Category Archives: Rituals, festivals, holidays

Kumbhabhishekam

Nationality: Indian American
Residence: United States
Performance Date: 04/23/2018
Primary Language: English
Language: Telugu
  1. The main piece: Maha Rajagopuram Kumbhabhishekam

“So this happens once in twelve years. It’s a consecration ceremony that is done by uttering weighted hymns to evoke the entity of the supreme God…to…bless the… the temple. So we were there for that ceremony. It’s a five day long ceremony. It has five days of chanting, some Vedic hymns, uh…that invoke the supreme God, you know, to…energize the holy water. Which is then poured over the temple in a…in a ceremony called Kumbhabhishekam. That’s the ceremony.

“And since it’s a once in a twelve year ceremony at the temple, and the chanting of the hymns is special, you know. It’s not normal. There were 30 priests visiting our local temple from all across the globe. It’s a consecration ceremony for the temple, the deities—the temple. So every twelve years we do that. So it happened, we went there to witness it and be blessed…you know. Yeah. The belief is that, uh, attending such ceremonies gives you the, the positive energy, you know, comes to devotees as blessings. That’s the belief.”

  1. Background information about the performance from the informant: why do they know or like this piece? Where/who did they learn it from? What does it mean to them? Context of the performance?

“Our temple here in the US has never had one before. Back in India, I had never been to one, either. This is very sacred and will bestow fortune on those who attend. It’s a key Hindu religious ceremony that not many people get the opportunity to witness. Our temple sent out fliers to remind and call us.

  1. Finally, your thoughts about the piece

This temple ritual is rare and not all Hindus experience it or have the chance to attend a similar ritual. Having sacred and rare rituals like this once in twelve year event increases the amount that community members value such traditions. Thus, when such sacred rituals do occur, a large portion of the community members attend and are united in their religion and as a community.

  1. Informant Details

The informant is a middle-aged Indian-American male, who grew up in an urban setting in India with three siblings. While he moved to the United States over 30 years ago from India, many of his family members still live there, and he enjoys maintaining his links with them through his heritage and Hindu religion.

Nowruz – Jumping over Fire

Nationality: Persian
Age: 22
Occupation: University Student
Residence: San Diego
Performance Date: 4/11/2018
Primary Language: English
Language: Farsi

The following informant is a 22-year-old Persian-American women from Southern California. In this account she is describing a tradition that is done before Persian New Year (Nowruz). This is a transcription of our conversation, she is identified as S and I am identified as K:

S: For Persian New Year, what you do like the Wednesday before, is you jump over fire. The point is to basically like ward off the bad vibes of the past, and like my parents told me that if I ever don’t jump over the fire then, like you don’t actually go into the New Year with bad vibes, but like the bad vibes are going to be more prominent. So, I will always try to go to whoever’s house to jump over fire, because you know, bad vibes.

K: So do you normally go to your family’s house?

S: Yeah or like, this year I jumped over a candle with my friend, still works

K: Do all Persians partake in this tradition, or is it a specific to Persian-Americans

S: Yeah, all Persians do it, or like 70… 80… like 90%

K: Do you have to do it in a group or can you do it by yourself?

S: No, you can do it by yourself, but it’s just more fun to do it with your family. So that you can jump with someone else, so you are both leaving bad vibes in the past, that is like what typically happens.

K: What does it mean to you, to partake in the tradition?

 

S: Um, I don’t really believe that you actually leave bad vibes back in that sense, like you don’t have to jump over fire to get rid of the bad vibes of the past year. But I think it is a fun way of keeping a tradition, a cultural tradition alive. So, to me it’s just a fun cultural activity, and even though a lot of Persians don’t live in Iran, they still do it.

Context:

This conversation took place at a café one evening. I was visiting the informant at USD, and after providing a different collection of folklore, she continued on to talk about this tradition. The conversation was recorded and transcribed

Thoughts:

I think it is a wonderful tradition. As the informant describes you don’t actually have to believe in its ability to ward off, as she says, “bad vibes” in order to participate. Any Persian can participate anywhere in the world, but still feel connected to one another.

Day of the Ditch

Nationality: Mexican-American
Age: 20
Occupation: University Student
Residence: Upland
Performance Date: 4/13/2018
Primary Language: English

The following informant is a 20 year old college student from Upland. Here she is explaining the tradition of Senior Ditch Day at her highschool. This is a transcription of our conversation, she is identified as GA and I am identified as K:

GA: So, every year the seniors of Upland High School would have a Senior Ditch Day, and all of the seniors, well … maybe not all of them cause maybe some would not go … but a lot of them would go to the beach.

K: Were you guys aloud to miss school?

GA: No, like the teachers were pretty adamant, they did not want anyone to go!

K: So how did it work? Did you first meet at the school?

GA: Yeah, we first meet at the school and then carpool to the beach, we would spend the day at the beach and then comeback. After the day no one really talks about it because we did not want to get in trouble. Like no one posted anything about it cause the teachers might find it

K: How did you hear about the tradition?

