Category Archives: Life cycle

Graduation – A Shared Celebration

Nationality: American
Age: 18
Occupation: Student
Residence: Schenectady, New York
Language: English

Ritual: Graduation- Celebrated at the completion of an educational cycle or program

Background/Informant’s Interpretation: With an older brother and a twin, he has had his fair share of high school graduations. A yearly occurring ritual that symbolizes one graduating into the next steps of life where one is spreading their wings and is leaving home for the first time. Most kids in the US go through this ritual, with the lessons from high school carrying on in your actions and thoughts that occur within college, especially during your freshman year of college. His older brother, witnesses him and his twin crossing the stage was symbolic to him of how he was able to share a non-religious ritual with brothers in an public environment. Getting to meet many people and different experiences, this culminates into a mixed culture across college campuses in the United States, he has experienced as a non-traditional theatre major. At the end of the ritual people may take an untraditional path going into trade school or forgoing school overall. However, at the end of the day, this a ritual that is key i one’s development and one that celebrates past accomplishment laying out steps for what is to come next.

My Interpretation: Personally, I believe that this riytal that is common amongst all yet is easily forgotten due to its yearly appearance. With a brother who recently went through a collegiate and medical school one this rituakl demonstrates a part of someone’s heritage that we often times forget about due to the fact that their are no systematic, religious or ethnic ties to it. Its important to a heritage, due to the fact that the steps it took to get to graduation differs person to person, with arduous steps and sub-processes highlighting how family and culture has pulled through for them. As such, graduation acts as a culmination of all these factors and emphasizes an essential part of heritage in the 21st century.

Brasilian Birthday

AGE: 20 

Date of performance: 04/29/2025

Occupation: Student 

Primary Language: English 

Title-   Brasilian Birthday Traditions

Context- M shares a part of her familial heritage that influences how she celebrates birthdays in her family. M says, “I LOVE the brasilian happy birthday song, it’s awesome. It’s a tradition during birthdays to always have brigadeiro made, which is like a chocolate truffle ball made of milk, cocoa powder and butter that’s covered in sprinkles.”

Analysis- M shares a variation of the typical birthday most people imagine. Instead of the classic ‘Happy Birthday’ ballad followed by a whole cake, M celebrates her birthday the Brazilian way—singing the ‘brasilian happy birthday song’ and sharing many brigadeiro. An iconic element of folklore is observing how certain elements of a tradition, such as a birthday, are kept throughout the world but slightly adapted to the certain region/people. The way people can share similar customs but make it their own based on their unique traditions is a trait of folklore, which can be seen in M’s Brasilian birthday tradition.

Toss of the bouquet

Date_of_performance: 04/25/2025

Informant Name: FR

Language: English 

Nationality: American

Occupation: Student/Vaulting Coach

Primary Language: English

Residence: Westwood

INTERVIEW:

I recently went to my cousin’s wedding in the beginning of April, I guess you can call that recently. One thing that I saw my cousin do after they got married during the reception, was toss the bouquet to the crowd. I knew what it meant, but my younger sister was confused why she did that, so we talked to my mom about it and this is what she said is the meaning of it: “Usually, at traditional weddings, brides will through the bouquet towards family and friends who gather on the dance floor and the person who catches it, if they are single or in a relationship, it would mean they would get married next. It usually surrounds women guests. It basically symbolizes good luck and love in your future relationships. It doesn’t mean it will actually happen, it is supposed to be a lighthearted and fun game where the person who catches the bouquet could get teased and to put pressure on their partner to make a move.” I found this interesting that the bride is willing to make the wedding about someone else and the excitement of them possibly getting married instead of wanting to keep all of the attention of them and their partner and how they just got married. I think my cousin did to keep the wedding ritual alive because it is to normalized to do the bouquet toss at weddings, you get peer pressured to do the traditions that your parents did before you because it is seen as the norm and what everyone should do. I just found the idea of tossing a bouquet at your wedding an interesting wedding ritual.

