Tag Archives: high school

Rite of Passage

Nationality: Irish, English
Age: 20
Occupation: Student
Residence: Boston, MA
Primary Language: English

“Since it was our senior year we decided that we had to do a really memorable senior prank.  We knew that we could get in big trouble, but some of my friends were going to community college and didn’t care if they got caught.  So, we decided to prank the deans because we wanted to get revenge against them for all the detentions we had gotten over the past four years, and decided to glue the door to their office shut and trap them inside.  We picked a day when we knew the deans were going to be going through a lot of paper work and would be in the back of the office, and we had people stand guard to distract any teachers that might walk by.  Then, three people in the group wore sunglasses and put their hoods on (so they couldn’t be recognized) and really quietly opened the door and started putting glue around the entire frame.  Then they shut it and put more glue to seal the crack between the door and the wall.  We brought a blow dryer so we could try and make the glue dry faster, but we put it on a lower setting so it wouldn’t make so much noise.  Then we waited a couple hours for the deans to try to leave for the day, and when they tried to open the door it was completely stuck shut.  They had to call a repair company to come and saw the door off so they could get out!”

Analysis: Laura was one of many high school seniors that tried to play a senior prank before graduation.  It is a rite of passage traditionally done by seniors during their last days at school, and it is often a chance to one-up the seniors of the previous year. Many seniors are discouraged from playing a prank because they might be prevented from receiving their diploma or walking on graduation day if they are caught.  For Laura and her friends, however, the risk of getting caught was not as big because many in the group were going to community colleges that would not revoke their acceptances if the students got in trouble.

Usually senior pranks are aimed at teachers or at underclassmen and are a way for seniors to demonstrate their superiority as a graduating class.  Laura said that after the school found out about the prank, everyone said it was probably the best prank done in the history of the school.  She and her friends became small celebrities among the people that knew the identity of the pranksters.  Unfortunately, that news spread quickly and Laura said that within a few days she and her friends were called into the deans’ office.  They confessed but offered to pay for any damages.  Although the deans threatened to prevent them from participating in the graduation ceremony, Laura said she and her friends only had to help clean up the lockers at the end of the year.  She said that the risk of getting in trouble was worth it because they had such a legendary prank.

When I talked with Laura about the primary influences on her decision to participate in the senior prank, I thought that she would mention her two older brothers.  Both of them were involved in senior pranks, and it seemed likely that Laura would want to follow in their footsteps.  However, Laura said that she did not think about her brothers so much as the senior class that graduated before her.  She said that they their prank was pretty good so she wanted to try and top theirs.  This seems to show that rites of passage, such as a senior prank, are more connected to institutions they are associated with than with family members.  Regardless of whether her brothers would have done a senior prank, Laura knew she wanted to be involved because it was a “once-in-a-lifetime opportunity”.

The context in which the prank takes place also helps explain why it is such a significant event. For instance, on a normal day, pulling a prank may get a few laughs but is probably looked down upon by others as stupid and a waste of time.  However, in the context of the situation, the prank is not only accepted by the student body, but expected and looked forward to.  It is a rare occasion when the seniors are united together for the goal of common mischief before everyone leaves for college.  Thus, even though Laura was not known as a trouble-maker, the senior prank was a rite of passage worth getting in trouble for because the chance would not happen again.

The senior prank is a rite of passage that has become so popular that it has even had movies and television shows depicting it.  For instance, MTV ran a special countdown of the “Top Ten Best High School Senior Pranks” and conducted interviews with administrators and students from each school to hear their opinions of the success of the pranks.  Though the pranks ranged from the silly, (releasing 1000 bouncy balls down a flight of stairs), to the incredible, (using a crane to hide the principal’s car on the auditorium roof), almost all the students agreed that the senior prank was an essential part of graduating from high school, and was almost as important as receiving their diploma.  Despite the seemingly immature nature of a prank, the senior prank serves as a transition between the childish realm of high school and the more mature world of college.  Therefore, the senior prank is also one last time for the seniors to be foolish before it is no longer acceptable.

