Monthly Archives: May 2015

Ring Around the Rosy

Nationality: United States
Age: 22
Occupation: Student
Residence: Los Anglese
Performance Date: 28APR2015
Primary Language: English
Language: None

Informant Background:

This informant is a senior at USC in the Naval ROTC program. The daughter of a navy chaplain, she spent a lot of her life traveling. Despite having to move, she still claims she had a every enjoyable childhood and made many lifelong friends because of it. She can easily recount the many games and stories her and her friends would play.

Informant’s Story:

“I’m sure everyone’s heard about ring around the rosy. You play it when you’re really little. We all grab hands, side hop to the left and sing the song. [me: can you sing it?] Haha, sure I guess. it goes ‘ring around the rosy, a pocket full of posies, ashes, ashes, we all fall down,’ and when you say ‘we all fall down,’ everyone drops to the ground.”

Analyses:

This little game has been around for centuries and originates from 17th century England when the great plague was in full swing. It has two versions; the American “ring around the rosy” and British “ring a ring o’ roses” and is about the stages of an infected person. Both versions are identical but have a one line difference (besides the wording of the first line)

British

Ring a ring o’ roses,
A pocket full of posies,
A tissue A tissue

We all fall down.

American

Ring a round the rosie,
A pocket full of posies,
Ashes! Ashes!

We all fall down.

When Someone had the plague, a common symptom was a rosy rash, and constant sneezing. Those living around the sick and dying would carry a pocket full of posies in order alleviate themselves from the smell of death. The English version refers to tissues, referring to the sneezing caused b the illness, but the American version is slightly darker, with a christian connotation. the phrase “ashes-to-ashes” comes from a verse in the bible and is used to burial rites. The final line of both is “we all fall down” meaning death. This is a prime example of how the morbidity of past is forgotten, yet that which it has created is not. By that I mean, it’s interesting how something so seemingly innocent and used by young children is about the gruesome death of thousands and no one seems to realize.

The Forbidden Forest

Nationality: United States
Age: 22
Occupation: Student
Residence: Los Angeles
Performance Date: 28APR2015
Primary Language: English
Language: None

Informant Background:

This informant is a senior at USC in the Naval ROTC program. The daughter of a navy chaplain, she spent a lot of her life traveling. Despite having to move, she still claims she had a every enjoyable childhood and made many lifelong friends because of it. She can easily recount the many games and stories her and her friends would play.

Informant’s Story:

“In elementary school, we had this massive play ground that was divided into like, three sections. There was a blacktop section, a jungle gym section, and a soccer field. the on the edge of the soccer field was this forest that we weren’t allowed to go into because then the monitors couldn’t keep track of us. Us being kids, we came up with stories as to what was in those mysterious woods. We thought there were monsters in there so we made a attempted to make a fence at the opening of the path that lead into the forest out of sticks and branches we found lying around. When we found the next day that the sticks were moved so there was a hole that someone walked through, oh man, our imaginations absolutely exploded. We made different groups who would defend the play ground and who would bravely walk into the forest in spite of the teachers rules to fight the monsters and stuff. Oh man, I’m suddenly sad now because I miss being a kid [she laughs].”

 

Analyses:

This story is a classic example of how powerful a childhood imagination is and how from a young age we are intrigued by the unknown. A story like this is a very common story among children. When an authority figure tells us not to do something, we are suddenly intrigued whatever it is we’re not supposed to do, especially when that something can so easily be turned into a mystery. A forest that we can’t go into begs the question why? simple; because there’s monsters in there. Kids being kids, they decide to do something and create a barrier. At this point, we’re still unsure if there really are monsters in the forest. When the next day comes though, and there’s a development and the barrier has been altered mysteriously, well that confirms it, there’s something in there and we must protect our domain. The fact that kids are able to make that kind of logical thinking using only their fantastical imagination, shows just how creative the child’s mind is. What this story also demonstrates is how this child like wonder then carrys with us through our adult life. When we’re told we can’t do something, our instant response is “why not”. This idea of “why not” leads us to create and discover using our technical ability acquired through schooling and life experience. We find new locations, create incredible inventions, and push the limits of what we “can’t” do.

