Monthly Archives: May 2011

Joke – Dumb Blonde on a Plane

Nationality: American
Age: 19
Occupation: Student
Residence: Austin, Texas
Performance Date: April 2011
Primary Language: English

Joke – Dumb Blonde on a Plane

“There’s two blonde girls on a plane together… they’re friends. The pilot comes on the intercom and says, ‘we have lost an engine, but don’t worry we have three more. We will just be an hour later to our destination.’ A little while later, the pilot comes on again and says, ‘attention passengers, we have lost another engine, but it’s okay, we have two more, we’ll just be another hour later.’ They sit for a while longer, and once again the pilot comes on and says, ‘we have lost another engine, but don’t worry, we still have one more. We’re just going to be yet another hour later.’ At this, the blonde girl looks at her friend and says, ‘wow, I hope we don’t lose that last engine or we’ll be up here all night!’”

The informant doesn’t really remember where she first heard this joke, but says it was years ago and probably at school. Although blonde jokes seem to stem from a stereotype that is often associated with blonde women from California, the informant is from Texas, and also blonde. She made it very clear that she is not offended by blonde jokes, and knows she is “smarter than most people who tell blonde jokes.” She doesn’t really understand where this stereotype that blonde women are less intelligent came from, but she finds these jokes funny, and knows many of them. The informant did mention that she has noticed that the stereotype does not usually apply to blonde men, which gives the stereotype a sexist aspect. Although these jokes have existed for years, the informant attributes their popularity to the media and “dumb blonde celebrities,” such as Jessica Simpson and Playboy Playmates.
I agree with the informant that recent depictions of blonde women in the media live up to this stereotype, which only strengthens the stereotype and leads to the further dissemination of these jokes. The most vivid example that really went down in “pop culture” history is from MTV’s reality television show, “The Newlyweds,” where Jessica Simpson was depicted as a shallow, dumb blonde, saying things like, “is it chicken or is it fish?” (referring to the Chicken of the Sea tuna fish brand). This one statement still lives on in popular culture’s representations of blonde women, and only helps perpetuate this stereotype and this form of humor.

Tradition/Foodways – Thanksgiving Dressing

Nationality: American
Age: 74
Occupation: retired
Residence: Marble Falls, Texas
Performance Date: March 2011
Primary Language: English

Thanksgiving Tradition/Foodway – American

“I have a grinder that we use once a year to make the Thanksgiving dressing. I helped my father make it when I was little.. so, um, he left it to me when he died. When I started making it my sons would help me and we use the same grinder, and now my grandson helps his father and I do it. So when I go to the happy hunting grounds, I will leave the grinder to him. The traditional part is, uh, that the boys come to the house and stay over the night before Thanksgiving. We get up very early in the morning, before the sun, and grind the ingredients together. And we always do it outside because it’s messy, and we attach the grinder to a table. We mix the boiled onions and stale bread together with the grinder. And another thing is that the bread has to be really stale.. I start that part two days before we grind. I put the bread out two days before and flip them every once in awhile to get them really stale. The day before Thanksgiving I peel and boil the onions. Then the boys come, we get up early, and grind the bread and onions with seasonings, eggs, and butter.. and then stuff the turkey. There is no recipe.. we just do it by taste. You know when it’s done because of the taste. This has been going on for six generations at least.. it started in Manchester, England, where my father’s ancestors are from. I don’t think there is any real reason behind which child it gets passed to, but it usually alternates genders every generation…with the exception of this one. It’s like ‘the gender switch.’ My dad was the forth child of ten, so there’s no real reason it was him.. I guess he just showed interest.. like I did over my brother. The grinder is still in the same box from when it was bought in the early 1900’s. I think this is just a way to pass down our heritage… a way for the adults to teach their kids about our ancestry.”

I agree with the informant’s analysis for the reason behind this tradition. It teaches children how to cook and uphold ancestral traditions that have been passed down for generations. It contributes to their perceptions of cultural identity, but also teaches them about the turkey tradition that comes with Thanksgiving. The only inconsistency I noticed with this tradition is that it supposedly began in England, yet it is in celebration of a decidedly American holiday: Thanksgiving. I mentioned this to the informant, and she seemed a little confused, as though she had never thought about it. She came off as a little defensive, as though I was questioning the validity of her story. She responded that the dressing recipe has been passed down from her ancestors in England, but that it was adapted to the American Thanksgiving tradition. I’m not sure how valid this is, as I’m not quite sure how much turkey they eat in England. I highly doubt they ate much turkey in England six generations ago, at least not enough to justify a custom such as this one. Nonetheless, this tradition is obviously extremely important to the informant, as is the story that goes along with it. It provides a method of connecting generations of family members, which after all, is the point of traditions such as this.

Ghost Story

Nationality: American
Residence: IL
Performance Date: 12 April 2011
Primary Language: English

” In St. Charles, Illinois, there is a very fancy hotel on the west side of the river, right downtown on Main Street. The facade is done in a faux-spanish style with a terracotta roof and beautiful painted tiles. Inside, the whole lobby and the ballroom is made a gleaming marble; they are separated by a short flight of stairs and a wall of doors that are always open.  Way back when, a family was staying in the hotel. There was a mother and a father and a little boy that came to the hotel every year in the summer. The little boy used to play in the lobby and the ballroom with his ball. He would roll it down the stairs, and watch it bounce on each step, boing, boing, boing. But one time when he was running down the stairs after the ball he tripped and broke his neck on the marble.  His mother threw herself into the river in grief not long after, and his father only lasted a few years before he also killed himself. To this day, on afternoons in the summer, you can hear the ball bouncing down the stairs. You might see a man and a women standing next to each other in the ballroom, watching the stairs.”

