Tag Archives: african american

The Man and the Snake

Nationality: African-American
Age: 28
Occupation: Student
Residence: Los Angeles, CA
Performance Date: April 30, 2014
Primary Language: English

Context:
I had asked my friend if he had any stories or tales from his childhood that his family would tell. He comes from an area of Kansas City, Missouri that is traditionally an African-American community, and he told me a tale, a fable, that his mother used to tell him when he was growing up.

Tale:
This is a story that my mother reiterated to me many times during her lifetime and when I was a child. There was a man in Africa, walking up a mountain. Halfway up the mountain, it starts to get cold, even though it is hot at the bottom of the mountain. Halfway up the mountain it is kind of frigid. Halfway up the mountain, this man happens upon…a very sickly snake. And the snake is sitting there in this cold climate and its basically freezing and it looks up to the man and says, “Please, sir, please, will you carry me down the mountain?”
And the man is going down the mountain, and he looks at the snake and he says, “But you’re a snake. Not only are you a snake, but you are a very poisonous snake. If I pick you up you will surely bite me!”
And the snake says, “Silly man, now why would I do that? I – I need your help. If – if I stay here I will surely die. If you carry me past the peak of the mountain, and down to the warm foothills, I will not bite you. I will be forever grateful.”
So the man thinks about it. And being a good man, an honest man, decides to help the snake. So he picks the snake up and he walks toward the peak. And he starts to walk on toward the peak and as it gets colder, the snake gets very, very still. But finally they pass the peak and they slowly get down and the weather starts to get warmer and the snake starts to move around. And as they go down the mountain, all of a sudden the frost clears, there’s green foliage and the snake is slithering happily as the man is carrying it in his arms. And finally, they are almost to the foothills and the man feels a sharp pain. Bam! The snake has bitten him. And he falls to his knees as the poison takes hold and he looks at the snake and he goes, “Snake, I’ve helped you, I’ve saved your life, and you promised me that you wouldn’t bite me.” And he goes, “Why!? Why!?”
The snake slithers off, takes a moment to pause as he decides to answer. And he looks back at the man taking his last breaths, and he says, “You knew what I was when you picked me up.” And he slithers off.

Analysis:
This tale is a fable that has a clear moral, like most fables, which is that you should not offer your help, your aid, to someone or something that you know to be dangerous. This tale is also serving as a warning to not trust the promises of a desperate man, and to be wary of those who might stab you in the back. This is the kind of tale that would be told, and is told, to children. After all, the informant’s mother would often tell this story to him when he was growing up. The fact that the informant grew up in a traditionally African-American part of the city he lived in, would suggest that this tale is African in origin.

The Legend of Ibo Landing

Nationality: American
Age: 19
Occupation: Student
Residence: Los Angeles
Performance Date: April 3rd, 2013
Primary Language: English

This is a legend in the African American community, and the name of the island is occasionally spelled differently: Ebo, Ibo, Igbo.

“It’s sort of this coastal—this island off the coast of south Carolina and Georgia, kinda in between. Kay, so, the story goes that there was a slave ship that was coming—oh wait, let me start over. In Africa, there were this group of, like, native Africans and they were enjoying life in Africa and one of them had a wife who was pregnant. And, you know, the guy loved his wife and loved his child and he was looking forward to having a family, and then one day his wife was sleeping and he was just up doing whatever and he thought he heard the unborn child say “the water will bring you home”. And he was really confused because he didn’t really know what that meant… but it kind of stayed on his mind. Okay, and so later he was walking through, like, the savannas or the jungles of Africa and he was with some other Africans and they all got kidnapped by this slave trader, and so then they embarked on the middle passage and were on the ship headed to America and they were all really scared, of course. They didn’t know where they were going they didn’t know what was going on, they were shackled in these miserable conditions and people were dying, there was disease, like you know all that gross middle passage stuff you hear about. Finally they get to the island of Ibo Landing and they get off the slave ship and they’re led, and then, like, the slave–okay, hold on. They’re led around and then the slave trader just sorta looks at them and says okay this is where you’ll be staying–except less hospitable because it’s not like they’re at a hotel–and so then the slaves look around and they’re like oh no, we’re not staying here, or they’re still Africans, I guess they didn’t really become slaves. And so the main one who had the child gets an idea and he suddenly remembers the phrase “the water will bring you home”. And so, you know, all the Africans are shackled together but they turn, so starting with the native the main guy with the child he whispers a message to the guy standing next to him and then that guy does that to the guy next to him and to the guy next to him and so on and so on until they get to the end of the line. And so then when the slave traders aren’t looking or are preoccupied with something, the Africans turn around and walk back into the water. And it’s just like the child said, the water will bring you home. So the story goes that they never became slaves and that they walked across the water all the way back to Africa. And of course, it depends on who is telling the story because some people are like well they turned around and drowned and others are like they walked all the way back to the continent of Africa so you can take your pick which version you like better.”

This is an extraordinarily meaningful legend on many levels. One of the messages, according to the informant, was the notion of controlling one’s own destiny and doing the impossible to avoid a fate put on someone. The imagery also comes out of the Bible, with Jesus walking on water and telling Peter that he too could walk on water if his faith was strong enough. Clearly, the faith of these Africans was strong enough (or not, depending on the teller) to bring them back home. It also stresses the importance of family, as it is family ties that bring the slaves back home and the unborn child that gives them the idea to do it. All of it happens during a period of change in their lives, a liminal period, in which anything could happen (thus explaining the mysticism). Mysticism is also common in African tales and tribal religions, thus emphasizing that legacy as well.

