Tag Archives: ghost story

La Llorona

CONTEXT: 

RR is one of my best friends and roommates. She is a sophomore at USC who enjoys crocheting, writing poetry, and making me laugh. 

TEXT: 

Me: “Tell me the story of La Llorona.”

R: “Well, the way my mom learned it is that she’s a witch.”

Me: “Who did your mom hear it from?”

R: “Her aunt told her—her aunt is from Mexico. 

Her name is Evangelina—we call her Vengie 

That’s my grandpa’s sister. 

So my great aunt. 

And when they used to live in this neighborhood, they would run around and if there was like wind blowing, 

or like my grandma said, when cats mate, you know how they kind of sounds like babies crying, 

and so they would say oh, that’s La Llorona. 

She is coming back for her children who were swept away in a river. 

Other versions of the story are that they drowned or she drowned them in the river and then she comes back. 

My mom heard that they were swept away in a river so she didn’t do it. 

She lost them. 

And so she cries 

and she’s coming back and haunting the kids because she’s looking for her own.”

Me: “So did she want to steal kids to replace them?” 

R: “Yeah. 

So her kids were swept away

but she’ll drop other kids in the river to take their souls

My mom and her older sister, Paula used to say.

They would get really scared when they heard wind blowing or like crying.

ANALYSIS:

La Llorona is also known as The Weeping Woman or The Cryer. Her tale originates from Latin America—specifically Mexico. The most common version of the story states that La Llorona drowned her own children, however, it is interesting that R’s’s family grew up telling the story that the children got swept away on their own.

For another version of the story you can check out this link:

Electrician Ghost Story

So my uncle was at this bar, in like Philly, and he’s sitting there. My Dad and his brothers are so talkative, and they will just talk to strangers. And so my uncle introduces himself to the person next to him and they start talking and the guy says that he is an electrician. My uncle asks if he has any crazy stories from his job and the guy says “actually I do. I’ll never forget this day”. So the electrician begins to tell the story: “This old lady asks me to do work on this closet. And this guy comes into the room and I freak out because I thought just the old lady lived there. And I explain I’m there to do the electricity and the guy just leaves. And the old lady comes and I explain, oh your husband comes in, and the old lady says that she does not have a husband. I find a photo of the man and I explain that this is the man I saw, and the old lady says that’s her husband but he died ”. So the electrician freaked out and left. And my uncle goes “That’s so crazy, I’m also from rural pennsylvania, what area” and the electrician goes “Westchester” and my uncle goes “wait so am I, what street” because Westchester is a small area and he says the street and the house he was in and my uncle goes “Oh my god, I used to live there and my mom still lives there”. So supposedly, this electrician saw the ghost of my grandpa. 

Context:

The informant is a college student explaining different folklore from their family, diving into how their family has lore and traditions that are particular to their folk community. 

Personal Thoughts:

This particular ghost story shows how different folk groups can overlap, sharing similar lore. As the electrician shares this legend, the uncle is able to connect with him on being related to the ghost, allowing for lore to grow between them. This also demonstrates how folklore can live on in different folk groups, as both the uncle and the electrician are a part of other folk groups, and as this legend gets shared by both of them to their respective communities, this will allow the ghost story to continue to spread. And since they may have their own interpretations of it, more variations of the legend will come up, allowing for this legend to live on even more. 

Bloody Mary

Informant Information — GD

  • Nationality: American
  • Age: 57
  • Occupation: Teacher
  • Residence: San Pedro, California
  • Date of Performance/Collection: March 20, 2022
  • Primary Language: English

This informant learned about Bloody Mary in elementary school in the late 1960s. Most of her friends from school also attended the same church and Bible study group, so they felt like they were a part of a very tightly-knit religious community. She shared this information with me in an in-person interview. 

Interviewer: 

Can you tell me the story of how you first experienced Bloody Mary?  

Informant: 

When I was in fourth or fifth grade, my group of girlfriends and I learned about the Bloody Mary game from some older girls. Our school bathrooms were really dark– they didn’t have any lights except for windows near the ceiling so they were really creepy. 

