Author Archives: Eliott Lanz

White Vans Superstition

Interviewer: “I’ll give an example to start turning the gears in your head. A superstition my friends have is never splitting a pole because it gives you bad luck. Can you think of any similar practices?”

MA: Yea its kind of niche, but in high school there was this really bi superstition that if you wore shoes or white clothing when taking a test your mind would go blank and you’d perform poorly. If anyone was wearing white they always would dirty their clothes or shoes very slightly in order to do well on the exam.”

Context: MA is a sophomore at USC, however she is the youngest of her siblings and cousins who all attended the same high school. When she learned about this ritual, she was wearing white shoes to class, and her cousin, who is her age, scuffed her shoes slightly and told her about this practice to help her destress for the test they were about to take.

Analysis: This functions as a control ritual. In high stress environments like midterms, tests, exams etc, students often create causal links in order to relieve stress or justify grades. This functions as a folkloristic mechanism to manage anxiety, often employed by students across various cultures.

Knocking on Wood

Interviewer: “OK, personally some rituals i’ve grown accustomed to and practice are mostly related to theatre. Superstitions such as avoiding naming the play “Macbeth” in the theatre, never wearing your costume outside of rehearsal and performance, and a created folk song that was local to my high schools theatre department. What are some rituals or superstitions you believe in?”

AB: “I always knock on wood when I say something I don’t want to jinx, I don’t really even think about it anymore its more of an automatic reaction out of fear or something”

Interviewer: “Why do you think that works, like why do you use it?”

AB: “I don’t know, it makes me feel like i’m undoing evil energy, like your correcting it before some karmic lesson is taught to you, its like proactive.”

Context: The informant learned this practice from her parents. Her parents are very spiritual and superstitious and thus this, among many other practices, have become common place in her life. She recalls using the practice of “knocking on wood” since she was very little, around 9 years old. She is unsure if this practice has a tangible affect on her life, however she still uses it as a method of providing comfort to herself, proactively “saving” herself from an event before it occurs.

Analysis: This interview highlights how folk beliefs persist even when individuals do not fully rationalize or consciously believe in them. AB repeatedly framed their practices, such as knocking on wood as accidental or habitual, suggesting that these rituals function more as a medium to grant oneself peace of mind rather than superstition. This suggests that these rituals function less as explicit belief systems but more as engrained cultural behaviors where the action of knocking on wood takes less energy than the worry that accompanies bad karma.

“A stitch in time saves nine”

text: “a stitch in time saves nine”

Context: after telling my partner the Chinese proverb “未雨绸缪 (wèi yǔ chóu móu) or “repair the roof while the sun is shining” she said that another English proverb with the same message a “stitch in time saves nine”. She said that he learned the proverb from her grandmother who lived in rural America. It represents a universal truth about efficiency.

Analysis: Proverbs are often used from parents, telling their children a warning in order to induce better behavior and to instill a moral within children. This is an older proverb that has withstood the test of time which is impressive in our fast paced consumer culture, and has been passed on through oral tradition. This also demonstrates multiplicity and variation of folklore as two different proverbs from two completely different languages have the same meaning and cultural effect, employed in the same way in order to teach lessons.

Dumpster Pasta Ritual

Interviewer: “Thank you for meeting with me can you please tell me more about ritual practices you and your family perform?”

DA: “The one that comes to mind is this tradition we have where we make pasta every week. The pasta is called dumpster pasta because we use whatever is left in the fridge in the end of the week to make a pasta dish. The ritual started when my dad lost his job, money was tight so we tried making unfortunate financial circumstances into fun ritual practices in my family”

Interviewer: “Thank you for sharing that with me, do you still perform the ritual?”

DA: “Yes even though my family is doing better we still do the ritual as an act of gratitude to remind us of our struggles.”

Context: This ritual started in her immediate family and became an event for her and her family to break bread weekly and share a meal together. She mentioned that although her families finances are stable now, that she and her family still do the ritual, and she still partakes from her college dorm.

Analysis: This ritualistic practice spans distance as she still performs it even though her physical connection from her family is severed. It can be considered a ritual of healing for them now, and serves as a sort of liminal ritual as her family transitioned from financial statuses.

“Bless your heart”

Interviewer: “Can you think of any folk speech or phrases that are passed through oral tradition in your family?”

AB: “Bless your heart sounds like a very nice thing to say to someone, however in the South it is considered an insult. It is a weaponized phrase that we use on dim witted people under the guise of wishing them well.”

Context: AB lives in the South, and her family has used this insult for a long time, it reflects both a cultural and geographical shared folklore, but also familial. What initiated the conversation was her explaining difficulties of moving to California to attend USC. She has heard female figures in her family use this phrase, particularly in church or faith based settings. She now uses this phrase in California against people who don’t know the origins or meanings of this folk speech, enabling her to slyly insult people.

Analysis: This piece of folk speech is an important example of how context is important, as the words do not have visual meaning, but require the performance and subtext of the speaker. This is regarded as a Shibboleth, as it differentiates southern people as their own group with shared customer. It is reflective of the gernous and kind culture of the south and how people have to employ folklore in order to navigate the strict confines of Southern society.