Category Archives: Riddle

Catch Riddle

Nationality: American
Age: 18
Occupation: Student
Residence: Santa Barbara, CA
Performance Date: March 25, 2008
Primary Language: English

Instructions in performing the Catch Riddle titled “Stop & Pots”:

  • Subject 1 asks Subject 2 to do two things
    • When Subject 1 says “stop”, Subject 2 must spell out “S-T-O-P” out loud
    • When Subject 1 says “pots”, Subject 2 must spell out “P-O-T-S” our loud
  • Subject 1 randomly alternates between saying stop and pots, nearly ten times.  Throughout this time, Subject 2 is constantly spelling the two words repeatedly.
  • Finally, Subject 1 asks Subject 2, “What do you do at a green light?”
    • Subject 2’s tendency is to say, “stop” even though that is the wrong answer, thereby being the catch riddle.

Eric, now a student in Santa Barbara, “learned this catch riddle in elementary

school when another boy pulled the catch riddle on me [him].  I fell for the catch riddle and actually said stop.  Most people actually fall for it.  I tried it out on my family when I first found out about it, and everyone except my mom fell for it.  The funny thing is that I haven’t forgotten the riddle and have actually used it as I have gotten older.  And still, even when people aren’t in elementary school and are more intelligent they still fall for the catch.  Anytime I say the riddle it brings back vivid memories of when I actually first heard it on the blacktops of my school where we played basketball at recess.”

When I first asked Eric if he knew of any forms of folklore, specifically jokes and riddles, he responded by beginning the process of this catch riddle.  I fell for it myself and then he went into detail about how and when he learned it.  It seems appropriate that these catch riddles would spread throughout elementary schools because kids find them extremely fascinating.  However, I am not certain that most originate at elementary schools.  One theory I have is that most originate amongst older children, anywhere from middle school to high school students, and they proceed to try out the catch riddles on their younger siblings.  Then, the younger siblings find the catch riddles amazing and cool, only to spread them across elementary schools.  This catch riddle seems appropriate to say to people of all ages, which isn’t always the case.

Joke/Riddle/Blason Populaire

Nationality: Black
Age: 20
Occupation: Student
Residence: Las Vegas, NV
Performance Date: April 28, 2008
Primary Language: English

Question: “How do you hide something from a black person?”

Answer: “Put it in a book.”

Subject’s Analysis:

“It’s funny and embarrassing because it’s true to the stereotypical extent. I learned this joke watching a movie, I think. It was when I was in my teens, I believe it was a progressive movie, like a satire. I don’t feel comfortable repeating it around other races or demographic, most black people don’t.”

Collector’s Analysis:

Being a member of the African American community, I have mixed feelings about this entry. I feel that it is untrue of me, however, I know of others who do not read frequently if at all. As we discussed in class though, jokes like this can become a self fulfilling prophecy. The more that people joke about blacks being uneducated and illiterate, the more that the community will feel that it is okay to be such. So while I felt that this joke was slightly humorous, overall I don’t think that it is very funny, it is supposed to have that effect for black people I think. If Jeremiah saw it in a conscious movie, then it was intended to illicit shame from blacks who were watching, and possibly encourage change.

Proverb/Riddle

Nationality: Black
Age: 19
Occupation: Student
Residence: Antioch, CA
Performance Date: April 26, 2008
Primary Language: English

“If there is a skunk in a room and a man walks in, and they both come out, who would come out smelling like who?”

Subject’s Analysis:

“It’s a riddle that I learned from my grandfather. He repeated it a lot during childhood. The riddle goes, ‘If there is a skunk in a room and a man walks in, and they both come out, who would come out smelling like whom?’ The obvious answer is that the man would smell like the skunk. It correlates to a verse in second Corinthians in the Bible. It means that associations ruin useful habits. What he was trying to get at was that if you are associating with people who don’t have good habits, or who believe in something that is different from your beliefs, then it can undo your understanding of right and wrong.”

Collector’s Analysis:

I’m not sure about the correlation to Corinthians in the bible, as the subject was unable to locate the exact verse. However, in essence the proverb is essentially about the company that you keep can have a strong influence. This says that if you are in bad company then bad company will have a poor  affect on you. While I understand that because she has heard the story firsthand it has special meaning to her, I don’t see where she extracted some of the meaning from. I feel that the meaning may be more general than she is making it.

