Tag Archives: Festival

Mamemaki (Quinn Calhoun)

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Title: Mamemaki

General Information about Item:

  • Ritual, Holiday
  • Language: Japanese
  • Country of Origin: Japan
  • Informant: DP
  • Date Collected: 11-14-21

Informant Data:

  • DP was born in 1999, in Southern, VA, where he has lived all of his life. He is half-Japanese, his father having immigrated to the U.S. in the late 1990s from Japan. However, it was his paternal grandparents who primarily taught him about Japanese culture and rituals.

Contextual Data:

  • Cultural Context: In Japanese folklore, the Oni are evil demons, trolls, or ogres who are born when evil people die and are transformed into these evil creatures. Usually large and ugly, and both strong and capable of shape-shifting. While the Oni vary in size and color, they are all malignant, often seeking to murder people or wreak havoc such as war, disease, or famine.
  • Social Context: QC learned about the tradition when QC reached out to DP about his cultural traditions involving defenses against supernatural creatures. DP learned about the holiday through his grandfather, who, while he didn’t believe in the Oni, thought the tradition was an enjoyable one and important to the culture. 

Item:

  • Every year during the Setsubun holiday celebrating the end of winter, a family would roast soybeans and throw them at a person wearing a mask to represent the Oni while shouting “Oni wa soto! Fuku wa uchi!” and chase them out of their home. This ritual would help cleanse the house of evil spirits for the upcoming year. 

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

Informant’s Comments:

  • Not something his family did often but still remembers it being fun.

Collector’s Comments:

  • I found this ritual to be a uniquely fun and simple way of driving out evil spirts: by simply throwing them at them until they leave.

Collector’s Name: Quinn Calhoun

Tags/Keywords:

  • Ritual
  • Holiday
  • Japan
  • Oni
  • Setsubun

Pa Then Fire Festival (Quinn Calhoun)

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Title: Pa Than Fire Festival

General Information about Item:

  • Material Lore, food recipe
  • Language: Viet
  • Country of Origin: Vietnam
  • Informant: VN
  • Date Collected: 11-12-21

Informant Data:

  • VN was born in 2002, in Ho Chi Minh city, where she grew up in an ethnically Kinh household. Her mother has lived in the city for many generations, but her father grew up in the countryside before moving into the city, where more cultural traditions are observed. Her wider family lives throughout Vietnam, but her closest relatives all live in the city. VN learned about most of her cultural traditions from her grandparents. 

Contextual Data:

  • Cultural Context: VN credits some of the rituals with a wider Vietnamese cultural belief in a spirit world which either protects or harms them, particularly, as VN argues, in the aftermath for the generation who lived through the Vietnam war. Pa Then, a remarkably small minority group in Vietnam, believes that the Universe was created by a benevolent goddess Quo Vo and an evil goddess Me Quo O, who are both associated with many good and evil spirits. 
  • Social Context: QC first learned of the practice from VN when discussing cultural traditions we had learned at school and from our families. VN first learned about the practice in school, when she, as a member of the majority Kinh ethnic group, was taught about the cultural practices of minority traditions: in this case, Pa Then. VN later learned more about the practice when she was present at one such event in the center of Vietnam when she was visiting relatives in the region. The ritual is regular, performed by Pa Then, typically at the end of the harvest season to both enrich the practitioners and protect them from spirits.

Item:

  • Held every year at the end of harvest season on the Lunar Calendar (Oct. 16), first offerings are prepared for the heavens, which include a rooster, a bowl of rice, incense, a bottle of traditional wine, and ghost money (fake money to be burned). Then a shaman lights candles and incense and the women of the ethnic group play music, which is meant to call the spirits of the heavens down, who are thought to induce the dancers into a trance. The dancers then run through a large bonfire. This entire ritual pleases the heavenly spirits who follow the good goddess Quo Vo, who, in turn, protects the village and its residents from evil spirits who follow Me Quo O, the underworld goddess. 

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

Informant’s Comments:

  • Interest use of fire to entice good, rather than to directly fight away evil.

Collector’s Name: Quinn Calhoun

Tags/Keywords:

  • Ritual
  • Vietnam
  • Fire
  • Festival
  • Pa Then

Christmas Tree Lighting Festival (Dylan Lawler)

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General Information About Item:

  • Material Lore, Item
  • Customary Lore, yearly festival
  • Language: English
  • Country of Origin: United States
  • Informant: G.G. Age 19
  • Date Collected: 11-06-2021

Informant Data:

  • G.G. is a sophomore at the University of Vermont School of Nursing and she is from Dover Plains, New York. When she isn’t studying, she pursues the fine arts as both a dancer and a studio artist. She is also from a Catholic family.

Contextual Data:

  • Cultural Context: There are historical symbolisms of both the tree and the lights that go on it that are celebrated internationally. The tree is believed to represent growth and continuation through dark times while the lights are a symbol of the returning lights in the days to come after the solstice.
  • Social Context: This practice was brought up when asked about notable traditions or events she has during Christmas time. Tree lightings are popular in town and city settings as a way to instill hope on both an individual and communal level.

