Title: St.Valentine

General Information about Item:

• Verbal Lore,  Joke
• Language: Kazakh
• Country of Origin: Kazakhstan
• Informant: Assel Uvaliyeva
• Date Collected: 11-1-18

Informant Data:

• Assel Uvaliyeva was born on February 25, 1995.  She is from Almaty, Kazakhstan, of Tatar and Kazakh origin. She currently works as a teachers assistant and studies at Dartmouth College as a graduate student. She speaks Russian, Kazakh, and English.

Contextual Data:

• Cultural Context: In Kazakh culture they celebrate a different Valentines day type holiday than we are familiar with in the US. In Kazakhstan they celebrate the holiday signified by two lovers Kozy Korpesh and Bayan Sala. In Kazakh culture St.Valentine is a warrior so the Kazakh people created new holiday. The meme in this collection is a dialogue between St.Valentine and Kozy Korpesh.
• Social Context: This meme comes from the same account which posts these memes on social media for the public of Kazakhstan. Memes are visual representations of viral lore, that is understood by a large of group of people associated with the meme’s content, in this case the content is best understood by people familiar with Kazakh and Russian cultures. The joke relies on knowledge of valentinki which are tiny Valentine’s Day cards but valentinki is also diminutive meaning small and cute. The meme ultimately makes fun of Kazakh speakers mixing Kazakh words with Russian ones. Also, the joke is making fun of the long names of the Bogatyr and his wife describing them as too long to name a holiday after.  

Item

• This joke is formatted as a meme from a popular Instagram page focusing on Kazakh memes. The use of the Russian suffix “ki” at the end of Kazakh words is truly the joke’s punchline. To understand the meme one needs a Russian and Kazakh cultural understanding. Ultimately, the joke is a play on Kazakh and Russian words because lots of Kazakh speakers also speak Russian.

File

Transcript

Panel 1- Bogatyr: “Listen, Valentine, why do your folk celebrate St. Valentine’s Day and not my holiday?”

Panel 2- St. Valentine: “Kozy, listen, would people ever buy valentinka?”

Panel 3- St. Valentine: “I wouldn’t even know what to name them.”

Panel 4- St. Valentine: “Kozykorpinky Kozykorpesh bayoenslelinki”

Informant’s Comments:

• “Ki is a Russian suffix and the names of these two figures are Kazakh. The confusion between Russian and Kazakh is called shala qazaq (Kazakh). This meme plays off of the common shala qazaq confusion.”

Collector’s Comments:

• We have never seen a meme or joke that makes fun of these particular saints or heroes before. However, the underlying joke relies on a mix up between two languages. Many jokes that we have seen following this same format involve European languages or jokes from South America differentiating between distinct dialects.

Collector’s Name: Philip Berton/ John Lass

Tags/Keywords:

• Verbal Lore
• Joke
• Russia
• Kazakhstan
• St. Valentine
• Bogatyr
• Meme

Title: World Expo

General Information about Item:

• Verbal Lore,  Joke
• Language: Kazakh
• Country of Origin: Kazakhstan
• Informant: Assel Uvaliyeva
• Date Collected: 11-1-18

Informant Data:

• Assel Uvaliyeva was born on February 25, 1995.  She is from Almaty, Kazakhstan, of Tatar and Kazakh origin. She currently works as a teachers assistant and studies at Dartmouth College as a graduate student. She speaks Russian, Kazakh, and English.

Contextual Data:

• Cultural Context: In 2017 Kazakhstan hosted the world expo. This is a large world fare type of event and was centered around a conversation of world energy. For the expo a character was created as the mascot he is seated on the couch in the meme. He is surrounded by some of problems in Kazakhstan which are ironic to the message of the world expo.
• Social Context: This meme comes from the same account which posts these on social media for the public of Kazakhstan.Memes are visual representations of viral lore, that is understood by a large of group of people associated with the meme’s content, in this case the content is best understood by people familiar with the 2017 World Expo. The figures in the back are different problems in Kazakhstan like it is built on a swamp, has a lot of mosquitos, it is usually very cold, and it has a lot of problems with bureaucracy. This meme makes fun of issues people who live in Kazakhstan usually complain about.
• Item:

• This joke is formatted as a meme from a popular Instagram page focusing on Kazakh memes. This meme shows the world expo mascot being surrounded by a lot of the problems in Kazakhstan. 

