The Colour Red

Title: The Colour Red

General Information about Item:

Informant Data:

Informant is a twenty-two-year-old student, currently attending Dartmouth College in Hanover New Hampshire. She has lived in New England all of her life, though one side of her family is from the Mid-West and the other is Chinese. The informant is half Chinese and grew up with a Chinese nanny. Some of the superstitions she remembers are recollections of superstitions held by and passed on by her nanny when she was a child. While her mother did not mention many superstitions, others are remembered from her grandfather and grandmother on her mother’s side. Some superstitions are also recalled from Chinese School. The informant was interviewed in conjunction with another Dartmouth female senior that did not want to be identified, and after the other interviewee requested to be anonymous this interviewee requested to be as well.

Contextual Data:

Cultural Context: The colour red is considered to be good luck. In context of Chinese New Year’s, this stems from a New Year’s story involving a story about a monster called the Nian that was terrorising a village. The Nian was scared away by red paper pasted on the doors around a village. Consequently red was considered lucky, and putting up red papers is also supposed to keep away bad luck and bring good luck.
Social Context: The Informant remembers this superstition being relevant at the yearly Chinese New Year celebrations held at her Chinese School. Her mom would always make her wear red to the celebrations, though otherwise she didn’t have to wear red to other places on Chinese New Year’s. Her mom would generally wear a red shirt or sweater though.

Item:

Associated file (a video, audio, or image file):

Transcript:

“A Chinese superstition is that you should wear red on new year’s or um you’ll get bad luck.”

Informant’s Comments:

My mom also really believes in the luck of the colour red in general. Almost all especially nice jewellery she owns is red.

Collector’s Comments:

This seems to tie interestingly into the Western superstition of wearing red underwear on New Year’s Eve.

Collector’s Name: Mia Kobs

Tags/Keywords:

Dartmouth Folklore Archive