Author Archives: Owen Nuckols

Jiggalo – Ritual

Nationality: American
Age: 18
Occupation: Student
Residence: Los Angeles
Language: English

Ritual Dance: Jiggalo

Context: “Jiggalo is a dance I did with my high school volleyball team before every single match we played. It’s to kind of get the team hyped up and energetic for the game at the end of our warm-up. It also brings the team together as a sort of bonding thing. It starts with everyone separating off into grade levels, so the freshman, sophomores, juniors, and seniors all go off with their grade and get a few minutes to coordinate a dance. Once everyone is ready, we come back in a circle and sing ‘Our hands are high, our feet are low, and this is how we jiggalo,’ and then one at a time, each group does their little dance.

I first learned it in my freshman year at our first home game of the year, when the team captain said ‘Alright let’s go do jiggalo’ after we warmed up. The girls who had been there the year before taught me how to do it, but because I was the only freshman on the team, I had to do the actual dance alone which was kinda fun. They’re also the ones who told me that if we don’t do it, it’s basically an automatic loss, so the tradition was very important.”

Analysis: Not many people think about sports teams as folk groups, but they can definitely be considered as such. The main focus of sports is the athletic competition, and it’s clear why, but the communal aspect of it is often overlooked as a result. The entire world of sports is home to countless rituals that are only understood by the participants and/or fans of a select sport, and my informant’s description of jiggalo illustrates this perfectly. When she first said the word, my knee-jerk reaction was “what the hell is a jiggalo?” but that just proves my point. To me, it’s just a silly sounding word that could mean anything. To my informant and her team, it’s a sacred pre-game ritual that is important enough to where if they don’t do it, it immediately condemns the entire game. A common thread in folklore is the lack of understanding by outsiders, and while this pre-game ritual may not fit the traditional ideas of folklore, I believe it absolutely fits under the umbrella.

Bring Em Out – Ritual

Nationality: American
Age: 18
Occupation: Student
Residence: Los Angeles
Language: English

Ritual Dance/Entrance: Bring Em Out

Context: “‘Bring em out’ is an entrance tradition I do with my high school volleyball team. It starts with all of the girls lining up in pairs, captains in the front, then seniors, then juniors, etcetera. We line up by the main doorway that leads to the main part of the gym, and they play the song “Bring Em Out” by T.I. plays over the speakers in the gym. When it gets to a certain part of the song, every pair runs out one after another, jumping up and slapping the arch of the doorway as they pass it. The JV and frosh teams are lined up on the endline and sideline as we enter, so we high five them along the way and then high five our partner over the net before running a few drills and high fiving them on the other side of the net. It’s a really fun tradition for every home game, it serves the same purpose as like a wrestling entrance so the crowd gets hyped up and all the players ready to go.”

Analysis: This is the second of two pre-volleyball game rituals given to me by my informant, and I think it shows just how prevalent folklore is in places and situations where you wouldn’t expect it. I don’t think a single person on the planet thinks of folklore when someone mentions sports and vice versa. And yet it is featured so prominently, in ways that don’t jump out as being folklore but can absolutely be considered as such after learning about the ritualistic and symbolic significance behind it. I found the comparison to wrestling entrances especially funny, but it absolutely holds true. The entrance is an extremely important part of a performance, and what is sports if not an athletic performance? The whole process of “Bring Em Out” can be compared to some of the ritualistic practices of theatre troupes, which most would agree fall under the category of folklore. I had always seen things like this and enjoyed them without ever analyzing through the lens of folklore, and I think doing so can reveal a lot.

Harvard River Run – Ritual

Nationality: American
Age: 28
Occupation: Author
Residence: Long Beach
Language: English

Ritual: Harvard River Run

Context: “As a Harvard freshman, after living in what’s known as the ‘Freshmen Yard’ for a semester, we had to choose a ‘blocking group’ which was basically a group of 1-5 other people who you were agreeing to live with in one place for the rest of your time at Harvard. After choosing your group, you’re entered into the housing lottery, which determines where you and your group are housed. There are river houses, which are the most coveted because they’re much grander than the boring yard houses, and they sit right next to the Charles river, hence the name. So, in an attempt to appease what everyone called the ‘housing gods,’ freshmen will do the river run the night before housing day, which is when everyone finds out what house they got. For the river run, you get together with your blockmates, suit up, and some people will wear ridiculous outfits but most people just try to look as nonchalant as possible because if the security guards catch you trying to do this, they will kick you out. The goal of the run itself is to go from river house to river house, taking a shot in each house, usually in the room of an upperclassman you know who opens the door for you, but as long as you take the shot on the house’s premises you’re fine. The legend has it that if you successfully take a shot at each house without getting caught, you guarantee yourself a river house. My block successfully completed the run and was placed into a river house the next day so I guess there’s some truth to it.

