Author Archives: ivyhong

Heading Home After a Funeral

Nationality: Chinese American
Age: 16
Occupation: Student
Residence: Los Angeles, California
Performance Date: 4/24/16
Primary Language: English
Language: Cantonese

The informant is of Chinese descent and shared this piece at my request. It was an informal environment.

 

So why shouldn’t you go home immediately after a funeral?

 

“It’s cause spirits might follow you home, so you gotta just drop the spirits off like at a 99 cents store or something and then you can go home.”


The informant later clarified that you are tricking any lingering spirits that are following you into thinking that you have arrived home, leaving them at wherever you chose to stop. I found this quite interesting because it is in a bit of a conflict with what I know about how ghosts and spirits are viewed in Chinese culture, especially those of your family. Generally, people do not hold the same fear or aversion to the dead and spirits as white Americans do. I would assume that that people do this because too many spirits in one’s home may be a bother, or there might be malicious spirits. If this is the case, then 

Anthropomorphic Beans Having Small Talk

Nationality: American
Age: 18
Occupation: Student
Performance Date: 3/31/16
Primary Language: English

The informant sent me this piece folklore at my request. They said their friend formed the joke.

 

The joke is as followed:

So there’s two beans laying next to each other on a plate.

The first bean says to the other, “Hey, how you bean?”

The second says, “I’ve bean great thanks, just lima here.


Now, this joke follows the “classic” format of a simple pun. Because it’s initial pun is common, it is more likely to elicit amusement than a pure laugh. What particularly got to me was that it included a second, unexpected pun. Despite how it is still a simple one, the audience might have believed that the first was all there was, so they are surprised by the end of the conversation. Whether the addition of the second pun pulled a significantly greater response is indeterminate.

Why Was the Student’s Report Card Wet?

Nationality: Chinese
Age: 19
Occupation: Student
Residence: Los Angeles, California
Performance Date: 3/31/16
Primary Language: Chinese
Language: English

I met this informant at a social aimed at helping and welcoming prospective transfer students. The atmosphere was very informal, and I simply brought up this folklore project when it was relevant.

 

What jokes do you have for me?

 

“It’s really silly… Why was the student’s report card wet?… Because his grades were below C-level.”

 

The informant laughed after they told the joke, both at the joke and my reaction: a flatline of facial expression and a stony-faced stare over their shoulder. They told me that they tell it to nearly everyone they meet, and that they react to it the same way every time. Apparently, this is a nigh universal response to a joke you might not really want to laugh at. It is also interesting how sometimes, a person laughs at a joke because it is bad. This is not necessarily done so maliciously, because all parties involved often share the same ideas of the joke, even the performer. This leads me to wonder if there ever was a time when people thought these classic jokes were funny. However, I also do think that jokes like this still accomplish a part of what jokes are meant to do: break the ice, lower tension.

 

The informant also mentioned that they read it on the back of a Laffy Taffy candy.

Blue Frog

Nationality: Korean American
Age: 18
Occupation: Student
Residence: Oakdale, California
Performance Date: 4/26/16
Primary Language: English
Language: Korean

The informant is of Korean descent, and shared this piece of folklore at my request.

 

There is a Korean proverb that goes “청개구리 (Chung-kgeh-kgu-ry),” which translate to “blue frog.” It is used to describe someone who is behaving oddly for attention, stemming from the idea that it is like a blue frog trying to go against to standard of green frogs.


The informant sees that it follows a certain pattern found in Korean folk speech. That is, references to animals and normalcy. Following that second line of thought, there is a Chinese saying that roughly translates to “no one else is like you.” This is suppose to be a negative thing, a phrase also used to describe those who stand out from the rest.

A Gaydar with Slightly Homophobic Undertones

Nationality: American
Age: 18
Occupation: Student
Residence: Los Angeles, California
Performance Date: 4/21/16
Primary Language: English
Language: Cantonese

I requested the informant to recount some pieces of folklore, some being ones that they have told me before.

 

The informant recalled hearing in middle school that if someone’s ring finger was longer than their index finger, it meant that they were gay.

 

They admit that they feel it was ignorant of them, both in believing it, and using it to avoid a stranger on one occasion. As kids, it seems that people have not yet developed a healthy sense of skepticism, but have easily picked up antagonistic thoughts and ideas. As the informant talked about it, I thought the homophobia within the piece took on an odd form, how it was created to mark something that has a faceless identity. Unlike how race and gender still has a formal set of arbitrary and subjective characteristics, there is no “official” identifier for one’s sexuality besides stereotypes. To almost supplement this lack it seems, this speculation was formed.


This also reminds of how children are immediately born into a social fabric, one that they’ll have to learn how to navigate. If one is to speculate on this specific case, it seems that the informant was born into a society that has since changed to be a more understanding towards the LGBTQ community.