Author Archives: Sabrina Rivas

The Running of the Teachers

Nationality: American
Age: 19
Occupation: Student (University of Wisconsin, Eau Claire)
Residence: Minnesota, Wisconsin
Performance Date: April 2, 2017
Primary Language: English

(In informant’s description of the tradition, “you” refers to the interviewer. Informant’s actions are in italicized parentheses.)

Well, me and you started the whole “running of the teachers” thing… where, like, right before parent-teacher conferences, we’d just sit outside the Writing Center and watch all the teachers go down to, like, the gym or the cafeteria, wheeling their little spinny chairs down the hall. And, yeah, just every time there were conferences after school, we’d be there, like, yelling words of encouragement to the teachers and, like, making tunnels for them and stuff. And then by the spring conferences junior year, it spread so the teachers knew about it, right? Like, your history teacher came up to us and asked us about it, so that was cool. And then senior year, all the teachers knew about it, like, one of the new English teachers asked us if we were going to do the running of the teachers the day of the fall conferences. Yeah, and then that year we, like, expanded it to also making care packages for some of the English teachers… with, like, tissues and hand sanitizer and candy and personalized water bottles… (laughs) yeah, they really appreciated that. ’Cause before, like junior year, we just, like, stalked one of the teachers to her table and made her signs and stuff… and she was kind of mad, but, no, she laughed. But, yeah, senior year, we, like, made them care packages and we finally got to wheel down one of the teachers in a spinny chair, and that was awesome. And then your, like, AP Euro teacher or something, right, she was really sad that we wouldn’t be there to do running of the teachers this year? Yeah, so I guess we started, like, a thing that spread to all the teachers.

 

Background (from interviewer):

My informant is a good friend from high school, and a fellow “English nerd.” She was very close with many teachers, particularly English teachers and those who ran the Writing Center. She is a talented writer, and is now an English Education major at her university. She and I used to regularly stay after school and work in the Writing Center, which allowed us to bond with many of the teachers and witness (and later take part in) their preparations for parent-teacher conferences.

 

Thoughts:

This tradition indicates my informant’s (and my) bond with our teachers and desire for them to like us. My informant, especially, as an aspiring teacher and fellow “teacher’s pet,” found it important to show her appreciation for her teachers, and liked to form friendships with them. This is evident in the friendliness and care that out tradition showed for our teachers, and in the casual conversations in which they would let us know that they knew (and looked forward to) our tradition.

The Sentence Game

Nationality: American
Age: 19
Occupation: Student (University of Wisconsin, Eau Claire)
Residence: Minnesota, Wisconsin
Performance Date: April 2, 2017
Primary Language: English

So the sentence game, what it was is, we’d all get sheets of paper and write down a sentence, any sentence we wanted. And then, you would just pass the paper on to the next person. And then what would happen next is someone would read that sentence and have to draw a picture of what that sentence was, draw an image for it. And then once they had the picture that they drew, they would fold the piece of paper over so it covered the sentence, so the next person, the only thing they could see was the picture. And then pass the paper to the next person, and the person would look at the image and then write a sentence for it, and so once they had the sentence they would fold over the image, and the next person would draw an image for that sentence, and so on, and so on, until you feel like you’ve done enough.

 

Context:

I learned about the sentence game one of my first few Page meetings that I attended. Which, The Page was this awesome writing group, which was super cool, at my high school. For me, I wasn’t… I was an English nerd, but not really part of a group, and this was a fun way to get involved. It was like telephone but with words and funny images and weird sentences, and your sentence always developed into something that was completely the opposite from what it began with… and it was funny to see how it evolved over time… with different images and different sentences… and seeing different interpretations of the last person’s sentence and the last person’s image. And the more switches you did, the more it’d be kind of, like, funny. And I did it with my friends and then it got me even more involved ’cause then I wanted to come up with more writing games, and… that’s kind of one of the things that I did more with that organization, is I was constantly wanting to do different games and different ways to get people involved with the subject, because I loved making the subject fun… when I could, and using words like that.

 

Background (from interviewer):

My informant is a good friend from high school, and a fellow “English nerd.” She is a talented writer, and is now an English Education major at her university. When she first joined The Page, she was a very comedic writer, before veering into more serious themes. By our senior year, she and I jointly ran The Page and other writing clubs at our school.

The sentence game was originally meant as a writing exercise, or prompt, to get us thinking of ideas to write later on in Page meetings. Later, it turned into our default activity when the teachers who normally ran the club were too busy and the students were left to our own devices.

Pretending to worship talented peers

Nationality: American, Russian
Age: 18
Occupation: Student
Residence: Minnesota
Performance Date: March 12, 2017
Primary Language: English
Language: Russian, Chinese

In our choir… um, a really talented opera singer… A really talented classical singer in our choir in high school… um… became a running joke… partly, partly because of his talent, and partly just ’cause, like, he’s a funny dude in general. He became kind of a running joke within our group of friends, because we all, like, pretend-hero-worship him— well, half-pretend-hero-worship him.