Item:

  • The tree lighting festival, much like many other festivals, is a night long celebration with activities and food that all lead up to one grand moment: turning on the lights of the Christmas tree. The festival specific to G.G.’s town, Dover Plains, consists of all the stereotypical westernized Christmas activities. This includes starting with a small parade of the Claus’ along with sitting on Santa’s lap, hot chocolate drinking, and ice skating. However, the true moment of unity is the lighting of the tree itself that represents the beginning of the Christmas season and the return of light.

Transcript:

  • “Every year my town hosts a tree lighting event at the local park to signify the start of the Christmas season. It is usually held at the beginning of December around the time the big tree is lit up in New York City. Just off of the parking lot, there is a path of glowing nutcrackers that leads to an area under the pavilion where the main event occurs. There, hot chocolate is served along with a bunch of other pastries provided by the town’s recreational department. Being that it is usually very cold at the time that this event is held, holding the cups of hot chocolate is the only thing that keeps most people warm as they walk around and talk to friends. Something that I have remembered happening at the tree lighting since is a Christmas parade that starts in the driveway of the elementary school across the street and ends in front of the tree. The girl scouts and boy scouts march across the street followed by two fire trucks and Santa in the hood of a truck with Mrs. Claus. The parade is headed by snowmen and polar bears who then spend the night walking around talking pictures with all the kids. From the parade, Santa and Mrs. Claus goes into the recreational building the tree lighting is held outside of. Kids line up outside of this building, write a letter to Santa, and give it to him prior to sitting on his lap and telling him what they want for Christmas. What is cool about this event is that each kid who writes a letter will get one back a week or so letter from “Santa” himself. The night ends with the lighting of the tree. Frozen at this point, everyone bundles together and stands around the tree decorated with lights and all sorts of decorations. A countdown starts, and when we hit one the tree lights up. Because the tree is so massive, it shines all across the town . The tree will stay lit up until the end of the Christmas season, and this event is something I’m sure will happen in my town for years and years to come. ”

Informant’s Comments:

  • “I don’t think anyone in our town participates in any other event as much as this one. It’s especially odd to see how many people actually want to wear the snowmen and polar bear mascots.”

Collector’s Comments:

  • Much like the other festivities around Christmas, a lot of the stereotypical and westernized traditions happen in large settings while the cultural roots are seen on more of a familial or more intimate setting. However, it is quite notable the the means of the celebration often don’t matter at all because the symbols and ideas behind them are all similar in the sense that they emphasize hope and togetherness.

Collected By:

Dylan Lawler

Dover Plains, NY

Hanover, NH

Dartmouth College

RUSS013

Fall 2021

Sinterklaas (Dylan Lawler)

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General Information about Item:

  • Customary Lore, Town Festival
  • Language: English
  • Country of Origin: United States
  • Informant: S.A. Age 50
  • Date Collected: 11-01-2021

Informant Data:

  • S.A. is an elementary school teacher, teaching reading and writing comprehension. She is from Brooklyn, New York and is currently pursuing her phd at Columbia University. She is a habitual reader, mother of two, and loves to travel.

Contextual Data:

  • Cultural Context: Sinterklaas is the Dutch version of Santa Claus and is a piece of folklore believed to have followed Dutch immigrants to the United States three centuries ago. Over these past generations, Sinterklass has thus begun to leak into American literature and celebration.
  • Social Context: This specific festival was mentioned when asked about traditional Christmas events. Though hosted in the town of Rhinebeck, thousands of people attend Sinterklass each year because of the joy and spirit it brings along with the sense of community.

Item:

  • Sinterklass is the celebration where children are transformed into Kings and Queens and honored as the bringers of the light at the darkest time of year. It honors Dutch heritage by re-creating a celebration that the Dutch settlers brought to Rhinebeck by having a parade filled with elaborate creatures, characters, and performers that mirror the folk story of Sinterklass. The story goes as such:
  • Mounted on a white steed, a town resident dressed up as Sinterklaas (elegantly garbed in a bishop’s tall hat, red cape, shiny ring, and jeweled staff) rode through town knocking on doors late at night. He was accompanied the Grumpus, a wild looking half-man, half-beast. To good children — Sinterklaas and the Grumpus delivered a bag of goodies. To the naughtiest children, the Grumpus rattled chains and threatened to steal them away in his big black bag. And for those “less bad” he had switches for exacting lesser punishments.

Transcript:

  • “I had lived in Rhinebeck for most of my adult life and I had no idea what Sinterklass was until it happened my first December 6th there. The streets filled up immediately and I was so confused so I had to go check it out. I loved it immediately. I don’t think anything has ever felt more like Christmas, it epitomizes togetherness and joy. I’m not sure how this relates to the story of Sinterklaas but the festival has an animal that is the center of the theme each year. Finding out what the animal is like opening a christmas gift in it of itself. My favorite was the butterfly.”

Informant’s Comments:

  • “Seeing all of the cultural Dutch clothing is so fascinating, though I always have to hide my kids when the scary ones come because they get scared.”

Collector’s Comments:

  • This festival was especially interesting because it almost directly addresses our initial pondering question of American folklore. There are items and traditions that everyone knows about and others that no one knows about, yet it doesn’t appear to matter because everyone is so willing to celebrate in the name of just being together and happy in a typically mundane time of year.

Collected By:

Dylan Lawler

Dover Plains, NY

Hanover, NH

Dartmouth College

RUSS013

Fall 2021