Author Archives: Ariel Lockett

King Cake

Text (traditional foods/folk belief)

“I bought King Cake one year. I thought it was just going to be a slice, but it was big enough for multiple people.”

Context 

My informant has attended the Mardi Gras parade twice and tried King cake once when she went with friends.

Q: “What is King Cake?”

A: “King Cake is a large type of cake in a circular shape but hollow in the middle almost like a rope that is decorated in icing and sugar of the Mardi Gras colors: green, gold, and purple. It typically has a tiny toy baby in the center of it that represents baby Jesus and is a symbol of a year of good luck and prosperity to whoever finds it in their slice”

Analysis

King cake during the celebration of Mardi Gras is a collective ritual most people participate in to celebrate and participate in the cultural experience as well as hoping to find the plastic baby looking forward to prosperity in the coming year. Stemming from Frazer’s ideas of belief and sympathetic magic, this shows how non-scientific belief has an influence on the natural world implying good luck and warding off bad energy. It’s a form of homeopathic magic as “like produces like” or finding the baby Jesus produces good luck and prosperity. This custom is rooted in European traditions dating back to the Epiphany, a Christian holiday representative of the Magi visiting baby Jesus. Originally, a baby Jesus figure was hidden in bread and whoever found it would be king or queen for the day. After the spread of this tradition in New Orleans, bakers would add their own spin on the ritual varying decorations and selling the cakes during Mardi Gras season. The cake is very large and meant to be shared and eaten with others as a community bonding ritual that brings people together in celebration and festivities reinforcing communal cultural identity. This is an example of the ways folklore changes through time based on the cultural context of a community. Steering away from medieval societal structures, the context in which the toy baby Jesus was used changed from an aristocratic nature to an uplifting optimistic symbol of luck and prosperity brought by the baby Jesus. Also exemplary of religious folklore, this practice is a for Catholic belief to be communally shared, and enjoyed by festival participants bringing people together to cherish and understand more about the religious custom and how it has evolved through time.

Throwing beads

Text (ritual/folk belief)

“Throwing and collecting beads is a traditional practice and brings good luck.”

Context

My informant has lived in Louisiana for 4 years and participated in the Mardi Gras festival twice where this practice occurs collecting many beads to wear around her neck in participation of the celebration.

Q: “What is the significance of beads at Mardi Gras parades?”

A: “The practice of throwing beads on Mardi Gras stems from 19th-century French customs where the king would throw jewels and gold to the ‘common people’”.

Q: “How do you get beads?”

A: “The people on floats are above you at the parade and you can reach your hands out or jump and wave to insinuate for them to throw beads down, or people also commonly will flash their boobs to get beads. I didn’t do that though haha. There used to be a legend that University of Lafayette students wore beads to stand out during Mardi Gras and the custom spread to now where beads are commonly worn and exchanged at the festival”

Analysis

Originating in the 19th century, bead throwing is a traditional ritual/practice taking place where those of higher status or class would assert their position originally throwing any small trinkets to spectators of the parade. The evolution to throwing beads began in the 20th century as people of higher status would begin to dress up themselves and their floats in beads colored in line with the Mardi Gras theme as a symbol of creativity and expression. Today these beads are representative of the Mardi Gras season expressing appreciation for and participation in New Orleans cultural practices asserting a shared cultural identity. The traditional custom of wearing brightly colored beads and the ritual of exchanging or throwing said beads act as a way to show participation and involvement in the festivities as well as a symbol of good luck. Frazer explores the concept of homeopathic magic and the idea that like produces like. Many people partake in bead-throwing rituals in hopes of receiving good luck for the coming year partaking in this homeopathic ritual. His work provides a framework for analyzing the role and significance of rituals, symbols, and practices in various cultures. Recently, however, there has been some controversy regarding the environmental friendliness of throwing around thousands of plastic beads. Many people have called for more sustainable alternatives to this practice which is an integral part of Mardi Gras culture. This conversation touches on the adaptation and transformation of folklore over time to be more accommodating to 21st-century ideals and the evolution of folklore practices to fit the modern standards of societal and cultural norms in the United States.

Mardi Gras

Text (festival)

“A week-long festival celebrating New Orlean’s culture and heritage.”

Context

My informant has lived in Louisiana for 4 years and attended the Mardi Gras festival two times.

Q: “What exactly is Mardi Gras?”

A: “The celebration originated in New Orleans and people travel from all across the country to celebrate Mardi Gras here in New Orleans. Basically, it’s a week-long festival/series of parades that happens at the beginning of January lasting until Fat Tuesday right before Ash Wednesday.”

Q: “What is the significance of the celebration?”

A: “It’s essentially a ‘last hoorah’ before lent so it’s the last time you indulge, drinking, eating sweets, especially king’s cake, before you give it up for lent.”