 

Context:

Like, in all seriousness, his voice and his singing ability has always been something I, like, strive to achieve, because he is basically, like, the ideal in terms of… what you want to sound like as a singer… but it’s also kinda turned into a running joke where, you know, we’re all in love with him and we all hero-worship him.

 

Background (from interviewer):

My informant is a trained classical singer who takes pride in his training and singing ability. The peer to whom he refers in this tradition is also a highly trained singer who was in the same choir as him in high school. This peer was widely known for his singing and acting abilities within the school’s choir and theatre departments. They have both competed in national classical singing competitions, and both have placed very well within their categories. My informant is also a very competitive and dedicated person who strives to be the best he can at anything he does, particularly in something he takes pride in, such as singing and theatre.

 

Thoughts:

This tradition or “running joke” points to a tendency to inflate or idolize one’s peers for their talent. In doing this, the choir appreciates and commends this singer for his talent. The exaggerated, comic, and perhaps even semi-sarcastic nature of it, however, allows them to make it a way of poking fun at this singer and somewhat bring him back down to their level, so as not to take their idolization of his talent too seriously. Additionally, since this is a men’s choir, the joke of them all being “in love with him” makes fun of the stereotype of choir boys or men in theatre always being homosexual (since both my informant and the singer, as well as much of the choir, is heterosexual).

¿Cómo no te voy a querer? (Soccer song)

Nationality: Mexico
Age: 15
Occupation: Student
Residence: Minnesota
Performance Date: April 14, 2017
Primary Language: English
Language: Spanish, Chinese

¿Cómo no te voy a querer?

¿Cómo no te voy a querer?

Si tu corazón azul es

Y tu piel dorada

Siempre te querré

Translation:

How am I not going to love you?

How am I not going to love you?

If your heart is blue

And your skin is gold

I’ll always love you

 

Context:

When we lived in Mexico, uh, we used to go to soccer games a lot, like, club games. And, uh… my dad’s favorite team… I guess the whole family, we, like, really liked the same team, they were called Pumas. And, like… there was this song that they would always sing at the, uh, like, the games that was like… [performed the song] Um… because the team’s colors are blue and gold.

 

Example of performance:

(Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OQNqI3FhT0I)

 

Thoughts:

This song shows a loyalty to the team, regardless of the game’s outcome (“I’ll always love you”), and makes the bond between team and fans deeply personal, talking about the heart and the skin. Here, the fans (or the players) come to embody the team’s colors and logo. It is also one of the more positive sports songs, which simply declares one’s love for their team, rather than trying to tear the opposing team down.

 

Annotations:

For another version of this song, this time performed for the Real Madrid team, see:

“Como No Te Voy a Querer – Nuevo Himno Del Real Madrid.” YouTube, YouTube, 3 June 2014, www.youtube.com/watch?v=ED7QCHQzlRs.

(These lyrics read: “¿Cómo no te voy a querer? ¿Cómo no te voy a querer? Si eres campeón de Europa por décima vez.”

Translation: How am I not going to love you? How am I not going to love you? If you are champion of Europe for the tenth time.”)

Improv Theatre Games

Nationality: American
Age: 18
Occupation: Student
Residence: Minnesota
Performance Date: April 4, 2017
Primary Language: English

Game #1: The Question Game

When I was in a theatre class my freshman year in high school, our teacher had us play a lot of improv games that she taught us… uh… There was the question game, where everyone had to stand in two lines, and then the person at the front of each line… like, one person would ask the other person a question, and that person had to respond with another question, and, like, it had to make sense in the context, it couldn’t include, like, a statement answer, and it couldn’t be a repetition of the other question… that one was hard. And then if you couldn’t come up with a question, you’d lose and go to the back of the line, and then the person behind you would, like, challenge, I guess, the person you were going against.

 

Game #2: Freeze Tag

My favorite one was called freeze tag, and I still like playing it with people… theatre people, ’cause regular people don’t get it… but, yeah, this one we played a lot, and it’s where there’s two people, like, onstage or whatever, and they start improving a scene. And then at some point, someone from the audience will yell, “Freeze!” and the actors have to freeze in whatever position they’re in. And then that person from the audience will, like, tag one of them out, and get into the same position they were in, and they have to start a new scene starting from that position. And it just gets really funny, people do really weird stuff, and, like, our class got so many inside jokes from that game… yeah, it’s just really fun.

 

Background (from interviewer):

My informant is a very theatrical person– she enjoys playing games, making up scenes (one could say “playing make-believe”), and she has been very involved in her high school’s theatre department. We met during this theatre class, and the teacher who taught it had a very large impact on our lives. My informant has previously told me that this teacher was the one who got her into theatre and showed her she could become an actress someday, something she now aspires to be. These games and the general fun this teacher brought to our class are part of what made it so memorable and so enjoyable, and what created such close bonds between the two of us and between us and our teacher. My informant’s continued interest in and performance of these games shows the degree to which this class, this teacher, and the love of theatre that they inspired has shaped her life.