Author Archives: f00315b

Watch the Fire

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General Information about Item:

  • Customary, Practical Joke
  • Language: English
  • Country of Origin: United States
  • Informant: Claire Azar
  • Date Collected: This data was collected during a one-on-one interview in the library of Dartmouth College with Claire Azar on October 30th, 2018.

Informant Data:

  • Claire Azar ‘22 is a female student studying Chinese at Dartmouth College. She is originally from Indianapolis, and recently moved to Washington DC. Malcolm participated in a canoeing trip before the start of his Freshman year at Dartmouth as part of the First Year Trips DOC program. At Dartmouth, she is part of the Equestrian Team.

Contextual Data:

  • Social Context
  • Claire encountered this joke, which is specific to the cabin camping section of trips, when she was a tripee during August of 2017.
  • This joke is typically played by upperclassmen or students leading trips on their first-year tripees. As the objects of the prank, the new freshmen are supposed to be initiated and bonded together as a new class by going through the embarrassment of this prank together.
  • Cultural Context
  • This joke occurs on first-year trips, which close to 95% of every incoming class at Dartmouth College participates in. Trips are used as a way to welcome each new class to Dartmouth and to break down whatever misconceptions they might have. Accordingly, jokes on trips are used often as they offer a great way to subvert expectations and to make everyone have a good time. Typically, the practical joke is played once the members of the trip and the leaders have left Dartmouth’s campus and are together somewhere in the surrounding wilderness of New Hampshire/Vermont. In this way, practical jokes like this one are very common to the Trips setting as they serve to bring everyone closer together through group humiliation/embarrassment.

Item:

  • During the cabin camping section each year, Trip leaders will light a fire outside the cabin This is supposed to be used to cook food such as soup and mac-cheese.  The wilderness area where trip sections go is isolated and lacks a kitchen to cook food.  On the last night, her trip was instructed to keep the fire going while the leaders went to collect more wood. Her trippees enjoined bonding over the fire,  while looking after the fire, however, here trippees were getting worried after a few hours. Suddenly, her leaders returned, carrying with them Dominos pizza.

 

Transcript:

  • Gordon: Hi I’m here today with Claire and we’re going to talk about her trip.
  • Claire: Hi ok, so on the third day of our trip we just finished a lot of hiking. And it started to downpour and our trip leaders told us they were going to get more firewood.
  • Gordon: So what happened after that?
  • Claire: We kept ourselves busy for four hours and so to keep ourselves occupied we played we loved playing this game of Mafia.
  • Gordon: Did they give you any tasks to do while they were gone?
  • Claire: Oh, yeah, they wanted us to keep the fire going but like they were gone for a really long time. We started to get really concerned because it was dark out and it was raining and then you guys still kept the fire going we did we did what we were supposed to do and then then we like heard some like banging on the outside of the cabin and we like got really freaked out because we didn’t we had no idea what was going on and then it like stop for a little bit and then it was our trip leaders and they had gotten Domino’s pizza for us.
  • Gordon: So they really got you guys.
  • Claire: They did we were really freaked out. We were worried that they like died or something.

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

Informant’s Comments:

  • “It was a great experience, even with the rain our group really enjoyed talking and looking after the fire.”

 

Collectors’ Comments:

  • This prank seems like another example of trips leaders making the trippees work together and go through a tough or humiliating experience together. These are great way of integrating them into the wider Dartmouth community.

Collector’s Name: Gordon Robinson

Tags/Keywords:

  • Joke. Pranks. Practical Jokes. Trips. Dartmouth.

Face Place

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General Information about Item:

  • Customary, Practical Joke
  • Language: English
  • Country of Origin: United States
  • Informant: Jack Kinney
  • Date Collected: This data was collected during a one-on-one interview in the library of Dartmouth College with Jack Kinney on October 28th, 2018.

Informant Data:

  • Jack Kinney ‘19 is a male student studying Environmental Science and Geography at Dartmouth College. He is originally from Seattle Washington. Jack participated in a hiking trip before the start of his Freshman year at Dartmouth as part of the First Year Trips DOC program. Since then, he has led trips every year.

Contextual Data:

  • Social Context
  • Jack Kinney encountered this joke, during this own trip. Later he has made played joke himself on each of his trips.
  • This joke is typically played by upperclassmen or students leading trips on their first-year tripees. As the objects of the prank, the new freshmen are supposed to be initiated and bonded together as a new class by going through the embarrassment of this prank together.
  • Cultural Context
  • This joke occurs on first-year trips, which close to 95% of every incoming class at Dartmouth College participates in. Trips are used as a way to welcome each new class to Dartmouth and to break down whatever misconceptions they might have. Accordingly, jokes on trips are used often as they offer a great way to subvert expectations and to make everyone have a good time. Typically, the practical joke is played once the members of the trip and the leaders have left Dartmouth’s campus and are together somewhere in the surrounding wilderness of New Hampshire/Vermont. In this way, practical jokes like this one are very common to the Trips setting as they serve to bring everyone closer together through group humiliation/embarrassment.

