Do unto others as you would have them do unto you

Age: 55

Text: “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you”

Context: “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you” is a common statement rooted in Christianity. The participant grew up with Buddhist parents, but she was baptized and went to church, as her parents wanted her to be a part of the religion that the majority of Canada believes in. She was taught this phrase in Sunday School, and understood it to be the Golden Rule. She told me, “I learned from a young age that it is important to treat others with kindness, the same way that you would like to be treated yourself. I took this saying very seriously, as I saw my other family members treating everyone, friends, family, or even strangers, with kindness. This is something that I taught to my children early on, as I believe that it is necessary to be empathetic and moral towards everyone. It is no longer a religious belief to me, but instead a moral saying that I use every day.”

Analysis: The Golden Rule is a saying that I grew up using, but one that I never associated with a religion. To me, it was more of a moral code that I followed. The Golden Rule is very universal, and it has the feature of folklore related to multiplicity and variation. The general, vernacular saying that is most commonly expressed is even a different variation from the original, it is known as, “treat others as you would like to be treated.” For example, in Confucianism, they say “Do not do to others what you do not want them to do to you” and in Judaism, they say “What is hateful to you, do not do to others.” This shows that this idea of moral reciprocity and responsibility is a fundamental human value and it is not specific to one region. However, it is oicotypified because it is expressed differently in different cultures. In Christianity, it is institutionalized as it is taught formally, however, the way that people use it in everyday life is vernacular.

Snow Day Wishes

Age: 19

Date: 2/27/24

Major: Media Arts and Practice and Game Development in Interactive Design

Year: Sophomore

Primary Language: English

Place of Origin: District of Columbia

INTERVIEWER: Okay. so what is a superstition that you know of and practice and where did you learn it from? 

STUDENT: Um. I don’t know, actually, I don’t know if I have any superstitions. Is that..? 

INTERVIEWER: I mean, do you know of like the one you’ve seen a lot? 

STUDENT: Well, yeah. I like know some. There’s not but I that I practice. Like the first one that came to mind was like on like snow days where you were supposed to like flush an ice cube down the toilet to like wish for snow. or like put your pajamas on backwards to like wish for snow.

INTERVIEWER: And who did you learn that from?

STUDENT: I feel like just my elementary school community I don’t know if it was like my teachers or I feel like it wasn’t my teachers that like, I first heard it from. 

INTERVIEWER: Would you you still do this today? 

STUDENT: No No, I don’t. I don’t practice any. It was it was more just like as a kid. I didn’t practice it. I don’t. I just heard of it. 

Mal de Ojo

Age: 21

Date: 2/27/24

Major: Media Arts and Practice

Year: Senior

Primary Language: English, Spanish

Place of Origin: Peruvian Amazon

INTERVIEWER: What’s a superstition you have, are you practice and where did you learn it from?

STUDENT: Uh. It’s it’s a Peruvian or more like Amazonian superstition, and it’s like there’s these um seed that is like red colored with like a black dot. or like a a big blob, black blob.. Uh, and they usually make like either necklaces or um wristbands, um stuff like that. And they usually put them on little babies, and the superstition is that if you wore it, you’ll prevent getting “mal de ojo’”, which is like if someone looks at you with bad intentions, that, you know, they’re gonna like something bad is gonna happen to you, like you’re gonna get sick or something.. So, to prevent that on children, uh, they put that on. And sometimes, like some adults also keep it. um now, I think my mom did it with me just because he was like more of a cultural practice than she actually believed it. Uh, and then but also it’s like a very popular thing to wear. so now, I don’t wear it very often, but I have like two necklaces that my mom gave me when I got into college. so yeah, I I worked on every now and then, but yeah..

INTERVIEWER: And then you would say you learned this from, like, your mom? 

STUDENT: Yeah, from mom and like just the community and local culture. 

Split the Pole

Age: 20

Date: 2/27/24

Major: Media Arts and Practice

Year: Junior

Primary Language: English

Place of Origin: Georgia,USA

INTERVIEWER: Okay. All right, so what is a superstition you practice and where did you learn it from? 

STUDENT: Um I guess I practice I do not split holes. and I learned, um yeah, from I guess just like my family, like my parents. they told me that if I split a pole or if a group of people splits a pole in the youngest person dies, first, the youngest person dies first, and since I’m the youngest in my family, and they told me that when I was a kid, I took that very seriously. And so I carry that with me today, even though I feel like that’s kind of ridiculous, but at the same time who’s to say? So, yeah, okay. 

Weird Trees

Age: 20

Date: 2/27/24

Major: Archeology and Cinema and Media Studies

Year: Junior

Primary Language: English

Place of Origin: Houston, Texas

INTERVIEWER: What is the superstition that you’ve heard of and that you practice and where did you hear it from? 

STUDENT: Superstition? Sorry, I got to think. No, cause oh, I have one! I guess I only developed this superstition, this past summer because I was doing like archaeology work in Providence in San Andres . And so there’s like these funky looking trees on the island and like kind of, if you see a tree, like that stay away from them, because that means like someone’s doing like black magic. And so I’m like always looking at like kind of the foliage and being like, is this one of the trees like is today gonna be like a curse? I don’t know. 

INTERVIEWER: That’s really specific, but like it is it is that is kind of weird.. And you learned this from like other archaeologists? 

STUDENT: Well, yeah, like I learned it like in the field because like I kept having bad luck. and so so they were like, oh, like did you accidentally interact with this tree and I was like, I don’t know. So now, like whenever I have like a bad day, I’m like, did I touch the tree? Like, like, I don’t know that I touched the tree today, who knows? Right, okay, yeah. You’re welcome.