Garlic Garlands

Nationality: American
Age: 23
Occupation: Student
Residence: New York City
Performance Date: 4/28/2021
Primary Language: English
Language: Korean

–Informant Info–

Nationality: American

Age: 23

Occupation: Student

Residence: New York City

Date of Performance/Collection: 4/28/2021

Primary Language: English

Other Language(s): Korean

Background: MB has family in Filipino, Korea, Mexico, and US, and so he has heard cultural stories from many different parts of the world. Here he is explaining one belief that his Filipino grandfather told him. I contribute with a belief from my Indian culture.  MB – informant. SD – interviewer

Performance:

MB: My grandfather told me that if you keep a garland of garlic near your bed or somewhere where you spend a lot of time, it wards off witches and bad spirits. Does your family have a similar tradition?

SD: I know in Indian culture, it’s lemons and green chilis. Like when you do something big like open a new shop or get a new house, you tie a string that has one lemon and a few chilis strung through it on the front door of the establishment. This prevents evil from entering the home/shop. My family doesn’t do this but I have seen this in many places in India. 

MB: Yea. I know people like sages here so there are many things to ward off evil I guess. 

SD: Do you think the garlic garland has anything to do with vampires? (laughs)

MB:  (laughing) Maybe!  

Analysis:

Here we discuss the many different ways where people ward off evil spirits. The belief of evil spirits is present in almost all cultures and is probably tied to religious beliefs. It is often passed down through the generations, like in MB’s case. I have also noticed that the item that wards off the bad spirits is also a food item, which can be because it comes from nature and is available to everyone. In an institutional and religious context, spirits are warded off by holy water and other items that aren’t available everywhere, but from a folk belief standpoint, everyday items can be used by the masses to ward away evil spirits. 

Don’t touch anything with your feet

Nationality: American
Age: 22
Occupation: Student
Residence: Chicago, IL
Performance Date: 4/17/2021
Primary Language: English

Context & Background:

The informant is a friend met in college and is Indian. I grew up in a rural town in Wisconsin, USA, where there weren’t many other Indians. Throughout middle and high school, I didn’t have any friends with who I could relate with culturally, so when I came to college, I got to meet people who have the same heritage as me. Here is a conversation with my Indian friend. KR – informant, SD – collector.

Performance: (via FaceTime)

KR: Yea, so I know that whenever your feet touch anything, especially books or a laptop but basically anything, you have to touch it with your hand and put your hand to your head and heart. It’s kind of like apologizing or asking for blessings or something like that.

SD: I do that too! I’ve done this my whole life, so when I do it in public, people sometimes ask what I’m doing and then I tell them this exact same thing.

KR: Yes, I know a lot of my friends do it too. 

SD: So do you know why we have this belief?

KR: I think it has to do with our feet being bad. Like they are the body part taking all the dirt and scraps and so if we touch something with a dirty body part, we have to apologize. 

SD: Yes, I think that might be it. 

Analysis: 

In this piece, you can again see the underlying emphasis on knowledge and academics in the Indian culture. KR mentions “especially books or laptops”, which are sources that give you knowledge and wisdom. Another version of the importance of this tradition that I have heard is that if you put your foot on something, you think you are better than them. You don’t want to be arrogant and you don’t want to consider yourself better than anyone, even an inanimate object. So you ask for forgiveness. 

Indian Proverb on Procrastination

Nationality: Indian
Age: 50
Occupation: Software Engineer
Residence: Austin, TX
Performance Date: 3/12/2021
Primary Language: English
Language: Hindi

Context & Background:

I grew up around the house hearing this proverb all the time from my mother and father. The informant is my father who gives more insights on the meaning of the words. Translated from Hindi to English

Performance: (in person)

Proverb: “Kal kare jo aaj kare, aaj kare jo ab”

Transliteration:

Kal: tomorrow

Kare: to do

Jo: you 

Aaj: today

Kare: do

Aaj: today

Kare: to do 

Jo: you 

Ab: now 

Translation: What you’re gonna do tomorrow, do today, and what you do today, do now. 

Explanation: Whenever you say you will do something tomorrow or later, it doesn’t happen. So whenever you say tomorrow, think I will do it today. And, whenever you think I’ll do today, do it now. 

Analysis:  

I think my parents were giving me anti procrastination propaganda from an early age. Anyways, from first-hand experience, I know that Indian households put a large emphasis on studies and academics. The households obviously want to instill good values in their children, like not to procrastinate, but I think there is an underlying purpose for getting better at academics. The pressure to be good at school starts from a young age, a lot like Asian culture. In order to foster good habits, the parents say this proverb whenever they see their child not being productive. This is a quick and efficient way to get them back on track.

Leo Carillo Amphitheater

Background: The informant is a 14-year-old high school freshman living in El Segundo, California. The informant is my brother.

Context: After family dinner, my brother overheard a conversation about folklore I was having with my parents and he seemed interested, so I decided to explain the field of folklore to him and even interview him on some of the folklore he was aware of.

Main Piece: The informant described he and his friends stumbled upon an abandoned amphitheater on a trip to Leo Carillo State Park a few years ago.

Informant: Me and my friends would go there and there was like, or like the amphitheater, it was said like ‘Oh if you go in there, you die’. We would always get, f*cking, scared sh*tless whenever we would go near that.

Collector: Who said that?

Informant: I don’t know dude; it was like my friends and there was just like that story of that amphitheater.

Collector: So, it was an amphitheater in the middle of the forest?

Informant: No, the slender forest (another piece of folklore my brother has described to me before) and the amphitheater are two different things. It was just a tiny abandoned amphitheater.

Collector: And none of you ever went in there?

Informant: No, never. We barely ever went NEAR it dude. We would like ride our bikes there, and we would just run away.

Interpretation: This story of the haunted amphitheater is a great example of how children can create folklore about haunted or abandoned places without any prior knowledge or local lore. The informant and his friends obviously believed their saying “If you go in there, you die” because they clearly tried to avoid the place as much as possible. I find it interesting that the ghost stories I’ve heard from adults seem to have much more of a narrative, whereas the ghost stories or haunted places my brother has described to me when he was much younger are not so much narratives, but rather simple scares or sayings such as “If you go in there, you die”. Perhaps analyzing the differences between how adults and children tell their haunted tales can provide some interesting insights into the genre of ghost folklore.

Garlic Necklace

Nationality: United States
Age: 14
Occupation: High School Freshman
Residence: Los Angeles
Performance Date: 4/19/2021
Primary Language: English

Background: The informant is a 14-year-old high school freshman living in El Segundo, California. The informant is my brother.

Context: After family dinner, my brother overheard a conversation about folklore I was having with my parents and he seemed interested, so I decided to explain the field of folklore to him and even interview him on some of the folklore he was aware of.

Main Piece: My brother described that one time when he got really sick, our grandmother (who is an Italian immigrant) put a garlic necklace around his neck to help him with his sickness. He believes that garlic has health benefits when it comes to illness and Italians used garlic necklaces as a folk remedy.

Interpretation: I did not even know that my grandmother had done this. Because I was interested in this folk remedy, I did a little bit of research and found that garlic necklaces were used to ward off evil spirits. I believe that sickness was likely associated with evil spirits and garlic necklaces were used to ward off the evil spirits and heal the sick. However, interestingly there has been scientific research that has found that garlic contains alliin, which is one of the most powerful antibiotics in the world.