Tebowing

Informant: My informant is a close friend who I have known for many years. He is a 23-year-old college student and has lived his whole life in Orange County, California. He currently resides in Los Angeles where he attends the University of Southern California and comes from a prominently Scottish heritage.

I began this interview a little different than my other interviews because we are such close friends. I started with very casual conversation and because I thought if I put him on the spot asking him to give me folklore, he might freeze up and not be able to think of any. I was interested to see if he knew of any cyber lore so I started talking about cyber lore that I had seen in the past and the first thing he said to me was, “what like Tim Tebowing?” This is where this piece of folklore came from.

Me: What exactly is Tim Tebowing?

Informant: “It is when you, like, just do the Tebow pose pretty much anywhere. You drop on one knee and put your head down like your praying to god”

Me: Where did you learn about this?

Informant: “I saw it online first, but for a while you could see people doing it for pictures on the street.”

Me: So for the most part it is done on the Internet?

Informant: “Yea I guess, cuz that’s where it spread. Like there are forums on the Internet of people “Tebowing” in ridiculous places and I think that’s where it spread the most.”

Me: Have you every Tebowed?

Informant: (Laughing) Maybe once.

Me: Why do you think Tebowing isn’t prominent anymore?

Informant: “It was just a trend, like anything else, it comes in fast and leaves just as fast, plus Tebow isn’t even playing anymore so he is kind of out of the spotlight”

Analysis: The Internet is quickly becoming a vastly popular way to spread folklore. People are constantly on their phones and computers, so when something becomes popular, it can go viral so much faster. In this sense, these new trends become well known across the entire globe within days. Something as simple as posing for a picture can instantly become known by millions of people. It seems as if this genre of folklore is rapidly spreading because of its accessibility and I think in the years to come we will see more and more folklore appearing over the Internet as the performances and speech begin to dwindle.