Tag Archives: slavery

Passover/Seder – Holiday

Nationality: Israeli-American
Age: 17
Occupation: High School Student
Residence: Bellevue, Washington
Language: English

Text:

The celebration of Passover starts with the Seder which is a big community event where a bunch of people get invited over. It is a very long event where there is structured text with a melody that retells the story of Jewish people being enslaved in Egypt. The entire dinner is choreographed, the text tells you when to drink, refill your wine, when to drink, when to lift the matza, etc. There are symbolic foods, such as a hard boiled egg which symbolizes the way Jewish people went from being soft to being hard due to pressure. There is a part where a glass of wine is meant to be left outside for someone from the story. At the end, there is a lot of singing after everyone has drunk four glasses of wine.

Context:

The informant was raised Orthodox Jewish and grew up engaging with their family’s Passover and Seder traditions. They say they enjoy it but the kosher matza that is used tastes bad. There is also a moment where the youngest child (which they are) has to stand on a chair and sing, which they also dislike. The informant says that the reason that the glass is left outside is because historically, people who were antisemitic would leave bodies outside the homes of Jewish families because they believed Jewish people drank blood. By opening the door in the middle, the group can check if someone had left a body outside. The informant mentioned that their grandmothers would argue about which melody was correct because each family had a different tune for the words.

Analysis:

This holiday is a community event, meant to bring people together. The purpose is to remember the past and commemorate the strength and perseverance of the Jewish people. Remembering the past of a culture is a way of remembering who the people are. In the case of Passover and slavery, remembering the past is a way of preventing it from happening again. As the Seder dinner is a historical retelling of the events, the purpose is to commemorate the people who came before while celebrating the survival of the people now.

Since the event happens at sundown (the start of the Jewish day), it is centered around food. The story itself incorporates the food into the process, connecting it to events or people. This entwines what people are eating with the story they are telling, allowing them to still eat during the event.

The modern addition of checking outside the house for a body is a result of antisemitism. Before, people wouldn’t have to worry about checking outside so that wasn’t part of the story. As it became necessary though, it became part of the celebration as the glass of wine was left specifically for a character in the historical story. The needs of the people were incorporated into the traditions of the ritual so well that if someone doesn’t know the context of opening the door, they might not realize it came from antisemitism.

The melodic element of the retelling comes from how Hebrew is spoken from the Torah which is in a singing-like manner. This is extended to the Hebrew spoken during this event because it is also a religious text. Melody allows for a text to be better remembered. By connecting words to a melody, it allows people to remember what to say for the whole three hour event better which would have otherwise been practically impossible. The informant’s own family had two different melodies that were used and they argued over which was correct. These melodies can become part of family identity and religious identity. This makes it hard for people to use a different melody because of how important their version is to them. Changing it would feel wrong and incorrect.

The Legend of Elias White (Ghost Story)

Informant’s Retelling:
“It all began in the dense, foggy woods of Bass Lake, a place so quiet you could hear your own heartbeat echoing through the trees. Legend has it that many years ago, a slave named Elias White escaped into these woods, never to return. Elias was a big man, known for his piercing white eyes that seemed to glow in the dark. Some said he had a gift for seeing things others couldn’t—things that weren’t meant to be seen.

One cold October night, Elias vanished. The slave owner searched for days. When they caught him, he was hung. A group of young campers watched from the brush. Elias, hanging from a tree branch, staring at the hikers, screeched in a strangled voice: ‘The forest keeps what it takes.’

The woods became a forbidden place after that. People whispered about strange lights flickering between the trees and an eerie voice that called out to anyone who dared enter. But the most terrifying part? Those who ventured too far into Bass Lake claimed they saw two glowing white eyes watching them from the shadows.

Fast forward to a summer night not too long ago. A group of teenagers, much like you guys, decided to test the legend. They laughed off the warnings, armed with flashlights and bravado, and headed into the forest. As they ventured deeper, the air grew colder, the trees seemed to close in, and a strange silence fell over the group.

