Tag Archives: christmas

Tió de Nadal, A Catalan Christmas Tradition

Nationality: United States of America
Age: 21
Occupation: Student
Residence: Kansas City, MO
Performance Date: 4/12/20
Primary Language: English
Language: Spanish

Main Piece:

“The Tio de Nadal is a Catalan Christmas tradition that some Catalonia immigrant communities brought with them to other parts of the world, particularly in the Western Hemisphere there are big Catalan populations that still do it. But basically what it is a little log that you prop up on a kind of legs or stool or something. You can draw a face on it, you don’t have to. You put a blanket on it but you put it up weeks before Christmas and then it’s something fun for kids to do because you get a stick and you beat on it with the stick. And there’s all sorts of Catalan language chants and little songs, you know like Christmas songs, that they sing to encourage the log to shit out presents. Like small nuts and candies are the traditional idea because its a medieval tradition so like little sweets basically. The idea is that if you hit the log well enough, then on Christmas, you can take off the blanket and then the little kids are gonna have a bunch of little almonds or cheeses or something that they got from the log. There’s all sorts of names for it but there are regional specifications in Catalonia.”

Background:

The informant is a 21-year old male from Kansas City, Missouri who has lived there for the majority of his life. For his elementary and middle-school schooling, he studied at a school with a Spanish immersion program, making him near fluent in Spanish. Furthermore, he now attends Georgetown University where he intends to graduate with a major in History and a minor in Spanish. Last semester, he spent several months living in Madrid as part of a study abroad program.

Context:

This was a conversation we had late at night about Holiday celebrations around the world.

Thoughts: 

This piece, to me, seems very rooted in old Catalan culture. One of the most interesting revelations that came about researching this topic and talking to my informant is how the piece relates to Catalan identity. Catalonia has infamously had issues with the Spanish mainland as it relates to their own identity. Oftentimes, the celebration and practice of Catalan traditions have been restricted in order to better assimilate them into Spanish culture, so by celebrating these old traditions, it seems like a method of rejecting the push to assimilate and a method of maintaining their own unique identity from Spain. The other interesting part to this piece is the timing of the piece as it is close to Christmas, which is a liminal time for a majority of Europe.  As mentioned above, the origins of the practice go as far back as Medieval times and it seems to still be practice in Catalan culture. Furthermore, it does not seem to fit into the Christian canon of traditions associated with Christmas, making me feel like this might have roots back to Pagan rituals. This outlook is only further supported by the emphasis of the piece being wood, which would fit the notion of Pagan holidays that celebrate the natural world. Finally, the informant is not from Spain, but has visited there and taken the culture and reworked it into his own Christmas celebrations which somewhat shows the spread of originally location-specific culture to entirely new places and contexts. This type of reinterpretations across such a large physical location would not be nearly as possible with modernity and the increase in cross-cultural communications.

Christmas Baby Jesus Cake

Nationality: American
Age: 19
Occupation: student
Residence: Fullerton, CA
Performance Date: 4/29/2020
Primary Language: English

Text:

Informant: I know as a kid– I grew up in a fairly predominantly hispanic neighborhood– there was this cake. It’s like this big pastry, and each person gets a slice. One of them has the baby Jesus. It’s supposed to represent Jesus in everything. It’s also supposed to be good luck.  You’re like receiving him into your home, and the good luck that that brings.

Context:

I asked a group of friends if they had any holiday traditions. This was one of their replies. The informant is of hispanic descent.

Thoughts:

I grew up playing this game with my neighborhood at the holiday block party. I had no idea it had a specific connection to being a hispanic tradition.

Advent

Nationality: American
Age: 59
Occupation: Entrepreneur
Residence: Salt Lake City, UT
Performance Date: April 23, 2020
Primary Language: English
  • Context: The following informant, S, is a 59 yr. old man with three kids and a wife. Though the family does not identify as Christian, they celebrate Christmas and participate in the Christian tradition of Advent. This conversation took place when the informant was asked about any specific family traditions surrounding holidays. 
  • Text:

S: “So… for those who don’t know… Advent is a Christian celebration… uh… I think it’s tied in to the Twelve Days of Christmas too when you add it up, but I could be wrong… I don’t know about that… but, basically it’s the entire month of December it starts on December 1st and the day is December 25th… where you actually don’t get an advent… oh and each day you get a little… a little gift… sort of leading up to Christmas. But on Christmas day, you don’t get a little gift for Advent, you get your Christmas gifts. Um… and that… for me at least, started when I was… well as long as I can remember with my mom. And she would have an Advent calendar and we would open that up and… I think she had clues for us, if I’m not mistaken… and we would go find the little gift. It was was usually like a piece of chocolate for each of the three of us, I had two brothers… uh… nothing big… and maybe on the weekend a toy… but you know, nothing massive.

