Category Archives: Gestation, birth, and infancy

Generally up to the first year.

Hot Tub Pregnancy

Nationality: American
Age: 20
Occupation: Studentq
Residence: Los Angeles
Performance Date: April 19, 2017
Primary Language: English

“Friend: When I was in middle school at a Christian private school, there was this rumor that if you kissed in a hot tub you would get pregnant. I had a hot tub at my house and I remember at my birthday party in 8th grade we started playing truth or dare in my hot tub. One of the boys dared one of the girls to kiss another guy and we all freaked out (but not visibly, because you know, eighth grade is when you’re supposed to be cool about everything). She eventually kissed the guy and then people started talking the whole next week at school about how she was pregnant and she was going to have to marry that kid.”

Me: Why do you think that was a rumor?

Friend: “I think parents didn’t want kids to be messing around in the hot tub, you know where it’s hard to see where people’s hands are. Now that I think about it, I have heard that if you have sex in water and let’s say the guy pulls out right away, there’s still a chance that you can get pregnant. Like if the sperm were to travel through the water? It seems ridiculous that just kissing can do that, but kissing leads to other things. If you’re a parent you probably don’t want your kid getting in the hot tub with someone of the opposite sex no matter what.”

Analysis: I hadn’t heard this folklore about kissing in a hot tub, but I definitely heard that you weren’t supposed to go too far when you’re in water with someone. I think the fact that she was at a private Christian school says a lot about this folklore. Chastity is a big part of the culture, and so kissing overall would be a taboo, in the hot tub or otherwise.

Kurupi

Nationality: Paraguayan
Age: 23
Occupation: Student
Residence: Los Angeles
Performance Date: April 20, 2017
Primary Language: Spanish

My friend from Paraguay has a lot of folklore about the seven Guarani monsters and the legends behind them. The Kurupi was the strangest of all the seven that he told me about.

Friend: “There are several Guarani monsters I learned about growing up in Paraguay. One of them is the Kurupi, a weird gremlin-like dude with a really long penis. I think he represents the spirit of fertility or something. ”

Me: Were there any stories about him?

Friend:  “Yes. In ‘the old days’ a lot of people would say (if they had an unwanted pregnancy) that Kurupi had impregnated them without even entering their home. For example, if you were a single woman or if you had cheated on your husband and didn’t want to get into trouble, you would blame it on Kurupi. His penis is so long that he can go through windows and doors in the night. There are also a lot of stories about the Kurupi taking young women and raping them.”

Me: Did you ever believe the stories?

Friend: “No, I never really believed in the Kurupi. Mostly he’s just a funny little demon that we’d laugh about in grade school.” 

Analysis: The Kurupi is certainly the strangest looking creature I’ve ever seen. Besides the initial hilarity of his appearance, the tale of the Kurupi is creative and disturbing. In a place and time where modern medicine cannot explain pregnancies and sex, legends will replace science. This is a clear example where women would become pregnant (by someone other than their intended) and the only way to protect their virtue would be to blame it on the Kurupi. In many ways, belief in a creature like this can settle marital disputes before they even arise. Additionally, however, the Kurupi could have taken the blame for many rape incidents– when a real person was the perpetrator.

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Lunar Eclipse and a Red Towel

Nationality: Mexican
Age: 26
Performance Date: April 1, 2017
Primary Language: English
Language: Spanish

“During a lunar Eclipse, You’re supposed to put a red towel on your belly to protect the baby”

My informant learned this piece of folklore from his parents who were practitioners of this. My informant himself never tried it on his child and never knew why his parents did it. He shared this with me when the topic of pregnancy superstitions came up. This piece of folklore was very interesting to me and made sense because of all the connections that a lunar eclipse has to women, pregnancy and fertility that we learned in class. I also thought it was weird that the superstition says particularly a red towel. This reminded me of Vaz de Silva’s argument that the color red usually symbolizes women and fertility in folklore.

Red Ribbons on Fruit Trees

Nationality: Mexican
Age: 26
Performance Date: April 1, 2017
Primary Language: English
Language: Spanish

“My parents used to tie red ribbons on the fruit trees during an eclipse… it was I don’t know…  so that the trees wouldn’t die, supposedly like lunar events like would or an eclipse and stuff would mess with the harvest of that.”

My informant learned this practice from his parents who were practitioners of this themselves. We were discussing the color red and what it had to do with lunar eclipses. There seems to be a connection with lunar eclipses, pregnancy, and fruit. I believe that  fruit may symbolize a women’s fertility and that is why the red ribbon somehow protects the fruit from dying, just as the color red may protect an unborn baby from dying.

Naming Children

Nationality: Gabon
Age: 20
Occupation: Student
Residence: Los Angeles, California
Performance Date: 04/25/2017
Primary Language: English
Language: Mandinka

Subject:

West African Rituals Regarding Newborn Children

Informant:

Saran Kaba grew up in Gabon. Her family is mostly from Gabon and Guinea, and strongly identify with Mandingo culture which is prevalent throughout the region. Saran immigrated to the United States in 2014, where she now lives and studies at the University of Southern California.

Original Script:

“Whenever a child is born, we always wait um seven days to name the child and to… yeah to name the child. And um, we shave, like, the complete hair of the child after seven days. Just because, like, we want to remove any kind of, like, bad energy because like, babies are born with hair, so like it’s kind of impurity for us, it’s… a sign of impurity so like by shaving their hair we just remove like any kind of impurity and yeah to make like the child kind of… pure. Umm, and if the born child is like a female, we sacrifice one sheep, and if the child born is a male, we sacrifice two sheeps. I guess just because guys are… more wealthy than girls I don’t know. So that’s something that, like, my mom taught me.”

Informant’s Background Knowledge and Relationship with this Piece:

Saran learned of these rituals from her mom, and also knows that waiting seven days to name the child is based on a Muslim tradition, which she says is prevalent in in her culture. She doesn’t know any more details than that.

Thoughts About the Piece:

This is similar to some European traditions I have heard of, which involve waiting to name a child in case it does not survive early infancy. However, the head shaving is interesting: I know that many mothers I’ve encountered prize their baby’s hair, and I also know that in Jewish tradition, you are not supposed to cut a child’s hair until after their third birthday. Regarding the sacrifices, it seems like the birth of a baby boy is celebrated much more than that of a baby girl, although I don’t know enough about Mandingo culture to say whether that is an artifact of underlying sexism or if there is some other reasoning.