Riddle – Santa Monica, California

Nationality: Irish-America
Age: 48
Occupation: Realtor, Teacher
Residence: Santa Monica, CA
Performance Date: April 24, 2008
Primary Language: English
Language: Spanish

“Brothers and sisters, I have none. But that man’s father is my father’s son.

Who am I?”

Answer: the speaker

My mother, Tica, first heard this riddle from her father when she was a young girl of about 10 years old. She said he would say it at dinner parties and social gatherings as a mental challenge for the guests. She described the social setting as a showcase of his wits, continuing to amaze guests with his bountiful supply of brain teasers and puzzles. He would ask it in a straightforward and stern manner, almost commanding you to answer correctly. He would give his audience as much time as they needed to venture their guesses, and would only reveal the answer if no one could answer correctly. He would acknowledge a person when they answered correctly, but many times he would have to reveal the answers of many puzzles to shouts of, “Oh, of course!” She said he seemed to retain a sense of pride when he stumped his audience and had to enlighten them.

My mother described my grandfather as the quintessential patriarch who you could always go to for advice. This riddle therefore, was a way for him to not only show off his wisdom and intelligence, but a friendly way in which he could gain trust from his family by entertaining in recreation with them. This riddle can be looked at as a search for identity and the quest for independence and individuality. Because my grandfather was the one proposing the riddle, it implies that he has found a sense of identity and independence can thus be sought after for guidance. This riddle establishes a generational gap in a coming of age and self-discovery motif.

When my mother first said the riddle, my initial response was Jesus. The mention of “father’s son” brought images of a Heavenly Father and his son Jesus Christ. Therefore this riddle can also carry with it religious aspects as well. The significance of religion in my Catholic family is very profound. Thus I would also say that this riddle also implies the importance of faith in establishing one’s identity. Faith can also provide much-needed guidance in addition to that of a wise and experienced mentor such as a grandfather. This riddle therefore symbolizes the passing of knowledge and wisdom from individuals of different generations with the support of faith along the way.

Riddle – Central Uganda

Nationality: Ugandan
Age: 18
Occupation: Student
Residence: North Hills, CA
Performance Date: April 10, 2008
Primary Language: English
Language: Luganda

Nina       Mukyala       Wange   Agenda      kumaakya           Akomawo           kyilo

I have     wife              mine      she goes     in the morning    she comes back   night

When we were little kids, we used to engage in riddle competitions with my friends at school. All kids would pose their best riddles for everyone else to solve. Kids would often come up with the hardest riddles in order to win the contest. The winner would always be the one with that riddle that no one can solve. In one of the competitions, my friend Paddy posed the above riddle. No one around could come up with the right answer for it, which meant he (Paddy) was crowned the champion of the day. When we asked for the answer, he said that his wife was the household front door.

In his explanation of his answer, paddy said that the household front door is opened in the mourning and closed at night, which is true among the Baganda households. This, and several other Luganda riddles, is commonly heard in riddle contests, which are often between young kids of about 5 to 10 years old.

Analysis

If someone this riddle were told to someone from a different culture, it would most likely sound meaningless. That means that different cultures in most cases have different riddles. That being the case, it then means that riddles are subjective to the cultures in which they are told. That is to say:  a person from a culture dominated by coffee production is unlikely to tell riddles about car production. Riddles, therefore, can have some cultural significance. Riddles can be true, joking, catch, obscene, or oppositional depending on the type of information given in them. In the case of Charles’s riddle, it is a true riddle because all the information necessary to solve it is given.

I would also consider riddle contexts as an informal way of teaching culture to children. As Charles said, it is true that the Baganda open doors in the morning and close them at night. This means that the riddle was orally formulated to teach that particular norm to kids. It might be dramatic but when the riddle is solved for a kid, he or she is most likely to learn and remember that a door is supposed to be opened in the morning and closed at night. In a way, riddles build cultural identity. Like in this case, it teaches kids what it is like to be a member of the Baganda culture. This riddle, I think, also teaches family structure to the Baganda children.

There is a sexual orientation issue indirectly being tackled by this riddle. As we see, Nasser (a boy) tells his friends – one of them being Hamis (a boys too) – that he has a “wife.” To me this has something to say about who gets to pair up with whom in a romantic relationship. In essence, this riddle says that men marry women and not fellow men. That said, I would not be surprised to for a girl to say the same riddle but say, “I have a husband” in place of  “I have a wife.”