And that carried over when I first had, at least for me, I don’t know about my brothers, I’m sure it did, knowing my mom… but when I had my first kids, I started to get a box in November… from my mom… around Thanksgiving time… with all of the gifts and clues to go with them for the 24 days leading up to Christmas. So all I had to do was put the clues in the Advent calendar and run the process, and all my kids loved it… well of course my mom passes away a few years ago and… a couple years before that, I think actually, I started doing the clues myself and getting the gifts and what not.

Me: “What are the clues like?”

S: “Well, it’s a shame, I don’t remember what they were like as a kid. But what I do now… um… I either do a little sort of rhyming scheme sort of couplet thing… or I do a riddle… or I do something to do with the number of the day… umm or some combination of that stuff. Plays on words all the time ‘cus that’s sort of riddling. As [my kids] have gotten older I’ve tried to make it a little more challenging to figure out what it is and hidden them a little bit more… they used to be in plain sight way more often than they are now.”

Me: “And is it like each kid gets a clue or…?”

S: “One clue for the three [kids]. And [my kids] actually rotate, [they] decided to go youngest to oldest… uh [the youngest] does the first, [the middle] does the second, [the oldest] does the third and then [they] rotate through. Uhh…”

Me: “Reading the clues?”

S: “Reading the clues out loud. And then everybody… well it depends what kind of mood people are in… some days [my kids] decide to sit and not participate and sulk, but most days all three of [my kids] go and look, and of course mom, when she figures out the clue, can’t hold herself back and has to yell out where it is ‘cus she’s so proud of herself for figuring it out.”

  • Analysis: This version of Advent is similar to other versions I have heard of. Mainly, I have heard of pre-made Advent calendars with chocolates or small gifts inside each day. The main difference between this version of Advent and others is the addition of clues and hiding the presents. This type of Advent is more of a game, that includes riddles and rhyme schemes that lead to the hidden presents. This is the Advent I grew up knowing, and until I began to go over to my friends houses around the holidays I was unaware that Advent was not a game in all other households as well.

Le Pere Fouettard

Nationality: French-Moroccan
Age: Early 50s
Occupation: Unknown
Residence: South Florida
Performance Date: March 16, 2019
Primary Language: English
Language: French

Context:

The informant – MZ – is a middle-aged woman originally from the French Alps, now living in South Florida. Growing up, her mother was French-Moroccan, and her father was Moroccan-Algerian. She is one of my mother’s close friends. The following is from a conversation in which I asked her to tell me about any French-Moroccan traditions she remembers growing up.

 

Piece:

For us in Europe, all across Europe, when we have parades for Santa, there’s always the bad guy, we used to call him Le Père Fouettard. Fouet means whip, so he was the whipper. So we had this guy who was kind of a monk, with a brown cloak. And he would be along with Santa Claus, along with the parade. And during the parade, we’d have Le Père Fouettard, and it was like, be careful if you don’t behave! The Père Fouettard will come and whip your ass.

 

 

Analysis:

Fairly clearly, Le Pere Fouettard is a variation of Krampus. I think it’s very interesting that, though Krampus is a prominent figure all across Europe, this specific variation exists in France’s Christmas tradition.

Venezuelan Hallacas

Nationality: Venezuelan
Age: 50
Occupation: Executive Director for Educational Organization
Residence: Boston
Performance Date: March 13
Primary Language: English

Context: The informant was speaking of Venezuelan foods eaten during Christmas, and she began to expand on this recipe and the history of the food.

 

Piece:

Informant: Ah ok um so one tradition that we Venezuelans try to do every year is hallacas. And hallacas is a dish that originally comes from when we were conquered by the spaniards and it was it is made with, it is like a tamale but it combines um chicken, pork, olive, raisin, and it is said that it is the leftover from the slaves, what they ate. And the tradition is that family gets together and one person prepares the inside and one person cuts the leaves um and it is actually wrapped in plantain leaves and it’s a tradition that goes from family from family, and there is a saying that the best hallaca is always from your mom. And every family has their own way of doing it.

Collector: Is there any specific part that this matters to you

Informant: I actually haven’t done it myself, but in my family I remember my mom would put boiled eggs on it and that is specific to region I am from, Puerto Ordaz. Other people will put other extra ingredients depending on the region or family.

 

Background: The informant, a middle aged Venezuelan woman, currently lives in Boston but lived the majority of her life in Venezuela. She still practices a lot of Venezuelan traditions, especially in her cuisine. The hallacas are an example of a Christmas dish in Venezuela.

Analysis: This recipe is very historically connected to the Venezuelan people. The dish is said to be made of the scraps that the slaves were left to eat during the Spanish reign. This implies that this tradition has been practiced since then and continues to be a major part of the Venezuelan cuisine. It also reflects how history is important to the Venezuelan people, as it is displayed in the recipes of their dishes. The community aspect in the cooking of the dish is also very unique, as it brings together the family to work together during Christmas time– a time that is typically focused on family. It also has multiplicity and variation within the recipe, as it becomes personalized to the family and/or the region they are from.