Analysis: College is weird. Every school has their own traditions and rituals that seem utterly ridiculous to just about everyone other than the actual students of a given school. And maybe I’m wrong, but based on everything I’ve heard about various schools, it seems like the prestige of a school is directly correlated to the strangeness of said traditions and rituals. Ivy leagues, generally being in the upper echelon of prestige, always seem to be the weirdest, but I think that adds to the overall mythos they possess. Why are a bunch of highly intelligent and ambitious students running from house to house, drinking an ungodly amount of alcohol along the way? To appease the housing gods, of course. It’s a completely absurd idea, but at the same time, it’s hilariously fascinating. The fact that nearly every freshman participates in such a strange ritual speaks to the universities’ culture, as just based on what I’ve heard from my informant, Harvard has a very unique and unified culture among the student body. And for the ritual to be conducted yearly by every incoming class illustrates just how strong folklore like this can be.

The Schnitzel Man – Legend

Nationality: American
Age: 28
Occupation: Author
Residence: Long Beach
Language: English

Text/Context: “In elementary school, there was a rumor making its way around about the Schnitzel Man. I first heard it from my friend Emily who heard it from another kid, and he was described as a tooth-fairy like figure who would bring Schnitzel to all the good little boys and girls. It started to catch on, and soon enough everyone knew about the Schnitzel Man. Some people believed it, including me and Emily, and we became so obsessed with the idea that we told everyone we knew, including our parents. Then one day, I woke up to get ready for school, and I feel something under my pillow. I pull it out, and lo and behold, it’s a plastic toy hot dog. I freak out and run to go tell my mom “The Schnitzel Man! He visited me in the night and left me a Schnitzel because I’m a good girl!” And so of course, immediately, the first thing I do when I find Emily at school is tell her, “I got a Schnitzel under my pillow, did you get one?” She said no, and I was like “I guess you’re not a good little girl then.” It became a source of irritation for her, because the Schnitzel Man never visited her, I was the only one blessed by the Schnitzel Man. I told everyone else in the friend group and anyone who didn’t believe before really started to believe then. In reality it was just my mother who wanted to play into all the fun we were having and wanted to pretend the Schnitzel Man was actually real.”

Analysis: I think we often forget how gullible we were as children, and this hilarious story is a prime example of that. If you told anyone over the age of 14 about the “Schnitzel Man,” they’d laugh in your face. But elementary schoolers will believe anything. This is reflected in the folklore that originates from this age group, as it is often much more far-fetched and absurd than the typical folklore you’ll hear. Kids see the world in what I would describe as a whimsical light, a product of their lack of experience. I sometimes yearn for that naivety, wishing I could once again believe in something like a Schnitzel Man or whatever other crazy things I used to believe in. It’s just so much fun. And although my informant is now too old to fall for such a story and knows the truth, it clearly made her happy to reminisce about it. It goes to show how folklore is not just a means used to preserve and pass down tradition, but as simply something to enjoy.

The Big Red Bat – Legend

Nationality: American
Age: 28
Occupation: Author
Residence: Long Beach
Language: English

Text/Context: “In 5th grade, everyone in Long Beach unified school district went to Camp High Hill, up in the LA mountains. There were a lot of traditional camp stories and all that, but the scariest was the story of the Big Red Bat. We didn’t know exactly what it was, but sometimes the counselors would mention it, saying something about the ‘Big Red Bat that was up in the trees,’ and never elaborate. There was an air of theatrics about it, clearly egging on our panic about the Big Red Bat and the forest itself, but we were 5th graders so we all believed it. One night, the night of a group night walk, we were sitting in the amphitheater before setting out. The head counselor told everyone that while he knows people are worried about the Big Red Bat, he was actually friends with him so there was nothing to worry about, but no one believed him. After a lot of unease, we finally started walking. When we got to where it supposedly was, he told us, “Alright guys, I’ll hold it at bay, but if you wanna take a peek, now’s your chance” We looked up, and nestled in the trees, was a big red baseball bat.”

Analysis: This is quite the funny story, but I think it shows the power a piece of folklore like a bit scary creature hiding out in the woods has. It was clearly used as a means to discourage kids from venturing out when they weren’t supposed to, but the execution is what I find particularly interesting. The Big Red Bat wasn’t a complete fabrication, it was a play on words that doubled as a deterrent for troublemakers. It makes me wonder if its origin is accidental, like if someone swung the bat but let go at the height of their swing and got it stuck up there for good. Regardless, it definitely worked out because it became both a funny story and a useful warning.