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

Transcript:

• Blue Character: Cold Weather
• Green Character: Kazakhstan is built on a swamp
• Mosquito: Kazakhstan has a lot of mosquitos
• Masked Character: The bureaucracy of Kazakhstan
• Couch Character: Bayterek, expo mascot

Informant’s Comments:

• “When the character for the world expo was created there was a lot of content making fun of it. This is one of the things that came from that.”

Collector’s Comments:

• I had never heard of the world expo before and didn’t know these things about Kazakhstan. I think it’s an interesting take on the perception of Kazakhstan based on the world expo versus the people who actually live in the country.

Collector’s Name: John Lass

Tags/Keywords:

• Verbal Lore
• Joke
• World Expo
• Kazakhstan

Title: Kazakh Construction

General Information about Item:

• Verbal Lore,  Joke
• Language: Kazakh
• Country of Origin: Kazakhstan
• Informant: Assel Uvaliyeva
• Date Collected: 11-1-18

Informant Data:

• Assel Uvaliyeva was born on February 25, 1995.  She is from Almaty, Kazakhstan, of Tatar and Kazakh origin. She currently works as a teachers assistant and studies at Dartmouth College as a graduate student. She speaks Russian, Kazakh, and English.

Contextual Data:

• Cultural Context: There has been a lot of new construction going on in Abu Dhabi Plaza in Astana the capital of Kazakhstan. Despite the construction, the country has issues with shortages of labor and materials which contributes to plenty of missed deadlines. Furthermore, the President of Kazakhstan holds significant power and people always try to impress him. This joke ties together construction practices with the process of impressing the President.
• Social Context: Assel found this meme on an Instagram account that regularly posts Kazakhstan memes.nMemes are visual representations of viral lore, that is understood by a large of group of people associated with the meme’s content, in this case the content is best understood by people familiar with the way construction is handled in Kazakhstan. Although Assel is not from Astana, she has personal experience with Kazakhs trying to impress the President at her university. Furthermore, there is a Kazakh expression for people working to impress political figures.

Item:

• This joke is formatted as a meme from a popular Instagram page focusing on Kazakh memes. The meme pokes fun at lazy construction workers and people working extremely hard just to impress the President. The punchline is unexpected because instead of being a magical spell the worker lies and tells everyone the President is coming.

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

Transcript:

• First Panel: Person A- “Damn we’re not meeting the deadline. There is not enough materials.”
• First Panel: Person B- “I actually have a magical spell that will help. To get it to work you need to climb to the top of the building and yell it.”
• Second Panel: Person A- “The President is coming tomorrow!”
• Third Panel: Person B- “Oh yeah, that always works.”

Informant’s Comments:

• “This joke makes fun of Kazakh workers working extremely hard to impress the President. I experienced this first-hand at my university. We have fountains that the school never turns on. Then, when the President came by to visit, of course we finally turned on the fountains.”

Collector’s Comments:

• I have never seen a meme making fun of people trying to impress the President. However, I feel like this humor is universal across most workplaces. When the boss comes by production always increases as people are usually trying to impress them. I think this meme would be effective even if the President was replaced with a boss or foreman.

Collector’s Name: Philip Berton

Tags/Keywords:

• Verbal Lore
• Joke
• Construction
• Politics
• Memes
• Kazakhstan

Village Healer Meme

Title: Village Healer Meme (John Lass)

General Information about the Item:

• Verbal Lore, Joke
• Language: Kazakh
• Country of Origin: Kazakhstan
• Informant: Assel Uvaliyeva
• Date Collected: 11-1-18

Informant Data:

• Assel Uvaliyeva was born on February 25, 1995.  She is from Almaty, Kazakhstan, of Tatar and Kazakh origin. She currently works as a teachers assistant and studies at Dartmouth College as a graduate student. She speaks Russian, Kazakh, and English.

