Category Archives: Customs

Customs, conventions, and traditions of a group

Salem Witches

‘ As an anthropologist, I spent decades interviewing people in the Mayan highlands, throughout central America and Mexico, and the Andes all about their folklore, ghost stories, and witch stories… but I want to tell you the one that I grew up with in New England, a piece of folklore so important to me it changed the way I live. When we were kids, the histories and the stories of the Salem Witch Trials are something that everybody was taught. We were told these stories from our first grammar school class. I grew up during a period in the 70s where there was a whole revitalization of interest in witches. Because of the feminist movement, there was a retelling of who these women were. It is said that in 1692, the craze started… it went for a full year. Anyone who was considered an outcast or spoke out, were all accused of being witches. Here, in these little towns of New England, people were paranoid beyond belief. They were having heavy winters, people were starving, they were jealous of each other… there was so much religious belief that the devil was constantly surrounding them… he’s in the goats… he’s in your neighbor… he’s everywhere. So, in the late 1600s, this group of girls sitting around the fire, with a Caribbean woman named Tituba and the girls asked her to tell them a story to pass the time. Her story was about the devil, and the devil turning girls into witches. This got in the little girls’ heads, and before long, all of them start to have these visions of witches… that people are having paralytic attacks, epileptic attacks, visions and hallucinations, sleepwalking… They say this was all because of the witches. During this brutal Winter, the town of Salem used a book written by a British King called “How to Tell a Witch”, and they used this book to identify the ‘witches’. Over 200 people had been accused as witches. So, when I was growing up, I grew up with pictures of the Devil with puritanical etchings, pictures of the devil riding goats in the churches… These things were in my brain as real things that really happened. I was taught that the history is in my house, my clothes, the furniture, everywhere. Somehow, I am connected to them. So, I grew up with this belief that witches were our friends… that witches were these falsely accused woman… not falsely accused because witches don’t exist… we believed they did, and that they were killed because they were smart woman who spoke out and killed for that. Many of us identified as witches growing up… I did. So many of us growing up during this time thought we were witches and led a life to resemble the tales we heard of our ancestors.” – JB

JB has a personal connection to the tales of the Salem Witch Trials, specifically to the tales that were revitalized during the 70s. JB grew up very close to Salem Town, in which the trials happened. They were passed down to her throughout her childhood in places like school, or from friends and their parents. She felt so strongly about these tales and memmorates that she began to live a life similar to that of a witch. She believed she was one, she decided that her and her friends were the “new witches” and with that she prayed to the trees, the rivers, and to something much older than any religion she knew. JB recalls that the story she tells now, the tales she passes down to her own family are intertwined with those of the Salem Witches.

To me, this piece of JB’s life was very interesting, as I also grew up learning about the Salem Witch Trials, but not during a time where these stories were regenerated and strengthened. I learned about it more in the historical sense, what my teachers believed to be factual events during this time period. I was not told any tales or legends of these times. JB’s recounting of her experience shows how much historical folklore can be passed down through generations and continue to take effect on those who hear them, as it did to her and her peers. Additionally, the cultural beliefs of these legends have continued to adapt and be passed down to many audiences across the world. The adaptation can even be seen in JB’s interpretation of the legends, as in the 70s, the theme had changed to show the power of the women, rather than the ‘sin’ many past tales condemned them to have. It can also be assumed that these tales in the late 1800s and early 1900s were performed for audiences, as much folklore is. This folklore also took hold in shaping many communities throughout the last centuries, growing over time and bringing people together, fostering a sense of connection to such historical events.

Sacrifice for Deceased Osage Children

Tags: Osage, Ozarks, Funeral Custom, Sacrifice

Text

For the Osage, whenever there’s a death of a child/baby, dogs will be used in ceremonial practices as a sacrifice.

Informant Info

Race/Ethnicity: Indian

Age: 22

Occupation: College Student

Residence: Northwest Arkansas, USA

Date of Performance: March 2024

Primary Language: English

Other Language(s): N/A

Relationship: Friend

Context

AH, the informant, is of Indian descent. Her father practices Hinduism and speaks Tulu. He has been a very influential figure in her upbringing. She also studies indigenous peoples and their customs as a Sustainability major.

