Tag Archives: rite of passage

“Johnny, I want my liver back…”

Genre: Folk Narrative – Ghost Story

Text: 

One day a boy named Johnny is told by his mother to go to the butcher’s to get some liver for dinner. He takes the five dollars she gives him and heads off toward town, taking a shortcut through the local cemetery. When he gets to the butcher’s shop, Johnny is distracted by a stand of comic books, where the newest edition of his favorite series is on sale for only five dollars. Without thinking, he immediately buys the comic book and begins to read it, losing track of time until the sun begins to set.

Jonny realizes he’s made a mistake: he now has no money to buy the liver for dinner, and his mother is going to be furious that he spent it on a comic book! He has no choice but to hurry home, cutting again through the graveyard. But on his way home, just as he passes a freshly-dug grave, Johnny has an idea – a way to get a liver for free.

“What kind of liver is this?” his mother asks when he gets home and gives her the liver. “It looks old… you’re sure you asked for the freshest cut?”

Johnny tells her that he’s sure it’s fresh and it’s what the butcher gave him. Johnny’s mother finally accepts the liver and tells him to wait upstairs while she makes his favorite meal for dinner: spaghetti and liver.

While Johnny is waiting in his room, he begins to feel sick, thinking about the graveyard, the fresh grave, and the liver currently being prepared into spaghetti. When his mother calls him down for dinner, Johnny feels too sick to eat and tries to just go to sleep.

But late that night, once his mother has gone to bed, Johnny hears a low call…

Johnny, I want my liver back…

Johnny sits up straight in bed. The call sounds like it’s coming from the direction of the graveyard. He feels even more sick now and hides under his covers, but then he hears a thudding on the front door…

Johnny, I want my liver back… I’m outside your front door…

Johnny is crying now in fear, desperately wishing he hadn’t spent his five dollars on a comic book and instead had gone to the butcher’s.

He hears the front door creak open and then slow footsteps coming up the stairs, getting closer… and closer… and closer… Then there’s a rattling on his bedroom door.

Johnny, I want my liver back… I’m outside your bedroom…

Johnny runs to his closet and shuts the door, trying to hide but knowing it is too late. There is a sudden pounding on his closet door…

Johnny, I want my liver back… I’m inside your bedroom…

Johnny holds his breath. The closet door creaks open… and then…

AHHH! (the narrator screams)

Context:

“I grew up going to a summer camp near Lassen National Park and the camp led day trips through a bunch of subway tunnels. The tunnels were dark and cold and eventually led to a larger opening, where all the campers would gather in a circle and turn off their flashlights while the counselors told a ghost story. It was tradition to tell this story and the younger campers would always get scared, but it became a part of the camp’s culture. The story didn’t have an exact narrative ending, but it ended with the counselors suddenly turning on their flashlights and jumping at the campers while their screams echoed through the subway caves.”

Analysis:

This story has a pretty clear message to the listeners, who are primarily children: that dishonesty will only get you in more trouble and to follow directions. If Johnny had listened to his mother’s directions and spent his five dollars on the liver, nothing bad would have happened. But because he wanted to cover up his mistake of spending the money on a comic book, he ended up getting an old liver from a fresh body in the local graveyard and his actions came back to haunt him.

I also see this experience as a whole as a “rite of passage” for the participants in the summer camp described by the informant. Young listeners who are hearing the story for the first time will be hanging onto every word and will therefore receive the most shock at the end, when the counselors scare the campers. In contrast, campers who have heard the story before will know what to expect and may even join in on scaring the younger campers. The shared experience of anticipation, fright, and eventual laughter likely creates a sense of bonding/community within the group of listeners.

Paper Plate Awards Ritual

Text
“This is called the paper plate awards. For every [theater] show two seniors would get paper plates, and with sharpies, for every single member of the cast, they would get their own individual ‘paper plate award.’ So on a paper plate they would write, like, um, for me it would say ‘C, 2022 paper plate awards for The Sound of Music’ and then it would say, like, ‘best mistress’ or whatever. Like- like it would be a very specific award that has to do with, like, an inside joke about the show or something that has happened at rehearsals, or something about your character you’re playing, or a funny line you have, and they would do some type of variation on that turned into the name of an award. And it was important because every single person got their own award, and every single person’s award was very specific to them. Like, no one got a generic award, everyone felt included and like they had a thing that like, that was their show or their little specialty. So it was meant to make everyone feel close and like- even though it was a joke awards, it was all meant to show that like everyone has contributions to, not just like the talent of the show, but like the community that we are like forming.