Then, they heard it—a low, raspy whisper. At first, it sounded like the wind, but the words became clear: ‘The forest keeps what it takes.’

Panic set in, but when they turned to leave, they realized the path they came from had vanished. The forest had shifted, trapping them in its maze. One by one, their flashlights began to flicker and die. And then, they saw him.

Standing between the trees was a figure cloaked in shadows, his glowing white eyes piercing through the darkness. He didn’t move, but the teens could feel his presence, heavy and suffocating, as if the forest itself was breathing down their necks.

One of the teens, desperate to escape, shouted, ‘What do you want from us?!’

The figure tilted its head, and in a voice that sounded like leaves crunching underfoot, it replied: ‘To see what you’ve seen.’

The next morning, the search party found the teens huddled together at the forest’s edge, pale and trembling. They were alive, but something had changed. Their eyes—every single one of them—had turned a ghostly white, glowing faintly in the sunlight. To this day, they refuse to speak of what they saw, but they all agree on one thing: ‘Elias White is still out there, watching, waiting… and the forest keeps what it takes.'”

Context:
My information first encountered this chilling legend at a summer camp, narrated by an older counselor around a nighttime campfire. The setting enhanced the story’s eerie effect, amplifying its emotional impact and embedding it deeply in their memory. According to them, counselors would often use the tale of Elias White as both entertainment and a subtle warning to campers not to stray into restricted or dangerous areas of the forest. My informant recounted that the legend served as a rite of passage among campers, marking their initiation into the collective camp culture and identity.

Analysis:
The legend of Elias White embodies classic motifs found in ghost stories—escape, pursuit, punishment, and enduring hauntings—and taps into broader themes of historical injustice, lingering guilt, and retribution. Elias’s ghost symbolizes unresolved historical traumas and the oppressive past of slavery, turning a personal tragedy into a supernatural warning.

This narrative structure effectively uses fear to reinforce community boundaries, functioning as both a cautionary tale and a mechanism for social control within the camp environment. The transformation of the teenagers’ eyes symbolically conveys a loss of innocence or an irreversible awareness of darker truths.

Additionally, the phrase “the forest keeps what it takes” alludes to nature’s dominion over humanity, reflecting anxieties around human vulnerability and the unknowable mysteries lurking just beyond civilization’s edge. Thus, the legend of Elias White persists not only as entertainment but as a potent reminder of historical injustices and the enduring power of folklore to express cultural anxieties and collective memories.

Finger Point of doom. 

Nationality: African American

Primary Language: English

Other language(s): French

Age: 49

Occupation: Digital Marketing Consultant

Residence: Upstate, NY

Performance Date: 4/18/2025

Context: 

My informant, YD, is a family member of mine who lives in the Hudson Valley area of New York. YD has told me about gestures as they were growing up in quite diverse households, from gestures of Italian culture, Chinese culture, and Swiss culture, I had never truly known what each of these gestures they’d jokingly use with me actually meant to them. So one day I asked them this question, but instead of explaining the gestures they’d learned from their diverse cultural background, the ones in which I had known, they told me the story behind a different kind of gesture, one I had overlooked. 

Text: 

“I’d say the gesture that has the most meaning (good and bad) is the ‘finger point’. Typically growing up the ‘finger point’ was an unspoken instruction or nonverbal scolding. Similar to ‘the look’ that many black families instinctively understand, I had the ability to decipher what my mother was saying when she pointed to something or at me. You didn’t dawdle but moved into action, clearly understanding every ‘word’ and detailed action expected of you. I think it came from slavery’s time frame, from what my mother had told me, when communication needed to be coded. I see this as a badge of honor and super power within our family that has kept me safe and I will continue to teach that instinct within our culture.”

