Context:

The informant attended the same elementary school as me. We ended up going to different middle schools but somehow remained in contact. She is now studying Chinese literature at a highly selective university in China.

Text:

In the informant’s Chinese local college, there is a well-known student folklore about the “haunted fourth floor” of the Literature Building. Students say that after a certain hour in the evening, you should no longer step into the fourth floor, or else you will be cursed by a ghost who died in the building. There is also sayings that the literature building use to be a small factories, and a worker died from an accident yet their family was not compensate, thus he haunts the livings. Students sometimes would avoid staying there alone, especially during exam season.

The informant doesn’t believe in this ghost story. She thinks the fear is closely tied to the number four itself, which in Chinese pronunciation is similar to the word for “death” (死). Because of this association, the number is widely considered unlucky, and in some buildings it is either skipped or treated with discomfort. She considered this as superstition.

But when asked if she would go study there, she said no.

Analysis:

This folklore shows how superstition, memory, and academic pressure come together to shape student space and behavior. The “haunted fourth floor” draws on the cultural association between the number four and death, which gives the location an immediate symbolic unease even without belief in ghosts. At the same time, the story of a worker’s death adds a narrative of unresolved injustice, turning the building into a site of imagined haunting and moral tension. Even though the informant personally rejects the supernatural explanation, her reluctance to study there suggests that folklore can still influence behavior without belief.