Contextual Data:

• Cultural Context: There is a large tradition of people visiting healers in Kazakhstan. Healers are traditional medical people who claim to be able to cure people with magic. The popularity of healers in this culture is why there is a long line into the healer’s hut. This meme is also about a cultural stereotype of Kazakh people that they are lazy and do not want to work.
• Social Context: This meme is a taken from a social media platform. These photos called memes are forums for people to share jokes and poke fun at things. Memes are visual representations of viral lore, that is understood by a large of group of people associated with the meme’s content, in this case the content is best understood by people familiar with Kazakh Culture. Assel finds this meme funny because it makes fun of a stereotype about Kazakh people that they are lazy. The slap is a Kazakh social practice which is supposed to essentially make the person go out and earn money and try to be a productive member of society.

Associated File:

Transcript/Translation:

• Title: Shapalaque Meme
• Photo 1:

Boy 1: In the city there is a healer who helps change and solve all problems! And my sister says it helped her.

Boy 2: Wow this really works! Taxi!

• Photo 2:

Boy: I have this problem: I have little money, and my wages are not high enough, can you help?

Healer: This is a common diagnosis “Pohojaia” it is necessary for me to configure your chakras. I will pump the energy from my arms to you and all your problems will be solved!

• Photo 3:

Healer: Work then! Boy that’s how you want to fix your problems!

Informants Comments:

• “The young man goes into the hut to ask the healer to cure his poverty, but instead the healer slaps him. This is supposed to make him want to get a job and stop being lazy because Kazakh people are often thought of as lazy.”

Collector’s Comments:

• This Joke is pretty different from US jokes because it makes fun a tradition not seen in the US anymore. I think the slap is something that crosses a lot of cultures as a stern way to make somebody start working.

Collector’s Name: John Lass

Tags/Keywords:

• Verbal Lore
• Joke
• Kazakh joke on healers

Title: Doctor and the Spoon

General Information about Item:

• Verbal Lore, Joke
• Language: Hebrew
• Country of Origin: Israel
• Informant: Gilad Doron
• Date Collected: 11-3-18

Informant Data:

• Gilad was born and raised in Kibbutz Ein Hamifratz, Israel. He is currently the head coach of the Dartmouth women’s varsity volleyball team. He competed on the Israeli National team for 10 years, and later served as a coach for Mate Asher professional volleyball club in his native country. Hebrew is his native language, but he is also fluent in English.

Contextual Data:

• Cultural Context: The state of Israel is located in the Middle East, with Hebrew being its primary language. Over 9 million people speak the language worldwide. Humor has been present here in this location, historically through works of Judaism, but in today’s culture primarily expressed in a mainstream, anecdotal form, most frequently mirroring American humor.
• Social Context: The interviewee is a native Hebrew Speaker, who learned English while growing up and preparing to serve in the Israeli military. He later graduated with a degree from Temple University. The joke was told to him by a native Hebrew Speaker back in Israel. The interviewee went to the doctor for some pains, and this joke is what the doctor replied to him with.

Item:

• This is a joke in Hebrew about a man who goes to the doctor with complaints. He says that his eye hurts every time that he drinks tea and is asking the doctor what he should do. The doctor then replies to him that next time he drinks tea, he should remove the spoon first.

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

spoon2-2960gem

Hebrew Transcript:

English Transcript of Translation:

• “A patient comes to the doctor and says ‘every time I drink tea my eye hurts’. So he says ‘show me how you do it’. So he shows him and he said ‘why don’t you take the spoon out'”.

Informant’s Comments:

• This was the second of two jokes my informant told me, both from an interaction he had when going to the doctor in Israel. The informant said this was a joke his doctor made to him when he was younger and went to the doctors office because he was having some body pains. When I asked for a literal translation, he noted that there were a few words and concepts he could not specifically translate into English, so he provided me with a ‘loose translation’.

Collector’s Comments:

• This joke is a funny example of a short joke, which provides a normal context, then finishes with an unexpected punch line. The fact that a doctor told the joke to his patient is funny in itself as the joke is about a doctor and patient interaction. Although there are no specific references to the Jewish culture or life in Israel, the joke still provides insight in to the type of witty and sarcastic humor often found in modern Jewish humor. It may take the listener a few moments to piece together the joke and realize that the spoon in the tea cup is what is causing the eye pain.

Collector’s Name: Zoe Leonard & Bun Straton

Tags/Keywords:

• Verbal Lore
• Joke
• Tea
• Health
• Doctor