And so it was always the dinner before opening night, um, that is when the two seniors would do the award show and just present it to everyone. Um, and they would just go down the list and be like ‘we’re presenting this paper plate award for blah blah blah to blah blah blah.’ Um, and by the time I was a senior, since me and this one other girl were the two seniors who had been there the longest, we got to be the ones to make the paper plate awards and hold the ceremony. So it was something I got to see from being like, eleven years old as like a little kid to then growing up and being like the eighteen-year-old who’s doing it and passing it on.”

Context
C is a current student at the University of Southern California and grew up in Palm Desert, California. In addition to stating that it was the seniors who created the paper plate awards for everyone, C stated that the seniors got the role because they were in somewhat of a leadership role; having been there the longest also meant that the leading seniors knew the group the best. When asked what would happen if there were more than two seniors who had been there the longest, C described that they performed three shows a school year, so the seniors would be able to ‘trade off’ and each get a turn. C finished by saying she hopes to establish the paper plate awards tradition at some of her performance groups at USC because she feels it helps foster connection and belonging, even if someone is young or new to the group.

Analysis
As C pointed out during our interview, the main purpose of this ritual seems to be strengthening communal bonds through the special acknowledgment of the value of each group member. The silly tone of the awards and their references to inside jokes from the rehearsal process harkens back to forms of workplace humor, where teasing and getting ‘in’ on a certain joke designates someone as part of a group. That the paper plate awards take place over a shared meal adds a further sense of connectedness. C’s comment towards the end also indicates that the paper plates awards are a particularly special time for the seniors; after having received paper plate awards for numerous performances, stepping into the role of creating the paper plate awards functions as a kind of rite of passage that acknowledges the seniors’ leadership role and experience. Depending on how advertised the tradition is throughout the rehearsal process, it seems as though a new group member’s first paper plate awards could function as a sort of rite of passage by giving an award that makes them feel seen, and therefore, ‘part of the group.’

Quinceanera Celebration

Informant Info:

  • Nationality: Mexican 
  • Residence: Los Angeles 
  • Primary language: English and Spanish 

Text:

E.S said, “In my culture, once a young girl turns 15 they have a big party that could be considered a rite of passage, it’s called a Quinceanera.” This party is meant to symbolize the transition from a young girl to a woman. In the party there are multiple traditional processes that really resemble that of a wedding. As E.S explained, you start with mass at a church, then at the party you have the father daughter dance, the taking off of the shoes and into heels, etc. In some parties, they’re given this porcelain doll that represents or encapsulates their childhood, and at the end they have a surprise dance that’s very entertaining. The quinces in Mexico are somewhat different from the fact that as they move from the church to the reception, the whole group/family parade through the street with a live mariachi to the venue. Sometimes the quinceanera is in a carriage or on a horse. The invite is also not very exclusive as the whole community is invited. E.S recalls one time she attended a Quince, “I once went to a quince in Mexico where we didn’t know anyone, we were complete strangers and they still fed us and treated us like family.” The party allows for community bonding and the celebration of womanhood!

Analysis:

I deeply resonated with E.S’s relation to Quinceaneras because it is a well known tradition and celebration in my culture as well. Quinceaneras are indeed a rite of passage because the whole purpose of the celebration is to acknowledge the young girl’s transition from that into womanhood. Since I was a child, I attended various Quinceaneras from family members and acquaintances. I agree with E.S in the fact that the celebration is pretty welcoming to everyone, even if you aren’t directly related to the young girl being celebrated. I also vividly remember the surprise dances at these Quinceaneras, and they are indeed one of the parts of the celebration everyone looks forward to seeing the most. The Quinceanera does the surprise dance with her Corte de Honor, which consists of Chambelanes and Damas. The father and daughter dance is very special, and it usually makes a lot of people very emotional. While this celebration is very fun, it is also deeply sentimental for everyone because the now young woman is no longer a little girl.

The Drop Bears

Nationality: Australian
Age: 20
Occupation: Student
Residence: 530 W 27th St. Los Angeles
Performance Date: 04/01/23
Primary Language: English

Text: “The Drop Bears are essentially mutated Koalas that have developed a taste for flesh, so instead of eucalyptus leaves, they eat animals. So they climb up into the biggest trees in the forest, so you never go walking in the bush alone because otherwise the drop bears will get you. They essentially drop down from the heights and land on you and knock you out and then eat you. It’s like a mutated Koala. I think the whole point of it is to prevent people from walking alone in the bush because it’s so dangerous. There’s like snakes, spiders, you name it. It was created as a myth to scare tourists, which is the funniest bit about it. It’s not like a major regional thing or a time thing, it’s just kind of like clowning people who are not that familiar with the notion. If someone was gonna go to Australia, and an Australian asked where they were gonna go, after the person replies the Australian would warn the tourist about the drop bears. It’s basically a giant joke that all the Australians are in on and everyone else is out on. I first heard it when I was young, one of my first times seeing a Koala.”

