Category Archives: Customs

Customs, conventions, and traditions of a group

Nightly Bible Stories

Nationality: American
Age: 21
Occupation: Student, Part time facilities attendant at on campus gym
Residence: Los Angeles
Performance Date: 4/15/13
Primary Language: English

Here my informant recounts a tradition she shared with her Mom in childhood:

My mom used to… We had this old book of Bible stories, but they were kid versions, it was like, our kid Bible which our grandma bought us, and so we’d read a story from that every night and that was always really with my mom.

This tradition shows how the informant and her mother combined the common family custom of mothers and children reading stories before bed with her religion, sharing nightly Bible stories with her mother. The informant explained how she feels this not only strengthened her bond with her mother, but it is now a large part of her faith, and the stories she read as a child are still her favorite Bible stories today, as they carry the added significance of her Mother’s love.

Sleeping Around the Christmas Tree

Nationality: American
Age: 21
Occupation: Student, Part time facilities attendant at on campus gym
Residence: Los Angeles
Performance Date: 4/24/13
Primary Language: English

Here my informant recounts a Christmas tradition her family shares:

My family always sleeps, well, not always, we’ve done it before… Okay, so we always sleep in the living room right around the Christmas tree at Christmas time, and all of us just, like, sleep on the floor on this big mat. Uh, just like a mat, just, not like an inflatable bed, but we’d just kind of each make our own, we’d call it a mat, but it was more our own kind of blanket and pillow bed I guess, we’d all sleep on the floor with.

My informant described how her family started this tradition when she was just one year old, and how she, her parents, and her sister would spread out blankets and pillows under the Christmas tree, and sleep there together on Christmas eve. She said it was a way for her family to celebrate being together and loving one another on such a special holiday, and how it always made her appreciate what a wonderful home she had.

Thanksgiving Ham

Nationality: American
Age: 21
Occupation: Student, Part time facilities attendant at on campus gym
Residence: Los Angeles
Performance Date: 4/27/13
Primary Language: English

In the following, my informant recounts how her family traditionally has Ham on Thanksgiving rather than the more traditional Turkey:

We always have Ham for Thanksgiving, always, I mean, yeah, its not a Thanksgiving without ham. Turkey? Not turkey. We’ll have some turkey,  but we always have ham because my great, my grandma, or my Nana on my dad’s side, she cooked the best honey baked ham, oh my gosh, and um , we loved it when we were little, and, so each Thanksgiving she would make it for us, and we’d always have that.

The fact that my informant and her family continue to celebrate Thanksgiving with ham rather than turkey, even after, as she informed me, her grandmother, who made the ham, has died, shows that they do it in remembrance of her. My informant told me that for her family Thanksgiving is a way of not only celebrating the family currently there, but the family which either is absent or has died, and eating ham is a way of remembering not only her grandmother, but all the family members she once shared a Thanksgiving with.

Merde

Nationality: American
Age: 17
Occupation: Student
Residence: Norfolk, Virginia
Performance Date: 4/14/13
Primary Language: English

In the following, my informant recounts one of her pre-performance traditions:

So, in the last few days before we’re about to do a show, we have a tradition called “merde gifting,” where, everyone in the show buys everyone else a small present or treat, and like, it doesn’t have to , they don’t have to buy it, but, like, we make cookies, or little candies, or pencils, or even stuffed animals, it depends, but just something nice to give to the rest of the cast and show them you care about them. And then I guess the other part of it is, more than just giving gifts, you tell people merde before they go on stage, which is supposed to be like, good luck. It comes from french and I think it means “shit” and it means good luck on stage, don’t step in shit, because apparently cows would poop onstage in the olden times or something, I don’t know, but yeah, we tell each other merde and give each other presents before a show.

Although my informant does not know exactly where this tradition comes from, she believes it is derived from something more closely related to the meaning behind merde. However, by now it has simply come to mean “good luck,” and my informant and her fellow performers have expanded upon the word to include gifts, and other ways of showing support. Apparently it is part of a number of traditions designed to foster support among the cast before a show, and has been around for a long time.

Persian New Year

Nationality: Iranian
Age: 20
Occupation: Student
Residence: Los Angeles
Performance Date: 4/22/13
Primary Language: English
Language: Farsi

In the following my informant recounts how he celebrates Persian New Year:

This other Persian tradition that I’m gonna describe has to do with Persian New Year, or, Norus “new day” as it’s said in Farsi. Persian New Year occurs on the first day of Spring, and there’s a lot of symbolism in that: Spring is the beginning of life, the flowers come to bloom, the air becomes filled with perfume, there is, um, an incoming of life into the world, and that’s why it’s considered the beginning of the year. Spiritually also in Islamic, Iranian tradition, religion is considered the coming of life and springtime, but that’s only somewhat related. Anyways, during this period of Norus, this is very similar to Christmas in a way where, there’s a gift giving and families come together, um, there’s many… it’s usually a very outdoorsy thing where you do pick-nicks and if it’s like Los Angeles where’s there’s a large Persian population, there will be crowds of thousands that come to a park and come and commemorate Norus, or new year together. The Christmas tree for Persians is the Haft sin, which means seven “s”. Sin is the letter S in farsi, and this haft sin is, usually you lay out a rug, or on a table you set out 7 objects that begin with  the letter S in Farsi, and each have a symbolism having to do with the new year. So you would put the seib, the apple which is, you know, health, and the sedecay which is vinegar  which is a symbol of fertility, secay which is, um, a coin and is a symbol of wealth, um, many similar things, so seven things that begin with the letter s. And I  don’t know them in farsi, but there are goldfish on the table, there are, uh, there’s like a sweet sugary paste, there’s garlic I believe, there’ a bed of wheat grass that the families grow themselves, there’s painted eggs, all these things have a symbolic nature to them and they’re presented on a table, and It becomes a very, there’s uh, the hyacinth flower, they all have a symbolism, and it becomes the center of a house and a place which is the representative of the holidays.

My informant tells me he has celebrated Persian New Year every since childhood, and has observed these celebrations firsthand several times, since, for him, it is a major celebration. He talked about how even in Los Angeles, Persian tradition is strong, and the preservation of so many specific customs is important for the overall preservation of the holiday.