Item:

  • During First Year Trips each year, Trip leaders will talk to their Trippees about Dartmouth traditions and way of life. Since Trips is the first introduction to Dartmouth for many of students, they are eager to learn from them. Trip leaders will share many parts of Dartmouth folklore and slang with their trips to integrate them into the Dartmouth community.

Transcript:

  • Gordon: Hi Jack, could you talk a little bit about yourself and your time with the Dartmouth Trips?
  • Jack: Yeah, so I’m Jack Kinney am a senior at Dartmouth and have been involved with Trips either a trippees or a leader my entire time here.
  • Gordon: What kind of pranks were played on you, and did you do any on your trips?
  • Jack: I thoroughly enjoyed Trips. They were one of the best experiences I had here at Dartmouth, I wanted to share this same experience with future students. One of my favourites jokes was this one about Dartmouth lingo.
  • Gordon: Nice, what was it?
  • Jack: Well, while we told them about all the different slangs we have we told also gave them some wrong ones. For example, we told them that First Floor Berry was called “Faceplace” by Dartmouth students.
  • Gordon: Great, so what happened?
  • Jack: When they got to campus, they were confused about what we meant. It was funny hearing them talk about  Faceplace.
  • Gordon: Thank you sounds, like a great joke.

Informant’s Comments:

  • “I remember when this same joke happened on my trip. It was the I liked the most. Some of our trippees actually still talked about Faceplace as their one inside joke.”

 

Collectors’ Comments:

  • This prank wasn’t played on my trip. However, I heard about it from friends from went on other trips. I think that it’s a great way to introduce students to Dartmouth folklore and slang.

Collector’s Name: Gordon Robinson

Tags/Keywords:

  • Joke. Pranks. Practical Jokes. Trips. Dartmouth.

Fake Emergency

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General Information about Item:

  • Customary, Practical Joke
  • Language: English
  • Country of Origin: United States
  • Informant: Malcolm Robinson
  • Date Collected: This data was collected during a one-on-one interview in the library of Dartmouth College with Malcolm Robinson on October 28th, 2018.

Informant Data:

  • Malcolm Robinson ‘22 is a male student studying Russian Area Studies and Geography at Dartmouth College. He is originally from London. Malcolm participated in a canoeing trip before the start of his Freshman year at Dartmouth as part of the First Year Trips DOC program. He has 2 older brothers (Austin Robinson ‘19 and Gordon Robinson 21′), who attend Dartmouth, but Trips were his first true introduction to life as a Dartmouth student.

Contextual Data:

  • Social Context
  • Malcolm encountered this joke, which is not specific to the caneoing section of trips and is actually quite common when he was a tripee during August of 2017.
  • This joke is typically played by upperclassmen or students leading trips on their first-year tripees. As the objects of the prank, the new freshmen are supposed to be initiated and bonded together as a new class by going through the embarrassment of this prank together.
  • Cultural Context
  • This joke occurs on first-year trips, which close to 95% of every incoming class at Dartmouth College participates in. Trips are used as a way to welcome each new class to Dartmouth and to break down whatever misconceptions they might have. Accordingly, jokes on trips are used often as they offer a great way to subvert expectations and to make everyone have a good time. Typically, the practical joke is played once the members of the trip and the leaders have left Dartmouth’s campus and are together somewhere in the surrounding wilderness of New Hampshire/Vermont. In this way, practical jokes like this one are very common to the Trips setting as they serve to bring everyone closer together through group humiliation/embarrassment.

Item:

  • During First Year Trips each year, Trip leaders carry a first aid kit for an emergency.  This is because the College Grant, the wilderness area where trip sections go is very isolated area several hours from the College and any serious medical care.  Trip leaders inform their trippees of the importance of helping each other if one has an accident. At a certain point during the Trip, one of the leaders will pretend they are having a medical emergency. They will tell their trippes that they need to find the first aid kit and help the leader. When the trippees find the kit they will open it, where they will see a pie from Lou’s. This local eatery in Hanover, is a student favorite.

