General Information:

• Verbal Folklore, Material folklore (occasionally)
• Language: English
• Region of Origin: Unknown, 21st century
• Informant: Kathryn Keenan
• Date Collected: 5/23/19

Informant Data:

Kathryn Keenan is a 29 year old woman, originally from Albany, NY and was raised in an Irish Catholic household with many brothers and sisters. She is currently in her residency to be an Emergency pediatric doctor in Buffalo, NY. She was married to Michael Keenan, also a doctor, in the Spring of 2018.

Contextual Data:

• Social Context: Wedding Hashtags are at the bottom of all photos or posts from an event on social media. They are used by all wedding attendees, as well as photographers or caters showing work that they did at a wedding. Ms Keenan noted that she had seen them used at weddings of many different faiths and cultures, but had only seen them used by younger couples. The process of coming up with a clever pun or name mash-up often involves friends and family.
• Cultural Context: The Wedding Hashtag is a new digital trend that is considered humorous and is a piece of verbal folklore created for each individual couple. It serves to organize and bond those in attendance. In a way creating a folkgroup from people who did not know each other because they know share a unique tradition or knowledge. It also allows each couple to have something new and uniquely their own. It creates a rebranding for the couple as a now being one unit.

Item:
Wedding hashtags are a unique phrase, often related to the couples origins, careers, or names, that is added to any social media posts, such as Instagram, Facebook, Twitter. This allows other attendees to find photos from the wedding. The hashtag may represent physical lore as well. While Ms Keenan opted for a simple blackboard with their phrase written on it, other couples create wooden signs for it, have a wall with it to take photos in front of, or place it on souvenirs for the guests.

Collector: Rebecca Conway

Note: The upper photo is a stock photo and was not provided by the source. The lower photo was.