MY ANALYSIS

I agree with FR about how she choose to make her wedding about someone else by tossing the bouquet. I find western wedding traditions so fascinating and how it mostly focused on the women being given away to the man. For example, the dad walking the bride down the isle as a way to “give her away” to the husband. And now tossing the bouquet to the women guests to see if their partner proposes and it is always about heterosexual relationships or weddings. All of the weddings I’ve been too, have mostly been heterosexual weddings (due to my family members mainly being straight) and all of them have done the bouquet toss. But, the traditional aspects of weddings, example the bouquet toss, is rooted in folklore and the idea that the brides are met with rituals before getting married as a way to represent women losing their innocence and/or virginity. The bouquet toss falls under the idea of whoever gets the bouquet is next to lose their innocence by getting married and “belonging” to their partner and possibly losing the individuality they had before.

Christmas Eve ritual

Date_of_performance: 04/27/2025

Informant Name: MR

Language: English 

Nationality: American

Occupation: Teacher

Primary Language: English

Residence: Pasadena

INTERVIEW:

My birthday is on Christmas eve and by that time everyone has their lights up in suspense for Christmas. When I was younger, my parents and I started a tradition (or ritual) o drive to a neighborhood that were having light shows, and go look at the Christmas lights in the car with holiday music playing. It was always at night, so it was a wonderful way to end my birthday and introduce Christmas. It also was a great way to bring my family together, since my father was working a lot of the time, so I will always cherish those times. I loved the tradition so much, that I now do it with my daughters and son. Every Christmas eve, we would go drive to any neighborhood that is putting on an exciting Christmas light show, turn on the Christmas channel so it matches up with the lights and take in the view as we drive through the neighborhood. Christmas time always ends up becoming a stress with the pressure of getting everyone the gift they want, having dinner with the extended family, that it can be hard to find time to take a minute to breathe and actually enjoy what Christmas is all about. And to me, Christmas is all about being with my family, so having this time during my birthday where I can get my daughters and son together to feel the Christmas spirit, is a tradition that I’m always going to try to keep up as a long as I can.

MY ANALYSIS:

Christmas traditions are type of traditions that I hear about the most because it is always so surrounded by family and spending time with family that you want to cherish every moment you can get with them before everything starts to get complicated. Her tradition of seeing Christmas lights, is a great tradition to keep up because it gets everyone excited and is something that everyone can look forward to, so it can be easy for this tradition to stay around or even to make Christmas feel more like the old Christmas we felt as kids, sitting in the back seat while old holiday music plays on the radio, falling asleep as Christmas lights pass by the window, small memories like those is what keeps the joy of Christmas alive. The peace of it all, having something you can look forward to in the year, knowing it will always be there for you to help you get through the months or even through the seasonal/winter depression that may come up.

Christmas tamales

Date_of_performance: 04/28/2025

Informant Name: XM

Language: English/Spanish  

Nationality: Chilean

Occupation: Student

Primary Language: English

Residence: Santa Monica

INTERVIEW:

During every Christmas with my family we would usually eat tamales, not sure why it was tamales, but I was guaranteed a tamale when I went to my family’s house for Christmas. We aren’t Mexican, so I don’t understand, but it is a tradition and it feels with warmth and it was one of my favorite traditions during Christmas because it reminds me of my family and the time we spent together. It reminds me of good memories, makes me happy, and reminds me of home. I miss those christmases spent together as a whole family and when things felt easier as a child.

MY ANALYSIS

Hearing this story reminds me of the nostalgic Christmas when I was younger. How everything felt simple and nothing was changing. People fall into a routine during the holidays especially Christmas, because you are a kid so you go wherever your family goes, so you get used to the repetitive traditions that you create with the family you are with. The interesting concept of traditions, is that they don’t have to make sense on paper, it is something you create with family that you carry with you because it reminds you of home, so even if XM isn’t Mexican, having tamales every Christmas started to be associated with warm and happier memories and that is why traditions are made. It reminds her of her family and the Christmas she spent with them before she grew up and go thrown into the world and the messiness of it all.