Category Archives: Folk Beliefs

Blue For Boys, Pink For Girls

Nationality: French
Age: 33
Occupation: Assistant Professor
Residence: Los Angeles, CA
Performance Date: 4/11/12
Primary Language: English

This piece of folklore is something that is widely known across the country, if not the entire world. My informant is a pregnant woman, and works and lives in the Los Angeles area. When asking her about folk practices that she takes part in regarding her baby during pregnancy, she said that she is waiting to find out whether it is a boy or a girl so she can find out whether to paint the baby’s room pink or blue, get it pink or blue blankets, or get it pink or blue clothing.

When I asked my informant where she got this notion of baby boys being ‘blue’ and baby girls being ‘pink’, she simply said “it’s everywhere”. We all have grown up in a society where that’s just how it is. Popular culture, magazines, movies, and more all exhibit that this is just how it is and how it’s always been.

“The other day”, she said “I was watching the sequel to Father of the Bride”, and they were creating the baby’s room. She was going to be a girl, and they showed the room and it was “all pink, pink walls, pink furniture, pink stuffed animals, pink everything!” she said. It got her thinking about it, and solidified the fact that she would have to do this for her child if she wanted it to have a ‘normal upbringing’.

When I asked her how she believed that this notion and tradition started, she just said that it’s probably in human nature. Blue looks like a more masculine color, and obviously, pink is feminine she said. When I asked her why blue and pink rather than any other colors, she said that she wasn’t sure. “Maybe they’re just the most inherently masculine and feminine colors” she said.

I believe that this tradition started because, like my informant said, blue and pink are the most inherently masculine and feminine colors there are. I remember reading of a study saying that men are more naturally attracted to blue, while women are more attracted to pink. I believe that this tradition stuck on, and is now a big part of our popular culture and traditions of a baby.

Annotation: Father of The Bride Part II (1995), Movie.

Only Lesbians Drive Subarus

Nationality: American
Age: 19
Occupation: Student
Residence: Seattle, Washington
Performance Date: 4/14/12
Primary Language: English

This piece of folklore falls under a general stereotype and is potentially offensive to some people. When I was talking with my informant, he informed me that he drove a Subaru Outback. He paused for a second, seemingly waiting for my response. When I said nothing, he told me that many people say that

“Only Lesbians Drive Subarus”

When I asked my informant more about this, he began to tell me that he gets comments like that on a regular basis. People are always, jokingly, asking if he is a lesbian because he drives that car. My informant is from Washington and says that “even though there are a lot of outdoorsy women that drive Subarus, I still don’t fully understand how they got such a bad wrap”.

Subarus are a much more common car in the Pacific Northwest, but he says the he’s heard the stereotype everywhere. “It’s just a good all-purpose car. It can get me to the mountains, off-roading, and everywhere else adventurous that I want to go” he says. He said that it’s probably not a good thing for marketing the car, considering lesbians likely only make up a small percent of America’s total population. “Maybe they should do some new marketing or make a new name for it” to grow it’s market a little bit.

When I asked why he had the car in the first place, he said, “my dad said it was the only car I could get. I’m not mad about it, I still think it’s pretty cool”.

I think that the car may have gotten this stereotype because of advertisements, or because many pacific northwest women are more outdoor types, which is typically connected to a ‘lesbian personality’ in popular culture for some reason. I don’t think that there are more lesbians driving Subarus than any other brand of car out there, just that it tends to be more rugged women that drive them. It seems as though the stereotype has caught on, however, as I have heard people say that even living here in Los Angeles.

When your ear itches, someone is talking about you.

Nationality: Korean
Age: 49
Occupation: Travel Agent
Residence: Fullerton, CA
Performance Date: April, 2012
Primary Language: Korean
Language: English

Whenever your ear itches, it mean’s someone is either saying good things about your or bad things about you, depending on which side of your ear itches. Specifically when your left ear itches, bad things are being said; when your right ear itches, good things are being said.

 

My informant’s mother told her this proverb when she was 10 years old. She stated that one day while my informant and her mother were walking home from school, her mother said “My ear itches, someone must be talking about me.” My informant then asked what that meant and she explained this superstition to her. She then always answered with that statement when someone she knew said that their ear itched.

She said that this proverb was passed down from her grandmother to her mother. She believes it was a simple superstition due to the fact that Korean women are known to gossip frequently. Thus every time someone’s ear itches either good things or bad things are being said about them. She believed as a child if her ear itched a lot a certain day either people liked her a lot or despised her. My informants analysis makes a lot of sense as it provides quite the answer for a simple body reaction.

Whistling at night attracts snakes to your bed.

Nationality: Korean
Age: 55
Occupation: Homemaker
Residence: Fullerton, CA
Performance Date: April 2012
Primary Language: Korean

When you whistle at night you attract snakes to your bed.

My informant first heard about this proverb from her mother.  Due to this superstition my informant never whistled at night as a child as she did not want to bring harm to her family. She lived in a small country town in Korea, thus this environment helped this superstition gain steam. In her specific city, snakes were prevalent all over the neighborhood. She believes now that this proverb was told to discourage children to make noise at night, as this bothered the neighborhood. She also once witnessed her sister whistling while she was about to go to sleep, my informant then quickly told her the proverb so she would not brings snake into her bed.

This is actually quite an interesting usage of folklore as it was used to discourage children from doing a certain thing that bothered other townspeople. It also makes sense as snakes were prevalent all over the town and children usually hate snakes, thus the adults used a familiar animal to discourage children from whistling for generations as adults constantly passed this folklore down.

The Virgin Ghost

Nationality: Korean
Age: 49
Occupation: Travel Agent
Residence: Fullerton, CA
Performance Date: April 2012
Primary Language: Korean
Language: English

Whenever an unmarried woman dies, her spirit is cursed to become a “virgin ghost.” She is forced to roam around, instead of having passage to heaven or having a peaceful afterlife. This ghost is cursed, as no one loves her in the after-life and her appearance also frightens the living.

This story was told to my informant by her friend. They both believed as teenagers that they needed to get married, as they did not want to be cursed as a ghost. She now believes that this was told to encourage young women to get married.  Korean culture wants their offspring to get married as soon as possible. This is due to the fact that in the olden days Koreans considered unmarried bachelors to still be children. My informant also stated that this myth is quite prevalent in Korean television shows that deal with horror aspects.

This is quite interesting as the Korean culture values so much that they are willing to frighten young women in to getting married. What this folklore basically states to Korean women is that, if you didn’t get married you were not wanted, thus in the afterlife you are cursed to frighten people and roam around. Interestingly females ghosts are also prevalent in Asian folklore as menacing creatures, my informant could not give me a reason why to this. It does make sense to me that a “Virgin Ghost” would be lonely in the afterlife as her appearance is frightening. However my informant stated that if the “Virgin Ghost” meets a “ghost spouse,” the spirit will be free to have a peaceful afterlife.