At my high school, my senior class was not unified enough to create a good senior prank.  A few different groups tried to prank the freshmen, but nothing was very successful.  The senior class before us did not do a good prank either, which may explain why our class was unable to perform very well.  It was disappointing because I have heard from friends at other schools about their senior pranks, and I feel like I missed out on a special part of the graduation experience.

Joke

Nationality: Hispanic
Age: 15
Occupation: Student
Residence: Los Angeles, CA
Performance Date: April 29, 2008
Primary Language: English
Language: Spanish

If the world was covered with a sweater, where would the gangsters hang out?

In the hood.

Norby’s joke was followed by very little, okay, no comments or discussion, except for a smile and a bit of laughter at his own wit. He mentioned that he was unsure where he had first heard this joke or from whom, although he thought it could have been his brother who is also pretty knowledgeable when it comes to racist jokes.

I have known Norby for a few years now, and though I cannot pretend to know how he feels about the joke and any larger significance it may have, I can definitely comment on the larger discussion that this joke invites. The youth center where I first met Norby (and where I actually interviewed him for this piece) is located near the infamous Mac Arthur Park in Los Angeles, California. It is a predominantly low-income Hispanic immigrant community with unfortunately high crime rates and other unfavorable statistics. It could essentially be seen as “the hood” by some. Norby’s joke seems to speak to this kind of neighborhood, or ‘hood, and some of its experiences or more specifically, some of its local citizens; “the gangsters.” It is interesting that the joke asks where “the gangsters” would go if the world was otherwise completely covered in a sweater. This image of the earth being covered in a fuzzy sweater could reflect a sense of there being no where else for gangsters to go that was not covered or protected in some way from them by everyone else everywhere else. As a result, they only have one place to “hang out”; the hood of the sweater or the more obvious ghetto or hood that is the only place left for them to go to. This joke carries the weight of larger social implications regarding the economic and social disparities as well as certain populations that are seemingly outcast in the joke.

Jokes

Nationality: Hispanic
Age: 15
Occupation: Student
Residence: Los Angeles, CA
Performance Date: April 29, 2008
Primary Language: English
Language: Spanish

What does the whole world have in common with a jar of jelly beans?

Nobody likes the black ones.

What do you call White people inside a yellow bus?

A twinkie.

What do you call Black people inside a yellow bus?

A rotten banana.

At first, Norby was enthusiastic about sharing some of his jokes but became hesitant; eventually claiming that he needed a Black person next to him in order to tell his jokes. Then, after telling his first racist joke, he continued without hesitation this time to share the last two which build off of one another. After each joke he would stop and say that his brother had told him each of the jokes, except the very last one which he does not remember hearing from anyone specifically. He paused after the first one and commented that black jelly beans are nasty because they taste like licorice before continuing with his next joke. He did not want to comment or add much else. Although he did say that he only said these racist jokes for fun and not because he was racist or anything.

I purposefully chose to list the three racist jokes he shared with me together to highlight the sequence and also to illustrate in a sense his performance of these jokes; he said them one after another with only brief pauses to remember how each one went between these jokes. I believe that this adds to the nature of the jokes, which are obviously racist. Although he had little to comment and was reluctant to think that these jokes might have any significance other than being “fun”, I disagree. The first and last jokes are racist against African Americans, or Black people, and both betray strong sentiments of dislike. The sentiment is the same whether it is because black jelly beans do not taste good or because a rotten banana is unfit to eat and fit only for the trash; Black people are seen as unfavorable and dispensable in these jokes. Both images also convey the equally strong message that the black element in each joke ruins the rest of the jelly beans or the banana, which has larger racial and social implications. The ease with which he was able to recall these jokes and the people the jokes targeted also reveal something greater. It reflects how pervasive racist sentiments can be and also the nonchalant manner in which they are shared and perhaps even internalized without too much awareness of the ideas and beliefs at the core of these jokes. Norby learned them from his brother and then shared them with me. He also mentioned that he says them for fun or as a means of entertainment only. Also, the jokes were tellingly about Black and White people; two minority populations in the predominantly Hispanic community of Los Angeles in which he lives.