Context: My informant, TC, communicated the legend of the Drop Bears with me and our other two roommates as we cooked a feast on a Saturday afternoon. This is a common setting for storytelling in our apartment. TC first heard the legend from his parents at a young age, on one of his earliest Koala sightings, which he cannot clearly remember but guesses was on a safari. As an Australian, TC is in on the joke and is aware that Drop Bears are not real creatures, so he might be an active bearer who re-tells the legend to unsuspecting tourists or youth in Australia. My informant interprets the legend as both a caution to people considering going into nature alone and a joke to be played by Australians on non-Australian tourists. 

Analysis: I interpret this legend pretty closely to how TC interprets it. It was immediately clear to me that this story could be used in a cautionary sense to prevent children (essentially the believer population) from wandering off alone into the wild, which, with or without Drop Bears, can be very dangerous, especially in Australia. The implication of nature as a dangerous place highlights a cultural respect for nature, and the recommendation of traveling with at least one other person suggests an appreciation for companionship, whether out of amusement or out of necessity. The practical joke aspect of the legend, however, certainly caught me by surprise and added some interesting depth to the folklore–the Drop Bears are essentially leveraged by locals to display the ignorance of tourists, similar to examples from class like anchor watch in the Navy or the left-handed screwdriver. Tourists are arguably in a liminal space and definitely in a foreign space, so, in the same vein as van Gennep’s take on rites of passage, the opportunity for practical jokes as a ritual is ripe. Once the tourists have been joked on and understand the reality, they too can be initiated and tell jokes. I believe this legend gives insights to the Australian outlook on reality; I estimate that its functions come from a strong sense of national identity, pride, and humor in Australia, particularly to do with its famous wildlife and nature which can be difficult to navigate for outsiders. 

Tooth Fairy – American Folk Ritual

Nationality: American
Age: 21
Occupation: Student
Performance Date: 4/29/2023
Language: English

1. Text

When asked to share a folk belief, the informant responded with the following:

“The tooth fairy is a mythical creature that is very familiar to American children. They are taught that the tooth fairy will exchange their lost teeth for some kind of prize if they put them under their pillow before going to bed. Parents will often come in while the child is sleeping and swap the tooth out for a small gift, usually money, to make it look like the tooth fairy came.”

2. Context

Informant relation to the piece:

Informant learned the ritual from hearing kindergarten classmates talk about losing teeth. Informant is currently a college student. Informant is American and grew up in the states. They mentioned that at a “young enough age everyone believed in the tooth fairy” and was “upset when they realized that she isn’t real”. The ritual made the informant “excited to lose teeth” because it meant that they would get a gift that night. They realized the tooth fairy was not real around 8 years old when they caught their dad putting money under their pillow.

Informant interpretation of the piece:

The informant has no idea where the ritual originated, and suggests that maybe it started as a way to keep kids from being scared of losing baby teeth.

3. Analysis

The American folk ritual of the tooth fairy is tied to a life cycle event of aging where children lose their baby teeth and grow adult ones that last for the rest of their lives. This ritual is not tied to a specific time or date, but rather whenever a child loses a baby tooth. It also only happens for a limited amount of times before the child loses all their baby teeth. Since most children go through this process of losing teeth, it is a common and widespread ritual for American families. This ritual is mainly a form of deception from the parents to the children as they create a mythical figure called the tooth fairy to create a sense of magic and wonder in the children that they associate with losing teeth. This seemingly harmless form of deception or fictional storytelling from parents can also be observed in rituals such as Santa Claus bringing presents on Christmas Eve. This is interesting when compared to some Asian cultures which originally did not perform rituals such as the tooth fairy and Santa Claus. In Japan, when a child loses a baby tooth, they either throw it up on the roof or bury it in the dirt. There is no reward for losing the tooth like in the American Tooth Fairy ritual however it symbolizes the child maturing and wishing for good fortune and health for the child. In comparison the Japanese ritual does not involve deception from the parents as the American one does. Perhaps this speaks to how the Tooth Fairy and Santa Claus act as a rite of passage for Americans, where most children believe in the mythical figures until a certain age and must deal with the realization that they were deceived by their parents, which motivates them to continue to pass down this rite of passage to their children. In a way this form of deception encapsulated in the tooth fairy ritual represents the loss of naivety and gaining of maturity when a child grows up. Since growing up often means learning a lot of unpleasant faces of the world, the tooth fairy ritual can act as a vaccine or initial exposure to American children in preparation for adulthood.