Tag Archives: blabbermouth

Blabbermouth

Title: Blabbermouth

General Information about Item:

  • Customary Folklore: Korean Superstition (Bad Luck)
  • Language: English
  • Country of Origin: Korea
  • Informant: A.A.
  • Date Collected: November 10, 2018

Informant Data:

  • A.A. was born in Seoul, South Korea where he lived with his grandparents in the middle of the country. When he was three years old, J. moved to Tijuana, Mexico, before eventually immigrating to the United States and settling down in the Los Angeles, California area. Currently, J. is Junior undergraduate student at Dartmouth College. He is double majoring in Psychology and Women’s Gender and Sexuality Studies.

Contextual Data:

  • Social Context:

    As a child, J. tended to be extremely sassy and talk a lot. As a means of getting J. to talk less, his mother told him that if he kept talking as much as he did, and did not quiet down when told to, a frog would jump out his mouth. J. did not believe this. One night, though, when J. was 5 years old, his mother made a traditional Korean dish that was comprised mainly of spinach. As usual, J. was talking his mother’s ear off, when she asked him to quiet down. When he did not do so, his mother reminded him about the frog, but this did not work either. Suddenly, his mother turned to him and spit out a clump of spinach, which J. thought was a frog. Freaked out by the incident which he had just witnessed, J. was permanently scarred from the incident and did not speak out against his mother again.

  • Cultural Context:

    Korean cultures are very communalists, and respect is a large part of society. Listening to ones elders and being respectful of their rules and traditions is taken very seriously in Korean, as well as most Asian cultures. This superstition is one that is used to control a child’s behavior and have them learn to respect their elders, as well as reinforce these values.

Item:

  • One is cursed with the a frog in the mouth if that person refuses to be quiet or talks back to an elder. In this case, the frog is bad luck and caused by such actions if the person does not change their attitude.

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

Blabbermouth MP4

Informants Comments:

  • “You don’t want to speak out when a teacher is talking especially, or when your parents are talking because you don’t want to be talking over them. You want to show some level of respect.”

Collector’s Comments:

  • This is a common superstition utilized by Korean parents to discipline their kids. This is an example of a sign superstition.

Collector’s Name: Clay Han

Tags/Keywords:

  • Korean. Superstition. Frog. Sign Superstition. Blabbermouth. Talking.