Tradition

Nationality: African-American
Age: 18
Occupation: Student
Residence: Stevenson Ranch, CA
Performance Date: High School
Primary Language: English

The Cipher

During the spring semesters of my High School years, my friends and I ran track and participated in most of the same events. At practices, whenever the coach was late or whenever we finished the workout early, we would relax together on the infield or in the equipment shed with an iPod, speakers, and our amateur rap skills. It’s called a cipher and it is defined on popular website www.urbandictionary.com as “Two or more rappers freestyling together in an informal context. They could be battling or simply playing off of each other.” A freestyle is when a rapper rhymes and creates a song without having anything written down, which is also called “spittin a freestyle.” Freestyle and ciphers are a huge part of the Hip-Hop and Rap music culture, because it is a form of art created by African-Americans that allows anyone with something to say, a chance to say it.

My friends and I would join up, usually one of us would have beats to provide and we would just rap for fun. Sometimes the rhymes were clever and funny, sometimes they were boring and lame; sometimes we would battle each other, sometimes we would attempt to create songs; and sometimes we would just rap for as long as possible without running out of material or messing up the lyrics and tempo. Ciphers incorporate so many aspects like jokes/punchlines, metaphors/similes, and creativeness/originality that it became a competition to see who could produce the best combination of it all.

However, ciphers are not just about who is the best; ciphers were about displaying our talent and hanging out with friends. When a good cipher gets going, energy is present, people feed off one another and it is almost like a tangible feeling coursing through your body. In a cipher, people do not judge what you have to say because you are free to say whatever is on your mind. Ciphers act as a type of therapy, letting you express stress and frustration in the form original creations that might make a person or two laugh. Basically, a cipher is held when friends want to have fun with each other and it eventually transforms into tradition, something we looked forward to annually because it brought my friends and I closer for the period of time and made us all happy.

Practical Joke

Nationality: American
Age: 19
Occupation: Student
Residence: Clarksville, IN
Performance Date: March 25, 2008
Primary Language: English

Senior Prank:

“I remember my brother being involved in a Senior Prank when he was about to graduate.  He and his friends were able to get three pigs – don’t know how they got them, he would never tell me – and then they spray painted the numbers 1,2, and 4 on the pigs.  What they did was let the pigs loose on campus and the next day the principal and staff were gathering the pigs, but were searching for a pig with the number 3 on it.  That was the whole point of spray-painting numbers 1 through 4 leaving out 3.  There was a huge meeting with the principal and the entire grade, but my brother never got in trouble”.

Stephanie is four years younger than her older brother Steven, so she was not at school when the prank took place.  When I asked her if she knew why her brother took part in the prank she said, “It was just a tradition that senior guys did at my high school.  A year later the seniors stuck hundreds of plastic forks all over the lawn where you enter school.  The year after, the senior guys stacked all of the lunch tables in the middle of campus.  After that year, security on campus tightened up over the last few weeks of school to prevent any pranks from happening”.  I asked Stephanie if girls were ever involved in the pranks and she claimed, “Girls never get involved, I don’t know why.  I guess it’s a guy thing”. Stephanie said that students always enjoyed the senior pranks so much that underclassmen would “look forward to seeing what was in store each year.”

I did further research about this prank because I myself have heard of it before from other students.  With a simple search on Google, hundreds of pages show up with this prank, most commonly called “The Pig Prank”.  The senior prank represents the liminal period for high school seniors.  These students are in a period of time between the last few weeks of high school and graduation, and the senior prank is a practical joke, which is an apparent trait of liminal periods.  The common ideology behind these pranks is that since the “pranksters” can’t get in trouble since they are in this liminal period.  It is interesting that Stephanie says that no girls partake in this high school ritual.  I have never heard any senior prank involve girls myself, which might relate to the origins of senior pranks, which potentially began with males.