Dawn heard this story when she was 17 and, although it is set in the town where she grew up, she heard it from her manager at a shoe store one town away.

Research failed to turn up this exact story, but there are records of another haunted hotel story in St. Charles that shares some similarities with this one.
From http://www.ghosttraveller.com/Illinois.htm:” As the story goes, a chambermaid was thrown over by her lover, also an employee of  the hotel.  When he left her cold after a bad night of poker, she cried for days and days, finally drowning herself in the shallow Fox river behind the hotel.  Her cries are reportedly still heard by guests to the upscale establishment, and she likes to mess up the sheets once in awhile.”
That story is also documented in About.com’s Haunted Hotel Guide: http://hotels.about.com/od/hauntedhotelsatoz/p/hau_hotellbaker.htm

It is possible that the original ghost story was simply modified into a macabre cautionary tale about what happens when parents leave their children unattended. However, St. Charles, IL hosts ghost tours that are based out of the St. Charles Historical society, so it would seem that there are a plethora of ghosts to be found, and this story could be a distinct, but less-documented one.

Folk Narrative – Two Dead Boys

Nationality: American
Age: 51
Occupation: Insurance
Residence: Austin, Texas
Performance Date: March 2011
Primary Language: English

Folk Narrative – Two Dead Boys

“One bright morning late at night
Two dead boys got up to fight
Back to back they faced each other
Drew their swords and shot each other
A deaf policeman heard the noise
And came and shot the two dead boys.”

The informant stated that her father used to tell her this story when she was a young girl, but she has “absolutely no idea” what it means. The only purpose she was able to provide is that it is humorous and confusing, and “sounds funny because it doesn’t make sense.”
I agree with the informant in that this story is intended for children as a humorous story that isn’t supposed to make sense. It seems to be an example of a Nonsense Verse, which is defined as:
–noun
a form of light verse, usually for children, depicting imaginative characters in amusing situations of fantasy, whimsical in tone and with a rhythmic appeal, often employing fanciful phrases and meaningless made-up words.
(dictionary.com)

It seems that the whole appeal of this story lies in that it makes absolutely no sense, but it rhymes and is humorous, so it is appealing to young children that are just beginning to make sense of words and language. Furthermore, it seems to be something repeated often between parent and child, perhaps to create a playful atmosphere that is lighthearted and fun. In this respect, the story has a social aspect in that it builds relationships and bonds between people that are often of different generations. The variation provided to me by the informant seems to follow the general pattern of other versions of this story, but it is missing many verses. Variations of this story have been recorded from children on playgrounds since the 1850’s (http://www.folklore.bc.ca/Onefineday.htm).
Here is a variation that includes several more verses:

“One fine day in the middle of the night” (Journal Versions)
1. One fine day in the middle of the night,
2. Two dead boys* got up to fight, [*or men]
3. Back to back they faced each other,
4. Drew their swords and shot each other,
5. One was blind and the other couldn’t, see
6. So they chose a dummy for a referee.
7. A blind man went to see fair play,
8. A dumb man went to shout “hooray!”
9. A paralysed donkey passing by,
10. Kicked the blind man in the eye,
11. Knocked him through a nine inch wall,
12. Into a dry ditch and drowned them all,
13. A deaf policeman heard the noise,
14. And came to arrest the two dead boys,
15. If you don’t believe this story’s true,
16. Ask the blind man he saw it too!
(http://www.folklore.bc.ca/Onefineday.htm)

Annotation: further discussion on this story can be found in Peter Opie’s The Lore and Language of Schoolchildren [1959, Oxford. Oxford University Press, pp. 24-29].

Joke – Racist – African American/Mexican

Nationality: American
Age: 50
Occupation: Construction
Residence: Austin, Texas
Performance Date: April 2011
Primary Language: English

Joke – Racist – African American/Mexican

“What kind of baby do you get when a black person and a Mexican person have a baby? A baby that’s too lazy to steal.”

The informant made it very clear that he is “not racist” as he told me this joke, as people often do when telling jokes framed around racial stereotypes and conflict. He also made it very clear, before telling me the joke, that it is “really racist.” The informant is fifty years old and from Texas, and has lived there all of his life. He claims that jokes such as this are still used among close friends, but that “it’s just funny, we’re not racists.” He also claims to have “black friends,” as if that serves as some sort of justification or proof that he is not racist. He claims that jokes such as these stem from the racism that existed in the south during his childhood. The informant told me how he remembers when schools were desegregated in the south, and how “the blacks were brought over in busses” to his school. He stated, “they didn’t want to be there as much as we didn’t want them there.” He claims that much of the conflict was two sided, a kind of mutual racism. Furthermore, he claims that the inclusion of a Mexican individual in this joke probably stems from immigration from Mexico to the United States, often to border states such as California and Texas.
I agree that these jokes stem from a generation that experienced extreme racial conflict, but the fact that they are still used implies that they are still considered humorous. The fact that people still find these jokes humorous hints at the state of racism today, and shows that although it is much less prominent than in previous generations, subtle racism does still exist. The addition of a Mexican individual in this joke exemplifies the discomfort that many people feel toward Mexican immigrants, but the fact that they are portrayed as thieves in this joke conveys the stereotype that many Latinos are criminals. Furthermore, the idea of black people being inherently lazy seems to stem from Affirmative Action. Many people, who are usually white, are against affirmative action and other social programs, and believe it makes people who benefit from these things lazy. On some level, this joke serves as a racist critique of society in the context of immigration and social programs that are intended for minorities.