In the game, you had to lock yourself in the bathroom alone and stand in front of the mirror. You were supposed to close your eyes, say “Bloody Mary” three times, and then open your eyes. When you opened your eyes, you were supposed to be able to see a ghostly woman in a ballgown with black eyes and crying tears of blood. 

If you were a true Christian and believed in God, she wasn’t supposed to be able to touch you because you were too holy. If you only believed a little bit, she supposedly scratched you and left three bloody lines on your face. And if you didn’t believe in God at all or if you were evil, she was supposed to bring you into the mirror with her. 

Interviewer: 

Did you ever play the game? 

Informant: 

My friend went first, and she said that she saw Bloody Mary. I went after her but didn’t see anything in the mirror. I wasn’t sure what I did wrong so I lied about it and never admitted that I hadn’t actually seen her. 

Analysis:

This adaptation of Bloody Mary is very interesting to me as it reveals the large role of religious belief in the informant’s folk group. In this story, being exposed as a non-believer results in removal from the community as they are dragged into the mirror and disappear with Bloody Mary. Those of wavering faith are physically marked, seemingly teaching the person a lesson and informing others that the individual needs to be brought back into the community. 

The Little Ghost Boy

Informant: My informant is a very good friend of mine. She and I met in my sophomore year of high school. She is currently an undergraduate at Cal State Dominguez Hills. The following transcript is a retelling of a ghost story that she heard from her mom and that has been passed down by the family due to the erie circumstances and she is now telling it to me. 

Context: My informant states that after hearing this story from her mom. At the age that she heard it she was terribly scared of it. However, now that she has grown up, she’s not that scared, but still has a strong belief in this story. In fact, she has stated that now rather than fear for this little ghost boy she feels empathy for it. She can not imagine how lonely or how much this child must have been through that they are not able to let themselves go. 

Story:  So, this is my mom’s ghost story. It was around the 1980’s. At this time my mom was living at Jalisco, Mexico. She was in her friend’s house and was in the kitchen. She looks over towards the restroom and the bedrooms and from a distance, she sees a small child. He was dressed in a small white suit and no older than 5 years old. She saw him walk from the restroom into one of the bedrooms, then he just disappeared. When my mom’s friend came back to the kitchen my mom asked about it. The friends said, “Oh yeah. This is normal. When I clean, I can always hear a little kid laughing. 

Analysis: Based on the details of the story, I’m awestruck as to how my informant is not scared of this ghost story but rather how she experiences empathy and some sort of pity for this ghost child. By seeing my friend’s reaction toward this story, one is able to see a glimpse of how younger generation are slowly becoming more intrigued and fascinated by these stories. Rather than ghost inflicting fear, Americans have now become succumbed to the idea of suspension vs. if we go back in time America used to be terribly afraid of anything out of the supernatural.

Lady in the Alley

Informant: The informant is a very good friend of mine. She and I met in my sophomore year of high school. She is currently an undergraduate at Cal State Dominguez Hills. 

Context: The following transcript is a retelling of a ghost story that she heard from her aunt. Her aunt experienced this in early 1980s in Puebla, Mexico. My informant states that she believes it because this has not been the first time that her aunt has experiences something like this.

Story:This story was told by my aunt to me, and it was experienced by her in Jalisco, Mexico when she was very young. It occurred one day when she had stayed late with a friend out of school. By the time they left and were walking home, it was dark. She was walking with her friend, and they saw a woman walk into this dark alley. They were confused as to what this lady was going to do because it was a dead-end ally. Curious to see whether the woman might be lost, they approached the valley carefully, but to their surprise there was no one there!”

Analysis: Although, this encounter might seem like a huge misunderstanding, to my surprise I actually believe this ghost story. Although, Mexico is a beautiful place, it is also full of a lot of violence. Most of the violence is experienced by women. Therefore, when hearing this story, I believe it might be the spirit of a woman who is restless and looking for vengeance or peace. I think this is the reason why I believe in this. In today’s lore there are so many more legends that seem to be similar to what my informant’s aunt experienced all around the world.

To read another version of a woman in alley, which might be suspected to be restless ghost refer to the following: S.E Schlosser, 2007, “Spooky Canada: Tales of Hauntings, Strange Happenings, And Other Local Lore”, pp. 117