 

Transcript:

  • Gordon: Hi Malcolm, great to be with you again, as you mentioned in our last conversation your leaders played multiple pranks on you guys?
  • Malcolm: Yeah, so besides the Robert Frost Ashe’s they also played this other joke on us..
  • Gordon: Great, so could you tell me a little bit about that joke?
  • Malcolm: Yeah so my trip leaders were great and liked playing jokes on us. After Robert Frost’s ashes, they had another joke for us. One day while we unloading the canoe one of our leaders pretended to have an asthma attack. The other one told us to quickly find the emergency kit in their bag, while he called for help on his phone.
  • Gordon: What happened?
  • Malcolm: My friend quickly found and we all opened it. Instead of a medical kit, we saw a box from Lou’s. I looked inside and there was a cherry pie from Lou’s. We realized that it was all a joke.
  • Gordon: What a great joke!

Informant’s Comments:

  • “We were all worried for a little. When we saw the box from Lou’s, we all started to laugh. Eating the pie was great, especially after the bland food we on the trip so far.”

 

Collectors’ Comments:

  • This prank is a great way to reinforce how everybody on the trip must work together. Lou’s is also a favorite of Dartmouth students, and this is a great way to introduce people to this great local institution.

Collector’s Name: Gordon Robinson

Tags/Keywords:

  • Joke. Pranks. Practical Jokes. Trips. Dartmouth.

Robert Frost’s Ashes

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General Information about Item:

  • Customary, Practical Joke
  • Language: English
  • Country of Origin: United States
  • Informant: Malcolm Robinson
  • Date Collected: This data was collected during a one-on-one interview in the library of Dartmouth College with Malcolm Robinson on October 28th, 2018.

Informant Data:

  • Malcolm Robinson ‘22 is a male student studying Russian Area Studies and Geography at Dartmouth College. He is originally from London. Malcolm participated in a canoeing trip before the start of his Freshman year at Dartmouth as part of the First Year Trips DOC program. He has 2 older brothers (Austin Robinson ‘19 and Gordon Robinson 21′), who attend Dartmouth, but Trips were his first true introduction to life as a Dartmouth student.

Contextual Data:

  • Social Context
  • Malcolm encountered this joke, which is not specific to the canoeing section of trips and is actually quite common, when he was a tripee during August of 2017.
  • This joke is typically played by upperclassmen or students leading trips on their first year tripees. As the objects of the prank, the new freshmen are supposed to be initiated and bonded together as a new class by going through the embarrassment of this prank together.
  • Cultural Context
  • This joke occurs on first year trips, which close to 95% of every incoming class at Dartmouth College participates in. Trips are used as a way to welcome each new class to Dartmouth and to break down whatever misconceptions they might have. Accordingly, jokes on trips are used often as they offer a great way to subvert expectations and to make everyone have a good time. Typically, the practical joke is played once the members of the trip and the leaders have left Dartmouth’s campus and are together somewhere in the surrounding wilderness of New Hampshire/Vermont. In this way, practical jokes like this one are very common to the Trips setting as they serve to bring everyone closer together through group humiliation/embarrassment.

Item:

  • During First Year Trips each year, Trip leaders will carry a bag that they claim is filled with the ashes of Robert Frost. This is supposedly to scatter them in the College Grant, the wilderness area where trip sections go as Frost wrote extensively on the beauty of the rugged New England landscape.  Eventually, they will choose a place that was allegedly meaningful to Frost to scatter these ashes. At this point, they will reveal that the ashes are actually chocolate powder and proceed to make hot chocolate for the group.

 

Transcript:

  • Gordon: Hi Malcolm, hope you’re doing well,  could you talk a little bit about yourself?
  • Malcolm: Yeah, so I’m Malcolm Robinson, I’m a 22 at Dartmouth College and I’m here with my brother Gordon Robinson. He’s gonna ask me some questions.
  • Gordon: Great, so let’s talk a little bit about jokes or pranks they played on your trip. Could you give an example of any jokes from your trip?
  • Malcolm: My first-year trip was awesome, I had a great time and they played a lot of jokes. For example one point during the trip, they told us that it was a Dartmouth tradition because Robert Frost was an alum we had to spread his ashes around the College Grant. It turns out that those were not Frost’s ashes, it was pretty funny.
  • Gordon: How did you figure it out?
  • Malcolm: It was pretty obvious when someone in the group figured it out. At the start, many genuinely believed that those were Robert Frost’s ashes.
  • Gordon: Alright, great! Thanks.

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

Informant’s Comments:

  • “They [the trip leaders] had some people convinced until we saw the bag. I think that this brought us closer as a group, and made me reflect on the beauty of the wilderness.”

 

Collectors’ Comments:

  • This prank plays off the trippees desire to participate in an experience that they believe is shared by the wider campus. It also shows them how they are part of a wider Dartmouth community of current students and alumni.

Collector’s Name: Gordon Robinson

Tags/Keywords:

  • Joke. Pranks. Practical Jokes. Trips. Dartmouth.