The Bunny Man Bridge

Nationality: United States
Age: 22
Occupation: Student
Residence: Los Angelese
Performance Date: 28APR2015
Primary Language: English
Language: None

 

Informant Background:

This informant is a senior at USC in the Naval ROTC program. The daughter of a navy chaplain, she spent a lot of her life traveling. Despite having to move, she still claims she had a every enjoyable childhood and made many lifelong friends because of it. She can easily recount the many games and stories her and her friends would play.

 

Informant’s Story:

“I used to live in Northern Virginia for a bit, and there was story that always freaked me out, but at the same time really interested me. So there’s this bridge in NoVa [northen Virginia] called “The Bunny Bridge”, Where apparently some escaped mental patients escaped from the local insane asylum. I dont know how he got the stuff that he got, but really that’s not important, just know that he’s a dangerous insane person. Apparently, people started finding mutilated animal corpses along the road, like cats and rabbits. When someone stopped at the bridge to check it out, a crazy guy wearing a bunny costume came out of the woods with a bloody hatchet, yelling at him at him to get off his property, and the person sped off in their car before the bunny man could get to him. Legends says that if you stop at the bunny man bridge you can still be confronted by the bunny man yelling at you to get off his property, while waving a hatchet. I never went there but a lot of people I used to know would go there on Halloween. I was kind of a chicken.”

 

Analyses:

The legend of the Bunny Man Bridge is incredibly intriguing as it has a large element of possibiliy. Timothy Forbes actually signed a descriptive story that there actually was a local asylum for the criminally insane, in Fairfax Virginia, which was in the process of being shut down. The story goes that in 1904, a bus transferring some convicts crashed, killing all but 10. Eight were caught, but two were still at large at this time; Marcus Wallster and Douglas Grifon. shortly after, locals in the area of the crash reported finding half eaten rabbits being strung up in trees and on the bridge which would later be known as the bunny man bridge. Things took a turn  when the remains of one of the two still missing convicts, Marcus Wallster, hanging in a tree nearby the bridge. It is assumed that the two were traveling together before Grifon turned on his companion. As it turns out, this story and it’s details are false. It is important to note the importance of the fact that a company like Forbes wrote a story like this, however. In writing this story in such a way that it used descriptive details, those local to the area could figure out it was fake, but to those who dont know the are very well, these details provide believably and perpetuates it as a true story. The events that inspired this story, could have been several real accounts in that occured in the 1970. One story is about an Air force cadet and his fiance were parked near the location of the bridge, talking, when a figure shattered the passenger side window. The cadet claims that the the figure was wearing a bunny suit yelling at them to get off his property, to which the cadet  obliged, flooring the car all the way to the police. A hatch was found on the floor of the car where the glass was shattered. This is just one of over 50 accounts that occured in this area in 1970, and adds evidence as to how this legend came to existence.

Meaning of a full moon to the Emergency Services

Nationality: United States
Age: 22
Occupation: Student
Residence: Los Angeles
Performance Date: 28APR2015
Primary Language: English
Language: None

Informant Background:

This informant is a senior at USC in the Naval ROTC program. The daughter of a navy chaplain, she spent a lot of her life traveling. Despite having to move, she still claims she had a every enjoyable childhood and made many lifelong friends because of it. She can easily recount the many games and stories her and her friends would play.

 

Informant’s story:

“I’m not sure if this counts as folklore, but I have family who are cops and EMT’s and they all swear up and down that things are always busier on a full moon. My aunt’s an EMT and she actually has an alert on her phone to tell her when there’s a full moon.”

 

Analyses:

Through out history, the moon has been attributed to having a curious affect on humans. This can be turning them into a werewolf, or just being crazy. The word “lunatic”, meaning insane person, even stems from the latin word “luna” meaning moon. Though there is absolutely no evidence to support this idea, statistically it is true that hospitals and police stations become a hub of activity on moonlit nights. This could possibly be an evolutionary instinct bred into us before artificial light sources were created. When the moon was dim, early humans would be at an incredible disadvantage to any nocturnal predator. When the moon is out and in full intensity, early humans would be able to preform tasks at night and remain active through out it. This instinct could permeate through history to present day, allowing us to subconsciously notice the moon’s current phase and give us the suggestion to go out that night. Using statistics again, if more people are going out at one point in time, there is a higher chance for those people to get hurt, hurt others, party too hard, and other less than desirable actions. There is no evidence suggesting that lunar radiation has any affect on the human mind.