It exists in a lot of African American popular culture. Toni Morrison uses different themes of it for her books Tar Baby and Song of Solomon, and it is recounted in the film Daughters of the Dust (1991, directed by Julie Dash).

Stealing Ham Urban Legend

Nationality: American
Age: 20
Occupation: Student
Residence: New Jersey
Performance Date: 04/24/12
Primary Language: English

Transcribed Text:

“My friend told me this story. He said his friend was working at this grocery store, and this very large, borderline obese African American woman is walking towards the exit, and her body seems especially lumpy? More so than it would be for a normal obese woman. And all of a sudden, out of her shirt, on to the ground, falls a ham. A big ol’ ham, like you’d have for Christmas dinner. And – and she looks around, and she goes “who threw that at me?” (said in a very sassy voice). And- and it was very obvious that it had just fallen out of her shirt, but she proceeds to play it off like someone just threw a ham at her. And she reacts, and I guess this would supposedly be an appropriate reaction for having a ham thrown at you, by saying “nuh uh. Ya bettta don’t” (said in a very sassy voice with left hand on hip and right hand waving with the index finger. Head bobbing right and left while phrase is said). And, and then she just walks out. And the ham is on the floor and the employees were just standing there, mouth agape”

The informant currently attends the University of Southern California as a student. He says that he heard this story from a friend in high school in New Jersey. It has become a friend of a friend story, and he has told many of his friends the story several times. He normally tells the story after he uses the phrase “nuh uh. Ya betta don’t” in some conversation, and the people who do not know the context of that phrase ask him about it. I first saw him use it when it came up in a conversation on facebook where somebody refused to go look for their wallet to pay for a ticket that was going to be sold out within a few hours. The informant replied to that comment with “Sarah just tried to pull the same shit. Nuh uh. Ya betta don’t” to which he received many questions as to what that meant. Ever since then, he has repeated the story many times, each time receiving laughter regardless of if the audience has heard it before or not.

It is obvious by the way the informant tells the story that he is an active bearer of this now legend. Every time he repeats the story, there are fixed phrases and beats to the narrative. He makes use of the oral formulaic theory also with the final phrase where he imitates the woman. The audience, regardless of if they themselves repeat the story or not, the phrase “nuh uh. Ya betta don’t” has become a phrase that many people have started repeating and using within this group of friends at least. This story is a very amusing narrative, but it is also a bit racist. When the informant was describing how to properly say the phrase, he said that one has to do it with a proper ghetto accent and sass. This plays on the stereotype of African Americans that exists in the USA today, where it is normal and almost expected of the group to talk with a certain accent. This piece of folklore is an urban legend that makes use of the oral formulaic theory in the method that it is performed and Blason Populaire with the content that it contains.

 

 

 

 

“God don’t like ugly.”

Nationality: American (African American)
Residence: Inglewood, New Jersey
Performance Date: April 2007
Primary Language: English

This saying was told to my informant  when he would act out of line as a kid. This usually came as a warning prior to some harsh discipline like a spanking or a grounding.  He said one time he had a temper tantrum in the supermarket over a piece of candy. When he wouldn’t stop his mother harshly warned him, “God don’t like ugly.”, and he knew he was in trouble.

Joke – Racist – African American/Mexican

Nationality: American
Age: 50
Occupation: Construction
Residence: Austin, Texas
Performance Date: April 2011
Primary Language: English

Joke – Racist – African American/Mexican

“What kind of baby do you get when a black person and a Mexican person have a baby? A baby that’s too lazy to steal.”

The informant made it very clear that he is “not racist” as he told me this joke, as people often do when telling jokes framed around racial stereotypes and conflict. He also made it very clear, before telling me the joke, that it is “really racist.” The informant is fifty years old and from Texas, and has lived there all of his life. He claims that jokes such as this are still used among close friends, but that “it’s just funny, we’re not racists.” He also claims to have “black friends,” as if that serves as some sort of justification or proof that he is not racist. He claims that jokes such as these stem from the racism that existed in the south during his childhood. The informant told me how he remembers when schools were desegregated in the south, and how “the blacks were brought over in busses” to his school. He stated, “they didn’t want to be there as much as we didn’t want them there.” He claims that much of the conflict was two sided, a kind of mutual racism. Furthermore, he claims that the inclusion of a Mexican individual in this joke probably stems from immigration from Mexico to the United States, often to border states such as California and Texas.
I agree that these jokes stem from a generation that experienced extreme racial conflict, but the fact that they are still used implies that they are still considered humorous. The fact that people still find these jokes humorous hints at the state of racism today, and shows that although it is much less prominent than in previous generations, subtle racism does still exist. The addition of a Mexican individual in this joke exemplifies the discomfort that many people feel toward Mexican immigrants, but the fact that they are portrayed as thieves in this joke conveys the stereotype that many Latinos are criminals. Furthermore, the idea of black people being inherently lazy seems to stem from Affirmative Action. Many people, who are usually white, are against affirmative action and other social programs, and believe it makes people who benefit from these things lazy. On some level, this joke serves as a racist critique of society in the context of immigration and social programs that are intended for minorities.