Author Archives: Quinlan Stewart

Seven Waves New Year’s Tradition

Text: Below is a student’s performance describing a New Year’s tradition.

Interviewer: Are there any traditions you follow for New Year’s?

Interviewee: Yeah, so for New Year’s, in, like, Brazil, just as the clock strikes midnight, uh, we, people that are at the beach, we all, like, jump seven waves to rid ourselves of any bad luck that comes with the previous year.

Context:

The interviewee is a college student, who grew up in São Paulo Brazil. This interview took place after a conversation about Holidays, and a discussion on if there were any unique ways he partook in Holiday celebrations. At first, he could not think of any particular folk traditions, but eventually he remembered this one. He participates in this ritual when he is on the beach in Brazil for New Year’s Eve.

Analysis:

This folk habit represents a commonality of New Year traditions, which consists of preparing for the future year. Some traditions seek to bring good luck, for example, by eating grapes to bring fortune. However, this particular tradition engages in conversion magic, seeking to remove bad luck built up from the previous year. The habit of jumping, in particular, seven waves showcases how the number 7 is viewed as lucky in Western cultures. This action reflects a similar New Year’s tradition, the Times Square Ball Drop, where excitement over the New Year’s is also shared in large groups.

Drake Curse Legend

Text: The interview below captures a student folk performance of the Drake Curse legend.

Interviewer: Do you have any MMA or fighting beliefs?

Interviewee: So, for, like, the UFC, I don’t know if it spans across other promotions, but, for the UFC specifically, there’s a betting system. You can see who bets what on which fighter, uh, and there’s basically this thing called the Drake Curse, wherein whichever fighter Drake, the rapper, singer, uh, puts his money on, that fighter will lose, and that has uh, only a few fighters have broken the Drake Curse, but most of the fighters who he’s bet on have lost their fights.

Context:

This interview was collected from a college student, raised in São Paulo, who is captain of the school’s MMA(Mixed Martial Arts) club after a practice. The interviewee heard about the legend from UFC fight commentary and social media

Analysis:

MMA(Mixed Martial Arts) fights inherently have a lot of randomness. One stray punch, or one awkward position can lead to an upset, so betting on fights contains a lot of risk. Because of this uncertainty, folklore is used to explain and deal with that unpredictability. Now, the winner of the fight is determined by one factor: whether Drake put his money on him. The staying power of this folk speech is evident, as even when Drake does win some of his bets, the reputation of the Drake Curse still endures. The belief is able to permeate multiple folk groups, because Drake bets on a lot of different sports. The interviewed bearer of the legend heard about it both from official fight commentary, and from social media posts. This origin showcases the fight commentator engaging in folklorism, as they take the humorous legend from the digital folk environment, where it originates, and repeat it on the official commentary broadcast.

Royal Family Legend

Text: The excerpt captured below is a folk performance of a student’s legend about their family being of royal lineage.

Interviewer: Do you have any family legends?

Interviewee: Yeah, I think, it’s more, like, of a thing if we believe it or not, but essentially my dad tells us we are actually descendants from, like, a royal family, and I think it is true because I think my dad’s mom’s dad’s mom was a princess of, like, this area and they were really well off, and, yeah, it’s just a legend that we are like kinda descendants from, like, a pre-royal family. We, as kids, can’t really confirm.

Context:

This interview arose from conversation with a fellow Forms of Folklore student, when discussing family legends and folk beliefs. I asked him if there were any family stories he recalled and he responded with the excerpt above. When asked about the details of this royal family lineage, the conversation went as written below:

Interviewer: Do you have any idea where this family is from and what they did?

Interviewee: Yeah, it’s in India. These are like my, kind of ancestors, and they’re located South of India. It’s like a city, that they ruled, used to rule— not like a city, like a town. They used to have like a huge house, kind of palace, type of stuff. Yeah, there were kind of just royalty. It’s like a legend though, because I don’t know if it’s true. I wasn’t there.

Analysis:

This story showcases the shifting power structure prevalent throughout India over the last century, under British rule. Under these chaotic conditions, it is plausible that the interviewee’s family was in power over a town or small district, but changing political currents displaced them from their position, and resulted in an emigration to America. This narrative also follows the format of old family legends, describing the family either coming from rags to riches or riches to rags. The story also showcases the exaggeration that can take place as legends spread over time. The legend of being from a royal Indian family is very different from the possibility of being a ruler of a small Indian town.

Fast Paper Airplane

Text: Pictured below is the fully-folded fast paper airplane.

Context:

The image above shows the paper airplane that was made. This airplane is specialized to be faster and go farther than other paper airplanes. The creator of the airplane knew how to make many different planes, and assured me this one was the fastest. It landed in second place in a paper plane throwing contest. The creator of the airplane used to fold these planes while playing in elementary school.

Analysis:

The multiplicity and variance in paper airplane designs illustrates the folk dispersal from children in action. Different kids compete against each other to showcase their better, faster, more advanced folk items. This specific element of competition leads to more folk items being created, and those items, the paper airplanes, to be constantly optimized, until a fastest airplane is made and disseminated. Other factors also affect a plane’s popularity, like its ease to build, and its durability. Ultimately, paper planes are a great example of folk item culture amongst children, and showcase children refining and expanding their folk knowledge, as they compete amongst each other while playing.

Legend of Flight MH370

Text: Below is a performance about a Legend of Flight MH370:

Interviewer: So what conspiracy theories have you heard or do you believe?

Interviewee: This is not one that I believe, because, I think there is no definite conclusion on what happened, but, for sure one I’m interested in, like, the disappearance of flight MH370, an airplane that took off in, like, Singapore, or something like that, and, like, rerouted and no ones knows where it’s been, no one can find out any materials of its crash, or anything, and it’s, like, really fascinating because that points to so many other conspiracies, like aliens, or other life on Earth, or whatever it is, like, for a flight to completely lose contact, and, like, for no one to be able to find the people in it, or find the remains of it, is very scary, very interesting, given that it hasn’t been solved yet. It’s, like, a conspiracy theory that really interests me, and, I mean, I sometimes want to, like, try to think on my own, like, what could have happened?

Interviewer: Do you have any, like, belief of what’s possible, of what could’ve happened, any theories?

Interviewee: I feel like, definitely, it was not related to aliens. I think it was probably, like, an inside job, or something, by like, you know, I don’t know who I might’ve been because, like, a lot of those controls that you have to turn off for it to get off the radar, are stuff you can only do from the cockpit, so, like maybe, along those lines, but, it for sure probably crashed somewhere where it’s going to be really hard to find, and they probably crashed there because it’s hard to find, and, in general, I think, like. barely anything of the ocean has been explored, so given that, it’s probably somewhere in the ocean.

Context:

This question was asked to a fellow USC Forms of Folklore student after a class discussion.
This interviewed student grew up in America and is from a Southern Indian immigrant family.

Analysis:

This example illustrates how mystery naturally leads to the creation of folk narratives. Because there was no definitive, full explanation of the crash, multiplicity and variation arises as everyday people try to gain understanding about the flight. We also are able to see how folk narratives overlap each other, as bearers of this legend about the flight use other folk beliefs, like aliens, to make sense of the disappearance.