Office Folk Speech for Being Busy

Nationality: US
Age: 55
Occupation: Lawyer
Residence: Columbia, South Carolina
Performance Date: 25 April 2018
Primary Language: English

Context:

Leighton Lord is my father. Given this relation to me, I was interested in procuring some folklore that both of us participated in, but obviously from his perspective as he and my mother were the ones who set the traditions that we followed. Another unique perspective he has is being instilled in Southern traditions after twenty two years spent in Columbia, South Carolina following his marriage to my mother, a native South Carolinian. He grew up in Delaware, and was fascinated upon arriving in the South and witnessing the obsession with tradition and particularly talk about ancestors. I collected several pieces of folklore from him during a recent trip he made to Los Angeles. He currently practices law.

Transcript:

Owen: Can you give me some lawyer folklore? Like some water cooler kind of talk? Lingo, that kind of thing.

Leighton: Well there’s kind of this competition to always be the busiest. Like it’s embarrassing to not have anything to do. So you run into someone, elevator, whatever, and you ask how they’re day’s going. And in the office it’s usually something like “I can’t breathe with all this work” or “client’s got me in the weeds.” Stuff like that. Just complaining about how busy you are all the time. But I think most lawyers would go crazy if they weren’t. I think it’s American.

Interpretation:

I have also noticed this folk speech in college. Often, even if I am having an enjoyable week, I’ll catch my self complaining about work to someone merely to relate to them. It sort of feels like a ‘we’re in this together’ sort of mentality. Also, I find it interesting that my father included the bit about his particular work experience being a more general American thing. There could be truth to this, as laziness is looked down upon in the US.

 

Adams Family Ancestors

Nationality: US
Age: 55
Occupation: Lawyer
Residence: Columbia, South Carolina
Performance Date: 25 April 2018
Primary Language: English

Context:

Leighton Lord is my father. Given this relation to me, I was interested in procuring some folklore that both of us participated in, but obviously from his perspective as he and my mother were the ones who set the traditions that we followed. Another unique perspective he has is being instilled in Southern traditions after twenty two years spent in Columbia, South Carolina following his marriage to my mother, a native South Carolinian. He grew up in Delaware, and was fascinated upon arriving in the South and witnessing the obsession with tradition and particularly talk about ancestors. I collected several pieces of folklore from him during a recent trip he made to Los Angeles. He currently practices law.

Transcript:

When I got to the South, my mother and father in law took me under their wing. They’d take me to all these parties with old South Carolina people. At one party this guy comes up to me, says “oh let’s go sit with so and so”…Oh Weston Adams. So this Adams, he starts telling this story about his ancestors, a few generations back. He starts talking about Uncle Jed or whoever, I don’t know. Then the guy that took me over says “no, no, no. We don’t wanna hear about the good Adams’s, we wanna hear about the bad ones. So he tells a story about someone who killed someone over a land dispute or something. I don’t know. The point the guy was trying to make was that they’d rather talk about the good ones, but as long as they’re talking about their ancestors, they’re happy. I always thought that was the most South Carolina thing.

Interpretation:

This example tells of the general folk speech of Southerners. Southerners do love to speak about their ancestors and tell stories like the one my father vaguely mentions about a man of one family shooting a man of another family over a land dispute. The way my father told this made it sound like the story itself was irrelevant. In fact, that Southern story almost feels like a trope. It is even told in Huckleberry Finn. The truth, of course, is a moot point. What is fascinating is that this man is proud of an ancestor for allegedly defending the family’s honor.

Rice and Ancestors–Southern Folk Speech

Nationality: US
Age: 55
Occupation: Lawyer
Residence: Columbia, South Carolina
Performance Date: 25 April 2018
Primary Language: English

Context:

Leighton Lord is my father. Given this relation to me, I was interested in procuring some folklore that both of us participated in, but obviously from his perspective as he and my mother were the ones who set the traditions that we followed. Another unique perspective he has is being instilled in Southern traditions after twenty two years spent in Columbia, South Carolina following his marriage to my mother, a native South Carolinian. He grew up in Delaware, and was fascinated upon arriving in the South and witnessing the obsession with tradition and particularly talk about ancestors. I collected several pieces of folklore from him during a recent trip he made to Los Angeles. He currently practices law.

Transcript:

Leighton: What do Charlestonians have in common with the Chinese? They both eat a lot of rice and talk about their ancestors.

Interpretation:

By Charlestonians, my father is referring to people from Charleston, South Carolina. He could not remember exactly where he heard this joke, having heard several versions of it, and even once seeing a cartoon with similar content. This was his simple synthesization. The joke is straight forward, explaining that both Southern culture and Chinese culture appreciate rice and ancestors. Though relying heavily on stereotypes, my personal experience confirms this Southern speech about ancestors. Folk stories of ones ancestors are often told at dinner parties.

Stealing a Sneeze

Nationality: US
Age: 21
Occupation: Student
Residence: Los Angeles, California
Performance Date: 16 April 2018
Primary Language: English

Context:

Madeleine Hall is a Junior at USC, studying Communications. When I was about to sneeze, she said “bless you.” When I asked why she said it before I sneezed, she told me that it would steal my sneeze, that basically I would lose it. Seeing the folkloric potential, I recorded this piece.

Transcript:

Madeleine: Okay, when someone has to sneeze, you say “bless you”, so it takes their sneeze. I have no idea where I learned it.

Interpretation: 

I was excited to have stumbled across folklore without needing to ask for it. Also, I found her subversion of the “bless you” saying interesting. By saying it before the sneeze instead of after, the sneeze is somehow stolen from you. Also, it is worth noting that she cannot remember who she first heard this from. For her, this is a common saying taken for granted. For me, this is a common saying subverted in a new way.

Nigerian Wings Proverb

Nationality: Nigerian
Age: 21
Occupation: Student
Residence: Los Angeles, California
Performance Date: 24 April 2018
Primary Language: English

Context:

Stanley Kalu was raised in Nigeria. Since then, he and his family have lived in various African countries. He currently studies screenwriting at the University of Southern California. He is a friend of mine, and he has often told me stories about growing up in Nigeria. I asked him for folklore, and without even needing to ask for Nigerian folklore, he offered up several pieces, including two proverbs. When I asked why he gave me two proverbs, he said that his mother often said them to him, and that mothers and their proverbs are so infamous that there are meme websites dedicated to them that he visits when he feels homesick. Stanley only speaks English, and told me the folklore in English.

Transcript:

Stanley: Yo, it’s Stanley. Ummmm, so, when you’re misbehaving, you come home past your curfew, your Mom or your Dad will say, “oh, so you have grown wings, eh? We will cut them off.”

Owen: When did you hear this?

Stanley: Every time I went out, throughout my teenage years.

Owen: Where?

Stanley: In Kenya. But my parents are Nigerian. So they, and actually just everywhere we lived. Basically. Yeah.

Owen: So you think it’s a traditional Nigerian proverb?

Stanley: Yes. It is very traditional. Everybody says it.

Interpretation:

Stanley explained to me that Nigerian mothers are full of reproachful proverbs. This one essentially means that if you’re misbehaving, there’s an assumption that you think you’re above the rules, that you literally have wings–ie. too much pride. Even though this is a Nigerian proverb, Stanley’s family took it with them as they moved several times. Stanley only speaks English, and this is how he told me the proverb.