginity; if the corner of the table was the phallic symbol and represented a deflowering prior to marriage, that would be the reason why she won’t get married later.

Howling Dogs

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M: Me, I: Informant

I: When I was younger, growing up my mother would say if you heard a dog howling at night, it was the soul of someone who was about to pass away or die or crossing to the next world. So, howling dogs at night used to scare me

M: Oh it used to scare you. Ok

I: Yes because it meant that someone was going to died and you didn’t know who

M: Oh gotcha, gotcha, gotcha. So you believed it to be true?

I: Well yeah I was little, like 7 or 8.

M: Do you believe it to be true today?

I: No, but there things in our family from Peru because we’re from you know that more of the rural areas, that there’s the belief in signs

Context: This was taught to my informant and the rest of her siblings when she was a small child. They all believed in this and even believe their mother had a ‘sense’ about these things. Her mother heard a basketball bouncing in the middle of the night (a symbol connected to the neighbors) and a dog howling and she claimed that someone in that household would die. Soon after the mother of the neighbors died of a surprise brain aneurysm. Seeing the folklore working in real time help to solidify in their belief of the howling dog as a premonition for a soon approaching death.

Analysis: In Peruvian culture especially in the more rural areas, there is a large focus and trust in omens. The belief is that the dogs have a sense about death and illness that humans don’t and thus they know when death is coming sooner than humans do. I think that allowing animals, dogs in this case, to have the power to sense what is coming allows for humans to conceptualize these deaths as a part of nature, a part of the life cycle, and that this was what was in the plans. It makes it easier to attribute to nature’s timing when ‘nature,’ aka dogs, is involved and know what is coming in advance- there is nothing to do but allow for life to take its course. Additionally, ‘seeing’ this work in real life with their neighbors, help to cement this belief in my informant when she was growing up, even if she doesn’t believe it as much now, possibly because she is in a much more science-valued country(the US).

Eyes of Texas- UT Austin Anthem

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I: Informant, M: Me

I: So the Longhorns [University of Texas Austin] founded in 1881, have a song called the Eyes of Texas which was originally more of a baudry song sang by crooners and country folk. We adopted that and we sing that at the end of every game [football]. Win or Lose, when everybody is exiting the stadium the Longhorns put their horns up, this is the symbol for the horns [I love you in American Sign Language but thumb is wrapped in on top of ring and middle finger-in order to make the horns of a Longhorn] and we sing “The eyes of Texas are upon you, all the live long day” and at the end of it, it says “the eyes of Texas are upon you, til Gabriel blows his horn” 

M: Uh-huh

I: Gabriel is the angel in heaven and is the god of war, the angel of war. So we chant that at the end of every game to send everybody off the field. There is a whole tradition behind that, that is carried only by the Texas Longhorns

Context: My informant went to the University of Texas Austin and was a proud Longhorns fan and football supporter. Thus, he went to many games and participated in this custom.

Analysis: An important distinction to make here is that the song, “The Eyes of Texas” is not the folklore here. That song is copyrighted ‘authored literature.’ What is folklore however is the practice of using that song along with hand gestures at the very end of each football game. The performance of the song with the Longhorns ‘sign’ and rest of the supporters is the actual piece of folklore. This displays how authored literature can be taken and made a part of folklore. This performance allows for a display of pride in their identity as Longhorns, especially that this is done no matter if they win or lose to send their players off the fields. It’s as if to say, we support you and are proud no matter what.