Monthly Archives: May 2023

Los Duendes

Age: 22
Occupation: student

Context:

The informant’s mother told her about her encounter with los duendes aka the gnomes when she was a young girl. Los duendes are a part of Latin American legend and have different variations across the countries. This specific encounter occurred in Costa Rica when the informant’s mother was young so presumably around late 70s or early 80s.

Text:

Informant: “The gnomes also known as los duendes come in groups to basically lore children, typically mischievous children, into the woods or the forest and would distract them for hours on end with games, music, dances until it got really late. Eventually, the children would want to go back home and the gnomes would not allow that. If the children tried to go home the gnomes were really aggressive like grabbing their hair, scratching their skin and not letting them leave and forcing them to keep having fun even after hours of doing late into the night. This is what happened to my mother and in order for her to leave and safely make it back home she had to turn her clothes inside out and leave while singing or whistling which was to imitate that you’re still playing the game but you’re actually departing and done playing. My mother was able to escape from them this way and when they found her apparently her hair was messed up and scratches were all over her and her toe nails were clipped.”

Analysis:

This memorate corresponds with a type of urban legend that exists within Latin America. I think this is a type of urban legend that was used to warn kids from talking to strangers or venturing into unknown territory like the woods by themselves. With many memorates such as this one contributing to the legend, belief only strengthens and then many people, adults and kids alike are very cautious about trying to get into any encounter with los duendes. And I think stories like these are passed down in families to warn that it can happen and to pass on certain lessons/instructions so that if someone else in the family encounters them then they know what to do. I think this urban legend could suggest that Latin Americans could be very cautious and worried about child safety and that you should be weary of things/people who seem too good to be true or overly nice.

Pohm ( ဘုန်း) and Women’s Clothing

Age: 21
Occupation: student

Context:

The informant is from Myanmar/Burma and this superstition is found among their culture. Recently there has been a military coup within the country and so this entry gives insight to how the people are responding and resisting.

Text:

Informant: “So there is a superstition that if you’re a man — so like men in Myanmar have this thing called a pohm (ဘုန်း) or like they have pohm which is like a spiritual, well it’s just like something to make them better than woman basically, it’s like a spiritual thing. But there’s a superstition that if men walk under women’s clothing — like so in Burma we wore a bunch of these skirts like traditional skirts and if men walked under it then they lose their pohm so they lose their like higher spirituality if that makes sense. And recently actually like you know how the coup and everything is happening in my country the women hung up a bunch of skirts on the electrical wires so that the military could not walk underneath and because the military is so superstitious they actually had to take each skirt down before they could walk underneath. So it’s like a superstition in my country.”

Analysis:

From an outside perspective, one can see how superstitions within a country can be very influential on the way people think and act. Based off this superstition, it would seem that Myanmar is a patriarchal society and that they believe in “pohm” and use it as a way to differentiate between men and women spirituality within the society. However, walking under some type of feminine clothing, such as the traditional skirts the informant was talking about, it would cause them to lose that higher sense of spirituality and so they are, for lack of a better term, “downgraded” to feminine spirituality. I think Burmese men must be very proud of and value their “pohm” a lot, and more generally embrace their masculinity. So, in terms of the military, the men would rather take down a bunch of traditional skirts one by one than dare walk underneath them because they want to protect their “pohm” that much. In addition, the people and women resisting must also believe in the superstition a lot too in that they put up the skirts and knew it would cause the military to slow down.

Blocking the Groom

Informant AM is a graduate student from San Jose California, whose family is originally from Ethiopia. There is a strong Ethiopian diasporic community in San Jose, where much of its traditions live on.

Text:

“The morning before the reception, the groom and his family members accompany him to go pick up the bride. But, at the door, the bride’s family is blocking them. They’re role playing — that’s what it seems like. I’m like, ‘Didn’t y’all agree to this?’ I don’t know why it became a tradition. Every single Ethiopian wedding I’ve been to has done it.”

Context:

Informant AM witnessed this tradition in primarily Ethiopian Orthodox Christian weddings. Ethiopia is a country with 36 million Orthodox Christians as of 2017, according to the Pew Research Center (Diamant). The Orthodox Christian religion places an emphasis on sexual purity in women, with the most apparent example being the veneration of the Virgin Mary, the virgin mother of Jesus Christ.

Analysis:

In “Wedding Ceremonies in European Folklore,” Hungarian folklorist Géza Róheim gives several examples of similar wedding traditions where the families of the bride and groom role-play a situation with a barrier, such as a Slovak wedding tradition where the groom’s family attempts to stela the bride’s bed. Róheim proposes that this cluster of traditions, collectively termed, “The Barrier,” are a means of giving meaning to the liminal nature of a wedding, especially in the case of the woman transitioning into sexual maturity. The custom of blocking the groom similarly reflects the importance of sexual maturity, especially to Orthodox Christians.