GA: Umm.. like everyone was just talking about it and being like secretive about it because they did not want the teachers to hear about it. I found out probably when I was a junior, that other people were doing it so I kind of got excited about it, but then forgot about it, and then when I was a senior it came up and I was like oh man! This is a tradition.

K: How did it feel to participate in this tradition of Senior Ditch Day?

GA: It was a lot of fun… to get away… you felt pretty reckless. But like a lot of the teachers they did not want you to leave! And I remember that day there was like a couple of quizzes that a lot of people missed

Context: She told me this while we were sitting at her dining room table one evening.

Thoughts:

I think the Senior Ditch Day tradition for Upland High is great. These kids are seniors, about to embark on a new journey and leave high school, something needs to mark this occasion. This makes me think of the Rites of Passage, and how when we change identities we often ritualize it. That is kind of what this is, also like GA said it makes you feel a little reckless, it aloud her and her class to blow off some steam.

The Mannequin Challenge

Nationality: American
Age: 14
Occupation: High School Student
Residence: Claremont
Performance Date: 4/16/2018
Primary Language: English

The following informant is an 8th grader. In this account she is explaining what the Mannequin Challenge is. This is a transcription of our conversation, she is identified as SA and I am identified as K:

SA: So, the mannequin challenge was something you heard about online. We found it on Instagram, and it’s basically you play a song and you have to stay still like a mannequin. and someone takes a video of the room, and you can act like you are having a party or like doing sports or whatever, and they just take a picture of you still not moving

K: do you have to use a particular song?

SA: yes, Rae Sremmurd’s “Black Beatles,”

K: What grade where you in when this became viral?

SA: Well it was last year, so 7th grade

K: Did you participate and make a video

SA: Yeah we did it with my English class and someone recorded it and someone posted it on instagram

K: Do you know who started the challenge?

SA: No we just heard about it when it went viral. I think the first one was at a high school.

K: What did you think when you first saw it?

SA: I thought it was like really cool and a funny idea, and then a lot of people were doing it at our school so I wanted to do it too

Context: She told me this while at my house one weekend.

Thoughts:

Like with other internet trends and challenges I struggled to define them. It kind of feels like a ritual, in that you have to do a certain thing like freezing and playing that song, in order to say its that challenge and then post it online, but you are still aloud liberties, like doing it in a classroom, or stage, or anywhere really.

 

I could not get permission to post the video the informant did with her class, so instead Im providing a link to the top 15 celebrity mannequin challenges

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2ZwaTqpxgj4

The Dragon Boat Festival Story

Nationality: American
Age: 21
Occupation: Accounting Student
Residence: Los Angeles, California
Performance Date: 3/26/2018
Primary Language: English
Language: Mandarin

Item (direct transcription):

A long, long time ago, there was a minister that really, really loved his king, very much. But his king wouldn’t listen to him. He’s like, “King, the ministers you just hired are bad people. You really have to listen to me.” And the king’s like, “I will not listen to you. You know why? Because the new ministers I hired think you’re a liar.”

With that, the minister was so heartbroken; he wrote a suicide note. He wrote the suicide note that said: “King, I love you too much. You’re a very good king. You must not listen to them. These two new hire-ees are bad people. If you don’t believe me, then maybe in death you will understand.” With that, he jumped inside a pond, or a lake, or a large body of water, so he could get the job done. And then he drowned—he let himself drown—and he died.

The king saw the letter—the suicide letter—and said, “Oh my god. He would commit suicide just to warn me? Get those two hire-ees out of my palace!” And then, this minister was actually a beloved minister, so a lot of people were like, “Shoot, his body is in the water. He’s probably being eaten by fishes right now.” So, they made some meats and vegetables, wrapped it in rice, and wrapped it in bamboo leaves, and then they threw it into the water so that the fish would eat the bamboos—I mean, rice that are wrapped in bamboo leaves—instead of the body. And to this day, whenever we celebrate Dragon Boat Festival we eat that in remembrance for that man.

Background Information:

The informant was taught this story by his “elders” in the Chinese community. He has heard the story many times from many different people.

The informant thinks that the story might be true, since it seems plausible to him.

Interestingly, the informant does not believe that there is any meaning or moral to the story. When his elders taught him the story, it was presented as important not due to its truthfulness or meaning, but due to its ancientness. For that reason, he believes that the story is told simply for the sake of perpetuating a tradition from generation to generation.

Contextual Information:

This story is only told on the day of the Chinese Dragon Boat Festival, ostensibly to honor the minister’s sacrifice. The informant didn’t know why the story was associated with that particular festival.

Analysis:

I find it interesting that the informant does not find any moral in the story. To me, several morals (e.g. you can only know who your real friends are in hindsight) are apparent. It seems that because of the context in which the story was related to the informant, it never occurred to him to search for a moral. He simply took it for granted that the story is told only due to its ancientness.

Perhaps, over-stressing the traditional weight of a story can actually reduce its effectiveness by distracting the recipient from the interesting qualities of the story itself.