Hiking Nicknames Cont. (Justin Fowler)

Title: Hiking Nicknames

General Information about Item:

Informant Data:

Kyu Kim is a male Dartmouth student in the class of 2018. He was born in Korea and raised in the northern Virginia/ Washington DC area. During his time at Dartmouth, Kyu enjoys playing the bassoon in the orchestra. In his time away from Dartmouth, Kyu has hiked part of the Appalachian Trail (AT). His plans after Dartmouth include working as a consultant.

Contextual Data:

Cultural Context: Hiker nicknames are a tradition within the hiking community. Every hiker is given (generally by another person) a nickname to avoid using their real name and giving people a sense of a new start and sense of self. It is the name that you can use for the remainder of your hike on the trail and how you will be addressed by fellow hikers.

Social Context: This specific term came after some prodding about how people addressed each other on the trail. It became more obvious that hikers not only try to stay anonymous from one another to enjoy their hike to the fullest but also to try to have a fresh start. When hiking with others, nicknames are a fun way to bring the hiking community come together and create a sense of self on the trail.

Item:

Hiker nicknames are generally individualized from person to person. This allows each person to know the person of whom they are referring as well as give some hint or idea of the person or maybe their character. The custom of giving each other nicknames is interesting because it generally is something that other hiker’s perceive about one person which is different from one who makes their own nickname and doesn’t “earn it”. For instance Kyu- who’s nickname is Chai came about in a very interesting way and often it is found that funny events transpire leading to hiker nicknames. These nicknames allow for hikers to poke fun at one another and get to better know one another along the trail.

Transcript of Associated File:

“So, nicknames are a common thing to have. Obviously, names are important and on the trail a lot of people hike for different reasons- one being people want to escape from their old life, so entrusting each other with new nicknames is good for them and a fun way for the hiking community to kind of come together.”
How did your nickname come about?
“My nickname is Chai which comes actually from my liking the band the Chainsmokers. So, for a long time my nickname was Chainsmokers. At one point, I went with some other fellow hikers to a bowling alley. The scoreboards could only put up four characters and the first four letters of the word Chainsmoker is “C-H-A-I” so as you can imagine from then on out, my nickname was Chai.”

Collector’s Comments:

Enjoyed the background of how Kyu got his nickname and interesting to note that one reason people like nicknames is that they go hiking to avoid their everyday lives or to put the past behind them.

Collector’s Name: Justin Fowler

Tags/Keywords:

Dartmouth Folklore Archive