Analysis

This act of sacrifice is meant to represent the similar innocence of little dogs and babies. It is also done as a means to give the child/baby companionship in the afterlife.

Fasting Period After Hindu Death

Tags: Hindu, Funeral Customs, Reincarnation, Fasting

Text

Whenever someone passes away in Hindu households, there is a fasting period of 17 days where everyone has to be vegetarian/vegan.

Informant Info

Race/Ethnicity: Indian

Age: 22

Occupation: College Student

Residence: Northwest Arkansas, USA

Date of Performance: March 2024

Primary Language: English

Other Language(s): N/A

Relationship: Friend

Context

AH, the informant, is of Indian descent. Her father practices Hinduism and speaks Tulu. He has been a very influential figure in her upbringing. She also studies indigenous peoples and their customs as a Sustainability major.

Analysis

This custom is symbolic of cleansing away the impurities that come with the death of someone in the family. It is also a means of celebrating their life and accomplishments as they enter the cycle of reincarnation.

Christmas Raviolis

Text: 

“At Christmas, we make homemade raviolis. When I was growing up, my grandmother [made homemade raviolis] most of the time, and then when you kids were younger, Nonni (the informant’s mother) did it a number of years, and now we do it.”

Minor Genre: 

Holiday Ritual; Food Traditions

Context: 

“My dad has a funny story about the first time he had dinner with my mom’s Italian family. In the Italian meals, they would serve raviolis almost as an appetizer. My dad filled up on the raviolis and then there were still like four more courses of dinner to come.

“I never made [the raviolis], I just ate them. My grandmother made them and I didn’t really pitch in as a kid. It wasn’t until Nonni started making them with you kids that I helped. We would have raviolis throughout the year but really the ritual of making them was saved for Christmas.”

Analysis:

I have memories of making raviolis with my grandmother, Nonni, every Christmas growing up. It was a process that involved the whole family: we first made the pasta dough using an old recipe from the informant’s grandmother (my great-grandmother); then we rolled out the pasta into thin strips using a pasta-roller attachment to the kitchen table; then we used ravioli dishes to place the dough, add in the filling, and press the food into ravioli shapes.

Ravioli originated in Italy and is a type of pasta dish containing filling typically composed of meat or cheese. Nonni’s side of the family immigrated from Italy from the regions of Tuscany and Campania. Although the filling of our family’s ravioli is likely an Americanized version of the Italian original, we reference an old hand-written recipe for the pasta that could reasonably be believed to have been brought over by Nonni’s Italian ancestors.

The ritual of making raviolis each Christmas is a way to honor our family’s Italian heritage while simultaneously engaging in a community-building activity that will ultimately be enjoyed by every member of the family at dinner.

Eating twelve grapes on New Year’s

Text:

Eating twelve grapes on New Year’s Eve

Minor Genre:

Holiday Celebration; Folk Magic

Context:

“On the most recent New Year’s Eve, I was at a New Year’s Eve party when someone told me that you’re supposed to eat twelve grapes right after the clock strikes midnight as a new relationship thing. I decided to do it but I accidentally ate the grapes before midnight, so when the clock struck twelve, I ate another twelve grapes. I ended up getting into a love triangle afterward and now I’m superstitious that it was because of the grapes. I had never heard of or practiced this ritual before hearing about it at the party.”

Analysis:

I have heard different variations of this tradition of eating twelve grapes on New Year’s. The tradition is of Spanish origin, and the most popular version seems to be to eat twelve grapes on New Year’s Eve to bring about twelve months of good luck. Other variations include eating the grapes while sitting under the table and eating twelve grapes in order to find a new relationship in the upcoming year. 

This ritual is an example of contagious magic; the grapes are believed to possess a fortuitous quality that is then transferred to a person upon their consumption of the fruit. While I do not necessarily believe in the magical effects of consuming grapes on New Year’s, I do think that it would make sense for a person to trace back to their success in a new year to such an action. Particularly in the informant’s situation, where being in a love triangle is a fairly rare occurrence, it makes sense from a psychological standpoint that they would blame this situation on the mistake they made in the New Year’s Eve grape ritual.