Works Cited:

Róheim, Géza. “Wedding Ceremonies in European Folklore.” International Folkloristics Classic Contributions by the Founders of Folklore, Rowman & Littlefield, 1999, pp. 197–230.

Diamant, Jeff. “Ethiopia Is an Outlier in the Orthodox Christian World.” Pew Research Center, Pew Research Center, 17 Aug. 2020, https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2017/11/28/ethiopia-is-an-outlier-in-the-orthodox-christian-world/#:~:text=Ethiopia%20is%20an%20outlier%20in%20the%20Orthodox%20Christian%20world&text=The%20country%20in%20the%20Horn,largest%20Orthodox%20population%20after%20Russia. 

Ethiopian Wedding Gifting Traditions

Informant AM is a graduate student from San Jose California, whose family is originally from Ethiopia. There is a strong Ethiopian diasporic community in San Jose, where much of its traditions live on.

Text:

“My grandpa actually told me this, I didn’t know this was a thing. So, friends and family of the bride and groom, they give gifts to the parents, and usually the gift is money. I have no idea why. My grandpa told his friends, like ‘I have 11 children, you don’t have to give me gifts after each child.'”

Context:

Informant AM witnessed this tradition in primarily Ethiopian Orthodox Christian weddings. Ethiopia is a country with 36 million Orthodox Christians as of 2017, according to the Pew Research Center (Diamant). Ethiopian Orthodox culture is patriarchal, taking cues from religious hierarchy barring women from positions in the clergy among other examples set by the Bible and Orthodox customs. Similar, Ethiopian Orthodox culture places a heavy emphasis on the knowledge of elders and the importance of family.

Analysis:

Ethiopian wedding gifting traditions reflect the importance of family. For example, informant AM mentioned that it is customary to presents gifts to the couple’s parents, as well as to the couple itself. The practice resembles other traditions practiced in Ethiopia and other countries which emphasize family influence, such as the custom of gaining parental approval before marriage. One such tradition in Ethiopia is known as ሽማግሌ, or shimagelay, which translates to “elder.” In this custom, the groom sends his parents to deliberate with the parents of the bride before a marriage proposal can officially be made. This discussion mainly consists of the groom’s parents convincing the bride’s parents that the groom can adequately take care of the bride, reflecting both patriarchal values and the value of elders’ opinions in Ethiopian culture (Habeshabrides). Yet, informant AM also mentioned that her grandpa advised his friends not to give him gifts, indicating that Ethiopians are willing to be flexible about practicing this tradition for the sake of practicality.

Works Cited:

“Brides of the Blue Nile.” Habeshabrides, https://habeshabrides.com/culture/brides-of-the-blue-nile/. 

Assistants to the Bride

Informant AM is a graduate student from San Jose California, whose family is originally from Ethiopia. There is a strong Ethiopian diasporic community in San Jose, where much of its traditions live on.

Text: 

“It’s not necessarily the younger cousins, it’s the ones that they think are next to get married. For example, my cousin got married, she’s 8 years older than me, but they assume I’m the next cousin to get married so I have to be her right hand woman — well it was me and my cousin because we’re around the same age. We call it ‘Protocol,’ but it’s like an assistant to the bride.”

Context:

Informant AM witnessed this tradition in primarily Ethiopian Orthodox Christian weddings. Ethiopia is a country with 36 million Orthodox Christians as of 2017, according to the Pew Research Center (Diamant). Ethiopian Orthodox culture, like many others, places heavy emphasis on the marriage. In Orthodox Christinaity, the marriage reflects the original bond of Adam and Eve and subsequent bonds between husband and wife, such as that between the biblical figures Abraham and Sarah. In fact, Ethiopians will often give a new couple a blessing which translates roughly to “May your marriage be like Abraham and Sarah’s.”

Analysis:

This tradition resembles other wedding traditions that intensify the importance of marriage in a community, such as the tradition where the bride throws a bouquet of flowers behind her, and the person who catches the bouquet is likely the person to be married next. Both traditions serve to intensify and perpetuate the importance of marriage in a community by encouraging the next person in line to consider marriage, and reflects the importance of marriage in the American and Ethiopian communities which practice this tradition. This tradition also reflects the syncretism which takes place when traditional Ethiopian weddings mix with their American settings. Informant AM mentioned that the assistants are labeled ‘protocol,’ but the word “protocol” is meant to be used in a sentence spoken in Amharic, a language in Ethiopia. Effectively, this English word has been adopted into the Amharic language as a result of its prolonged exposure. From my own observation, another word that fits this description is the word “program,” which Amharic speakers in the United States and Ethiopia slip effortlessly into their otherwise Amharic sentences.