Context:

The informant attends the University of South Carolina, which has an intense football rivalry with Clemson University. This ritual is performed a week before the rivalry game each year.

Text:

Before the rivalry game between Clemson and the University of South Carolina, the students in the engineering school build a large tiger out of natural materials. The informant recalls that most recently they built this tiger out of wood. The tiger represents the mascot of Clemson University. The tiger is burned a week before the game occurs on the practice football field in front of all the students.

Analysis:

This ritual is a ritualesque performance that represents a sense of rivalry and shared group identities through the collective action of building and burning the tiger. This act connects to Jack Santino’s idea in “The Carnivalesque and the Ritualesque” that some events intend to create real effects (i.e. USC winning the rivalry game). Additionally, the construction and burning of the tiger reflects a form of homepathic magic that Frazer describes, where destroying a representation of Clemson’s mascot attempts to show superiority over them. This ritual helps reinforce both in-group and out-group boundaries by showing how folklore can strengthen group identity, while simultaneously sowing divisions within larger regional communities.