Context: SS, a girl attending high school in Los Angeles shared this legend of an incident that happened in her high school that had been passed down through the years to the people occupying the girls locker room. She had heard this story from her peers but it was viewed as common knowledge to the girls at her school.

Text: “ There was this high school legend that in the girls locker room a girl slipped, fell and cracked her head on one of the porcelain stand alone sinks and nobody knew who it was or when it happened but it was common knowledge amongst everyone, especially the people in sports because the people who were on teams had their own lockers. Because of this legend everyone avoided the sink furthest to the right in the locker room and it was seen as bad luck if you were to use it” 

Analysis: I believe this locker room legend’s lack of specific details, including the girl’s identity or time of the incident, allows for a heightened sense of mystery and adaptability of the story. It makes the plot timeless, being easy to pass down in the future to younger year groups as they adopt the locker room whilst also fostering a sense of community amongst the girls sharing the locker room as they share this superstition of the unlucky sink. Whilst the legend works as a cautionary story to prevent people from acting recklessly near the sink, a sink is not an innately dangerous object, so the outcome of this legend serves solely to make people superstitious about using it.