Tag Archives: Trickster

Myth: Anansi Story from a Coworker

Context:

Informant S is a 25 year old graduate student in the film production department of USC SCA and is the collector’s coworker. S is from New Jersey, and their family is from the Virgin Islands. S has “heard various Anansi stories within [their] family. This one [they] remember partially reading it for a project [they] were doing in a class but it also was within the realm of the ones [they] heard growing up [they] just couldn’t fully remember it so [they] just found one.” The informant has studied folklore for their own personal interest in it and employed it in their own filmmaking.

Text:

Informant: “Anansi is essentially like an African diaspora. It’s a spider, like a trickster-spider, and it’s everywhere in the Caribbean, it’s in the whole diaspora. And there’s one Anansi story I sort of remember where he’s hungry and he wants dinner. So he keeps getting himself invited to, like, dinner parties and pretending there’s a bunch of people and then he steals the host’s dinner and just, like, leaves. I think he killed one of them at one point. But it’s all these different like creatures of the forest I think, there’s a fox, a wolf, and a crow I believe? And then eventually he keeps coming home, eating all the food he stole, and not bringing any back for his wife and kids. So, I think his wife rats him out and then there’s like a fake dinner party made to get him and he eats so much food he can’t move anymore. And then all the people he stole the food from capture him and basically tie him up and leave him tied against a tree. And then he eats the rope and escapes. That’s not… that’s the gist of it, I can remember.”

Collector: “Like that’s how it ends?”

Informant: “Something like that. They usually have kind of dark endings but the… essentially Anansi is supposed to teach you […] lessons about why not to trick people and be greedy and selfish and a bunch of stuff. […] Anansi itself is like a… almost universal… one of the few universal diasporic concepts. There’s a whole bunch of them, that’s just one I remember.”

Interpretation:

I was lucky enough to find an informant for this collection entry that was familiar with concepts of folklore itself. S mentioned that their interest in the African diaspora is rooted in their own personal background, connecting them to heritage or family as we’ve discussed in class. It seems like this kind of interest in cultural folklore is common among the children and grandchildren of immigrants in America. S’ story reminds me of the concept of “universal archetype” – though that theory has been disproved, I can see why some folklorists have considered it. The concept of a trickster god, while not archetypal, appears in a number of folklores – notably in Indigenous American folklore, according to Lévi-Strauss’ work in structuralism. Anansi, like Lévi-Strauss’ examples, acts on instincts that are pretty reminiscent of human flaws, and is connected with a specific type of animal – a spider. Though S believes the story is to teach people not to mess with trickster gods, I believe it has to do with human flaw such as greed and gluttony as well. What’s more, I think it’s interesting that the informant specifically mentioned what they believe the story is supposed to teach, and has a pretty clear understanding of this story as a myth.

Karakondula

Informant: The myth of the Karakondula started in the Eastern parts of Serbia. The myth is of a small ugly creature called the Karakondula. The creature would assault and attack men late at night after they came home from the bar. It would primarily seek out men late at night hop on their back and choke them, while also stealing their pocket money. It was a myth because the men from these eastern parts of Serbia were actually really drunk and trying to convince their wives as to why they were home so late. These men were passing out in the roads and coming home late late into the early morning.

Context: I had a short interview with my informant and his sister and they recounted the folklore that they learned from their serbian father. He would tell them these stories. Later in their life the Karakondula became a sort of inside joke with their father.

Analysis: This gave me some more insight not only into my friend’s relationship with his sister and his father but also a bit into the folklore of Serbian culture. The karakondula is a trickster just like many others in folklore all around the world. It was a story completely made up by men to try and trick people so their bad behaviors go unnoticed. In reality these men might actually be the real tricksters here.

Saciperere, Brazilian Trickster

Text:

M: Oh we have the umm sasi, saciperere.

Me: sasipere?

M: yes, he’s a guy with only one leg

Me: okay

M: he has a a red cap. Well like kinda, kinda like a beanie, kinda like a cap. And he would like [coughs] sorry, umm, im kinda sick

M: don’t worry about it

M: he would like walk around, and he was more of a prankster. So he would like, if you were building stuff he would like– if you had like a plant, he would steal some of it, so he could eat. Like for him to eat, he would steal some of the crops. Anf he would like, I dunno, let’s say he would like tangle the horses like hair. He would like tangle it so you’d have to like brush it. He would like, if you left, let’s say you baked a cake and left it on the, he would steal the cake. Just liek stuff like that. He was more of a prankster. And then there was a thing that if you stole his cap he had to do whatever you make him do. And there was a whole thing that you could capture him. That if like you pick a bottle with a cork, and then you draw a cross on it, and then– uh I don’t remember the whole process– but I know you had to do that so could capture him, put him in the bottle. So if you want like him to go away.

Me: wait, whats his deal? Like, why is he like that?

M:its just a prankster

Me: just a prankster!

M: like you know harry potter, you know how there was like the poltergeist, that was just like pranking everyone in the hallways. 

Me: just like a mischievous spirit or somethin’

M: yeah, a mischievous spirit

Me: cool

M: yeah, and he was jumping on one leg so he.. And he, that’s the thing, he did, when he was walking around like long distances, he would create a small tornado thing. So I think that’s how people explained like those, those, sometimes we have those small vortexes. I think that’s how people explained it. It was him.

M: cool

Context:

The informant, M, is a 19-year-old USC international student from Brazil. She delivered this piece in the workroom of a campus center before class alongside other pieces in order to share some personal and Brazilian folklore. She learned about this legend growing up in Brazil.