Analysis: 

The “finger point,” as described here, and from my research, isn’t just a scolding gesture or a tool for discipline, but is indeed, part of a coded system of communication that has deep roots in African American cultural survival. YD connects it to practices that may have originated during slavery, when verbal communication was restricted or dangerous, and truthfully so, in many African American folklore studies that explores the development of nonverbal codes as survival strategies, quiet gestures that spoke volumes in unsafe or oppressive environments was common and impressively passed down for generations. That concept alone blows my mind. It’s interesting how YD doesn’t just view the gesture as disciplinary, but as a legacy of resilience, intuition, and inter-generational wisdom. It’s especially meaningful that they frame it as something to be passed down, reinforcing the idea that folklore isn’t always just stories or songs, but also ways of seeing and navigating the world. YD’s account transforms what some might consider a small behavioral detail into a rich cultural artifact, filled with meaning, memory, and pride. I think that’s all so brilliant, and will probably never look at finger pointing the same way again, in a good way I mean. YD’s tale is a great reminder that folklore can live in the body, in silence, and in a single glance or gesture.

Brooms and marriage in Haiti.

M is a 45-year-old Haitian immigrant originally from Port-au-Prince, Haiti. M is currently a body-builder based in Phoenix, Arizona.

M offered me this piece of folklore during a phone conversation. I Informed M that I was in the process of collecting folklore, and asked her if she remembered any superstitions her family in Haiti may have had.

M: When I was growing up, the adults.. from Haiti had a saying that if anyone sweeps under your feet, with a broom.. you will never get married.

Reflection: Though M did not provide me with many background details about this fascinating bit of Haitian folk belief/superstition, I can at least try to interpret its meaning based on historical context. I have heard that in post-colonial and post-slavery nations like Haiti, there is a common marriage tradition in which the bride and groom each jump over a broom during their wedding as a good luck ritual. Assuming that the broom’s association with luck and marriage remains consistent across Haitian folklore, it may be fair to interpret the sweeping broom in M’s account as the antithesis of jumping over a broom, as doing so literally ”sweeps away“ the luck of getting married from underneath an unlucky soul’s feet.

Chitlins & Sals in Southern Food

Main Piece:

Me: So, what are these foods that you’re describing?

DH: Uhm… Sals is leftover pig parts— I don’t know what parts specifically. Uhm, it’s good… Chitlins is really more of a Southern delicacy now, but it used to be… I’m pretty sure that’s just pig intestines and all that, right?

Me: I believe so. Yeah.

DH: So, the reason that black people eat that is, you know, back in slavery, the owner would give you whatever they had left… You gotta eat something… I’ve never eaten chitlins, but…

Me: Have you had family members who have eaten it?

DH: My dad. Uhm, mostly every family gathering—you know like Christmas, Thanksgiving—they’re gonna have that at somebody’s house.

Me: … It’s interesting too, because I’m pretty sure my mom eats chitlins as well and so does my dad, occasionally.

DH: It’s really more of like a Southern thing.

Me: It’s interesting how it’s evolved in that way.

Context:

This was performed over FaceTime with one of my best friends from high school, who is African-American. She lives in Brandon, Mississippi, a small town right next to the state capital of Jackson and is a freshman studying Communications at Copiah-Lincoln Community College.

Analysis:

As my friend said, this most likely derives from Slavery Era practices in the American South. When slave masters were finished with their meals, they would give the scraps to their slaves. This included all the undesirable parts of a pig, and so this adaptation to ‘eating anything’ and making the most out of a bad situation was most likely necessary for survival. It was probably passed down through generations and developed as a cultural delicacy amongst black southerners. This is evidence to how people take traumatic experiences from their collective histories and evolve it into a way of embracing one’s past and culture. It has now developed more as a general Southern delicacy, right along the line with gizzards. Food that is so rich in history like this, that was once used as a way of division, is now being used as a point of connection amongst communities.

See more on ‘Ethnic Folklore’ below:

Oring, Elliott. “Ethnic Groups and Ethnic Folklore.” In Folk Groups and Folklore Genres: An Introduction, edited by E. Oring, 23-44.Logan: Utah State University Press, 1986.