Analysis

Mardi Gras is a French phrase meaning “Fat Tuesday” translated into English. This comes from the custom of using up all of the fats in the home before lent in preparation for fasting and abstinence. Important families will create floats and dress up in extravagant glittery costumes driving the float around the city throwing out beads, coconuts, candy, etc. There is jazz music, performers, and people in costumes. New Orleans has a lot of French culture stemming from the Louisiana Purchase which gave the United States new land, including New Orleans. People typically dress up in the Mardi Gras colors of purple, gold, and green. People not coming from “important” New Orleans families will typically just wear comfortable clothes aligning with the Mardi Gras colors and walking shoes as they’ll be outside walking a lot. Different parades are happening throughout the week at different times and the streets are filled with people in celebration. The celebration marks the beginning of Lent, a yearly 40-day fasting period leading up to easter. This is exemplary of the connection between festivals and yearly cycles/the calendar as well as religious folklore. Festivals are often symbolic of cyclical time and the calendar year as Lent is a practice occurring yearly in Christian communities and the festival serves as an opportunity to commemorate and celebrate Christian practices and beliefs. Larry Danielson, a religious folklorist explores these themes of religious rituals and practices including communal groups participating in religious originating festivals representative of shared belief. Mardi Gras specifically has Catholic roots and people use festivals as a way to come together and provide a more deep appreciation and nuanced understanding of religious tradition.

“Hen-pecked”

Nationality: American
Age: 48
Occupation: Social Worker
Residence: Houston, Texas
Performance Date: 02/21/2023
Primary Language: English

1. Text (folk metaphor)

“Hen-pecked”

2. Context 

My informant heard this phrase often from her grandmother. They were born and raised in the south, Louisiana specifically, before moving to Texas. She recalls an old saying that states that you don’t let your boyfriend or husband carry your purse for that mean he’s “hen-pecked.” She further elaborated on how hen-pecked often referred to when a man “is not the head of household”, but the woman is and “as a woman, you have taken his power from him.” She heard this when she was a child growing up as a black woman in the south during the 80s. 

3. Analysis/YOUR interpretation

From my understanding of the phrase, it seems to be rooted in southern misogynistic beliefs. My informant was raised in a rural Texan community after her family moved from Louisiana. As someone who was born and also raised in Texas, I am aware of the stereotypes, traditions, and customs commonly associated. Being the head of the household typically entails the male figure is seen as the provider, masculine, and generally opposite of many stereotypical feminine traits associated with the women. So when a man holds his wife’s purse, these shared belief systems may consciously or subconsciously take hold resulting in narrow-minded beliefs. During the time my informant recalls these ideologies, hegemonic masculinity in the black community was apparent. Hegemonic masculinity at its core refers to the belief that men’s position in society remains dominant. This is often seen as the social pressures men have faced of being expected to depict a perfect “expression” of masculinity. The term hen-pecked means not seen as masculine but seen as subservient to one’s wife and therefore not upholding the hegemonic masculine standards. This is an oikotype of the original meaning. Hen-pecked originally came from the way hens are constantly pecking at the ground for food and the way a wife or girlfriend may nag at her significant other resulting in the man complying with the wife. It seems the term became used more generally not only referring to the woman pecking/nagging their partner, but anything done by the man which could be seen as subservient to women.

“Naked as a jaybird”

Nationality: American
Age: 20
Occupation: Student
Residence: Los Angeles, California
Performance Date: 02/21/2023
Primary Language: English

1. Text (folk simile)

“Naked as a jaybird”

2. Context 

My informant heard this piece frequently from her grandmother. She grew up in rural Tennessee, a small town with a population of about 900 people. If you’re going outside and looked like you’d be cold based on what clothes you have on, she’d often heard her grandmother say “Put some clothes on, you’re naked as a jaybird!” When asked, my informant made me aware that the phrase is not said in a joking manner, but rather just a normal, everyday phrase. When the phrase is used, she recalls that it is said in a more serious tone and in a way that doesn’t embrace nakedness as natural, but it is taken more negatively seeing it as a shock factor.

 3. Analysis/YOUR interpretation

The folk simile “Naked as a jaybird” to me, originally, seemed to imply one is fully nude. According to my informant’s rural Tennessee background, however, it is not used by her family in the same way. This is a prime example of Von Sydow’s proposed oikotypes as the meaning of this folk simile where one does not need to be fully nude, is a local variant of the original meaning that implies one is fully nude. The implication that the idiom does not always refer to a nude body, is a logical extension of the comparative method. The phrase is likely heard in more rural areas where there is more of a connection between animals and humans as opposed to cities. There also are no sexual connotations meant to go with this phrase, it is simply meant in a harmless way to say that someone simply isn’t dressed properly and should put on more clothes. When I first heard this saying, I immediately associated it with being another way to say that a person is nude but did not associate any sexual connotations. When you hear the phrase “naked as a jaybird”, are jaybirds naked? Birds don’t have clothes hence they are always “naked” and relating nakedness to a bird, lessens sexual connotations.