Analysis:

Trickster figures are very common worldwide. Saiperere fits this trickster model quite well, being a bit odd and performing traditional trickster activities: stealing cakes, and tangling horses’ manes. A specific of his unusualness, his single leg, indicates to me that limb differences are seen as funny or associated with untrustworthiness and trickery.

the idea that you might be able to trap Saiperere with a bottle bearing a cross is also interesting. the cross being relevant demonstrates the relevance of Christianity in this culture. And also the belief that the Christian god can control and contain malevolent spirits. Because of the cross being able to control him, Saiperere might also be thought of as a demon or devil.

The Oxen and The Tiger

Context: J is a 21 year old Filipino American college student who grew up in California, who was regularly visited by her Grandparents who shared stories from their childhood. The piece was collected during a discord audio call. 

Intv: “Hey! I was wondering if you wouldn’t mind telling me the story that your grandmother told you about.”

J: “ Yeah sure! So There’s a story my grandma used to tell, she heard while growing up in cambodia! Just a little outside of the capital of Phnom penh. It’s about the origin of tiger stripes and why ox have no upper front teeth.”

Intv: “Okay sounds great! I’d love to hear it!”

J: “So basically this tiger was stalking these oxen getting beaten around by a man while working the farm fields, full of curiosity, the tiger approached the oxen after the man walks away and asks “my ox brethren, why do you let the weak man beat away at you and make you work for him when you could easily kick him down and be free like me?” and the ox replies “it’s because the man has intelligence that makes us listen to him” the tiger then asks, “what is intelligence?” and the ox replies ‘go ask him yourself’ which the tiger does but approaches the human arrogantly because the tiger thinks he is the most powerful being in the world and demands that the human man show the tiger what intelligence was or the tiger would maul the human. the human responds ‘ah, i left my intelligence at home so i would have to go retrieve it but i don’t trust you around my livestock’ and while the tiger insisted that he’d wait for the man, they came to an agreement where the man would tie up the tiger to prevent him from potentially attacking his oxen. However, after tying the tiger very tightly to a tree the human placed a bunch of leaves and branches on the tiger and lit him on fire. The oxen began to laugh at the tiger while pointing at him with their front legs and they laughed so hard that they fell on their front two teeth and broke them and they never grew back. while the tiger screamed in agony until the rope tying him to the tree burned away and he fled back into the forest, with the black stripes being his burned flesh for forever”

Analysis: As a first time listener to this story the main thing that stands out to me is the human animal relations. Humans are depicted at the top of the food chain, not because of power but because of our wit. The unnamed human in this story even acts like a common trickster character, by pretending intelligence is a physical object. Also through the oxen we see another aspect of human capability and intelligence, through just how the oxen says “intelligence makes us listen to him.”

Math Joke

Text

AL – So there’s a far-off place that consisted of a perfectly triangular lake surrounded by land, with three kingdoms, one on each side of the lake. The first kingdom is rich and powerful, filled with wealthy, prosperous people. The second kingdom is more humble, but has its fair share of wealth and power too. The third kingdom is struggling and poor, and barely has an army.
The kingdoms eventually go to war over control of the lake, as it’s a valuable resource to have. The first kingdom sends 100 of their finest knights, clad in their best armor, and each with their own personal squire. The second kingdom sends 50 of their knights, with fine leather armor and a few dozen squires of their own. The third kingdom sends their one and only knights, an elderly warrior who has long since passed his primes, with his own personal squire.
The knight before the big battle, the knights in the first kingdom drink and make merry, partying into the late hours of the night. The knights in the second kingdom aren’t as well off, but have their own supply of grog and also drink late into the night.
In the third camp, the faithful squire gets a rope and slings it over the branch of a tall tree, making a noose, and hangs a pot from it. He fills the pot with stew and has a humble dinner with the old knight.
The next morning, the knights in the first two kingdoms are hung over and unable to fight, while the knight in the third kingdom is old and weary, unable to get up. In place of the knights, the squires from all three kingdoms go and fight. The battle lasts ling into the night, but by the time the dust settled, only one squire was left standing—the squire from the third kingdom.
And it just goes to show you that the squire of the high pot and noose is equal to the sum of the squires of the other two sides.

Context

I like to collect jokes, specifically puns, on various topics so that no matter what situation I am currently in, I can say, “Oh, I know a joke about that!” I have found that most people have a love/hate relationship with puns; they tend to love telling them and hate hearing them. I mostly tell puns to family and friends, and their anger and frustration fuels me. Though my friends groan and sigh every time they hear a pun, they will still send me any good ones that they find. I also find puns on various social media platforms, in books, and on the occasional popsicle stick. Any time that I find or am sent a pun that I like, I write it in a book that I keep specifically for this purpose. My very favorite kinds of puns are the ones that are long and drawn out, ones that are a paragraph, maybe two, and you get to the end and the last line is a clever pun that uses many elements of the story that came before it. My second favorite kinds of puns are the short rude/dirty ones, because in addition to the reaction you get for any other pun, you also get the shock reaction from the vulgarity. I save the more risqué puns for close friends, as I don’t want to offend the delicate sensibilities of people that I don’t know very well.

Analysis

This pun begins as a lengthy narrative that misleads the listener from thinking about puns. The punchline is succinct. And it is not necessarily comprehensible to everyone. Specifically, the listener must have a basic understanding about geometry. What initially sounds like an attractive David-and-Goliath story is actually… a math joke. The punchline, “the squire of the high pot and noose is equal to the sum of the squires of the other two sides,” can be misheard (with the right mindset and maths knowledge) as “the square of the hypotenuse is equal to the sum of the squares of the other two sides.” Not only is the listener tricked into listening into a pun (as the informant mentioned, most people hate hearing them), but they are also tricked into having to think about math, which, depending on the audience’s preference for school subjects, is insult to injury.