Salad After Dinner

Text:

“We always ate salad after dinner”

Context:

My dad grew up in a large Italian-American family in New Jersey. Every night they would have family dinner. They would eat different meals depending on the day of the week: spaghetti on Sunday, leftovers on Wednesday, etc. However, one thing remained the same: when salad was eaten. Salad was always eaten after the main course. At school, my father would sometimes tell other kids that his family would eat salad after the meal, and the kids would make fun of him, not understanding why his family did that.

Analysis:

Eating salad after the main course is a very Italian tradition. It’s a ritual because it is a repeated and patterned act that followed every family dinner my father had. My dad believes they ate salad after dinner in order to promote digestive health with the fiber. After having spent time in Italy, I agree with my dad’s belief and add onto it saying that salad is eaten after dinner in order to not be full for the main course. The pasta, fish, or meat dishes in an Italian meal are considered the highlight. It is considered almost disrespectful to not finish the main course, so eating salad after the main course ensures that you remain hungry for the meal and don’t fill up on salad. With food being so innate and important in Italian culture, it makes sense that rituals such as this one exist surrounding dinner time.

Scottish Fairy Flag

Text:

S: “Umm, it’s a Scottish legend. Umm, there was this like Lord, I think in Scotland who fell in love with a fairy and uh, I don’t remember all of it, but he fell in love with the fairy. Then the Fairy Kingdom said, fine, you can, the fairy can live with the and be a human with the Lord for a year and then she has to come back. So they lived together for a year and then she had to go back. But before she went back, she gave him this flag and it was like from the Fairy Kingdom or something. And the flag is still there in Scotland today.”

Context:

My sister told me this legend, and after doing additional research on the legend, I found that it was believed that the flag could be used in times of crises to protect the castle or win victory in battle – that the fairies may come to the humans’ aid if the flag was raised.

Analysis:

This is a real flag that can be found in Scotland. I believe this legend of the flag being a gift from a Lord’s somewhat forbidden fairy lover came to be in order to put the minds of the people at ease: that if war or battles came, they had otherworldly help to aid and protect them. I also believe that due to many legends of fairies that circulated in Scotland, a mysterious flag would likely be attributed to these supernatural creatures.

High School Coming-of-Age Rite

Text:

H: “Each class had its color, like I was the yellow class. So there was like a spirit day where you all wore your colors and at the end of the day, the seniors would jump in [a big fountain on the school’s campus] first and with all their kilts on – like our uniform kilts – and no one else was allowed to wear their kilt. And like they were allowed to go in the water like class by class you went in. So like senior, junior, sophomore, freshman, but like only the seniors could wear their kilt. And that was like a fun thing to jump in the pool ’cause like you weren’t really, the pool wasn’t used. It wasn’t like used for swim practice; it was only used this day. Yeah, it was like a fountain type thing. So yeah, if you were senior, you could wear your kilt. And I remember one year, like a freshman wore her kilt and she was like heavily trash talked, ’cause you’re not supposed to do that. It’s like a respect thing.“

Context:

H went to an all-girls high school in Philadelphia. Every grade level was assigned a color, and on spirit day they would wear their colors and jump into the school’s fountain in grade level order. However, only seniors were allowed to jump into the fountain wearing their kilt – a special piece of the school uniform.

Analysis:

High school seniors exist in a space of liminality: they are in-between youth and adulthood. Because they exist in the doorway between identities, many rites of passages are created to celebrate and commemorate the time. “Communitas” is created because of the special bond seniors form together as they transpire the liminality between youth and adulthood. This establishes sacredness of rites of passage. They are something to be earned that one cannot attain prior to their own existence in liminality. That is why students at H’s school would become very upset if a non-senior wore their kilt while jumping into the fountain – the ritual is being broken and its sacredness is being tarnished.

Orange County Folk Speech

Text:

When swimming with friends in the ocean and a big wave is coming, you shout “Over, Under,” triggering the “over, under” game.

Context:

S, who is from and grew up in Orange County, spent many hours and days at the beaches with her friends. When swimming in the ocean, they would see waves come in, and one of them would shout “over, under,” meaning, so we jump over the wave or swim under it. The bigger a wave was, the higher the chance everyone would swim under it because you would get pummeled if you tried jumping over a wave that was too big.

Analysis

It seems like this folk speech of “over, under” is a form of “esoteric” folk speech because the use of “over, under” is to trigger a reaction from S’s friends, who are part of her folk group. Therefore, “over, under” would function as “esoteric” speech as it is a form of communication aimed at the members of her folk group, rather than “exoteric” since it is not trying to be communicated to the general public or people outside of the folk group. I believe “over, under” could also be considered “emic” rather than “etic” since it is an insider’s (people who live and grew up in OC) perspective of the ocean and waves, and it would probably not be understood by someone who grew up no where near the ocean. For all the outsider may assume from hearing the shout “over, under” in the ocean a shark could be coming to attack them!

Vietnamese & Buddhist Healing Ritual/Belief

Text

S: “So, my mom, she’s very into like, I guess like folk medicine. She’s Vietnamese and Buddhist. So like whenever we’re feeling sick, like even if it’s not like a cold, like if we’re just like, have a headache or something. Do you guys know, like the suction cup? “

C: “Oh, I’ve heard it.”

S: “Yeah. There’s one that’s called where they like heat up the cup and then do that on your back. But this one, it’s kind of like pressure. So you kind of put the cup on your back and then like there’s like a little pump and then you put the cups all over your back. And then she [S’s mom] says like, oh, the redder your back is like the more sick you are, even though that’s like pretty sure that’s not true. So like as the days go on, like she keeps doing it and like if the redness going on, she’s like, oh, you’re feeling better or something, but she’s like, oh, like helps get the blood flowing and helps all that stuff.”

Context

Whenever anyone in S’s family doesn’t feel well – whether it be an illness like a cold or just a headache – S’s mom will take cups – or coins if there are no cups – and apply a specific amount of pressure. She believes that the redder the back becomes, the sicker one is, and that the combination of the pressure and release helps purge or cure the body of the illness/unwell feeling.

Analysis

This healing ritual seems to have a two part purpose: (1) to determine how ill one is – the redness of the back – and (2) to help the body heal from it whatever is afflicting it. The small change of the color of one’s back stands in for the immaterial presence of an affliction or illness which helps categorize this as a ritual, as well as its repeated, pattern, and symbolic characteristics.