Random randomness

[conuly]

Remember when I said I liked the folk process? Somebody said it was all called folklore when they took it in school, and yes, that's interesting, but no, what *really* fascinates me is the mere fact that things change, and looking at how different they are and figuring out why. Collecting different songs is interesting enough, but collecting 100 of the same song and tracking the differences? THAT is cool.

And it's the interest in changes that, I'm realizing, ultimately drives many of my other interests. Here I thought I had wide-ranging interests and perseverations, but no, upon closer inspection it's clear to me that they're all aspects of the same one. (Except for the ones that aren't, of course, like babywearing. But that's ultimately practical in nature.)

Why am I saying this now? Somebody elsewhere mentioned playing cops and robbers as a child. That, combined with the suggestion to get hula hoops for Ana's school reminded me of the way we used hula hoops when I was in kindergarten, living on West 10th Street. We used them to catch people in Cops and Robbers. No guns of any sort, in my memory, but the hula hoops to catch people.

Which reminded me of two things from living there. West 10th Street was our first apartment in Brooklyn. Prior to that, I'd lived in Louisiana. I was 3 when we left Louisiana and moved... well, home, really, to my mother's home city anyway.

And I very clearly remember sitting on our stoop (we do have a stoop here on Staten Island, but I hardly think of it as one because it's immediately followed by the steps of the porch. Tangent, sorry) playing the game King of the Hill. Except... I remember so clearly thinking how some people called it Lion's Mountain. Or Lion's Rock, I don't know - something with Lion in it, anyway.

I also remember sitting by somebody's fence looking at the bugs and thinking how strange it was that in Louisiana they called those bugs lightning bugs, but in Brooklyn they said fireflies. As an adult, looking at a dialect map, I can see that the terms are about evenly spread out in both areas, but as a kid it seemed I'd gone from a place of universal lightning bugs to a place of universal fireflies! (And, to be honest, I always have and always will prefer the term lightning bug.)

The fact that there could be these big differences really has stuck with me for a long time, you know.

Comments

[ksol1460.livejournal.com]

That's what folklore is!

skillet, creeper, spider, frying pan
water fountain, bubbler, cooler
coke, soda, pop, tonic water
hero, grinder, sub, hoagie

Do you want to go to the show?
I'd rather go to the movies.
That's what I said.
Would you like a coke first?
Sure, can I have a a root beer?
I said coke.
Right! I'll have a root beer.
All I have is coke.
Oh, never mind, I can just use the bubbler.
Okay then, do you want to come with?
With what?
Me!
Yes, but I'm a little short. Could you borrow me some money?

[conuly]

No, I thought...

If folklore is analogous to linguistics, then what I'm interested in is the... the etymology of folklore. Etymology is part of linguistics, but it's not the whole of it, and I wouldn't use the same word to describe both things.

[ksol1460.livejournal.com]

Ah, okay, I think I see what you mean. By the way, our first college course in this kind of thing was "Folklore and Linguistics", and it is definitely known that there's an overlap. One of our instructors said that the "lore" part was knowledge imparted through tradition. He had a great rant about what "tradition" meant and didn't mean!

You are looking for the etymology of stories and songs as well as expressions, and that's a key part of folklore -- you hear a jump-rope rhyme in the playground and you think "That's not how we said it when I was a kid", and that sets you off to you look for all the variations. There is a book out by Peter and Iona Opie, it's called The Lore and Language of Schoolchildren, that covers that type of thing.) (One reason Gabe suggested you watch Songcatcher is to get a glimpse of that type of fieldwork in action, although it tends to get subsumed in the rest of the story.)

[conuly]

I need to get off my butt, and then sit back *down* on my butt, and read the Opies' books already, don't I?

[rantinan.livejournal.com]

But but... did you use the hoola hoops you used to catch the robbers to shackle the robbers together into convict labour chains? Or was that strictly an Australian thing?

P.S. Using hoops to catch robbers in games of cops and robbers showing up in rural Australia and NYC and I've never head of it being played like that ANYWHERE else. that is both freaky and awsum

[conuly]

No. We didn't make convict labor chains. I think we just dragged whoever it was back to the nearest stoop and told them to stay there. Which they didn't, of course, requiring them to be caught again.

[gingembre.livejournal.com]

LMAO - Maybe we had a visitor, someone who came from your place (or from ours to yours) and shared this innovation...similar to how we brought Quack Dilly-o-so to Wavre (Belgium).

And, convict chains...no BUT I WISH WE HAD! That sounds AWESOME!! :-)

[conuly]

It's part of The Folk Process at work. *nodnodnod*

But more likely two independent kids looked at the hula hoops and had a bright idea, is all. I'm a bit surprised that rantinan hasn't found anybody else who's done that, though. I'd've thought that catching people with hula hoops was the obvious thing to do with them!

[ksol1460.livejournal.com]

That's what folklore is!

skillet, creeper, spider, frying pan
water fountain, bubbler, cooler
coke, soda, pop, tonic water
hero, grinder, sub, hoagie

Do you want to go to the show?
I'd rather go to the movies.
That's what I said.
Would you like a coke first?
Sure, can I have a a root beer?
I said coke.
Right! I'll have a root beer.
All I have is coke.
Oh, never mind, I can just use the bubbler.
Okay then, do you want to come with?
With what?
Me!
Yes, but I'm a little short. Could you borrow me some money?

[conuly]

No, I thought...

If folklore is analogous to linguistics, then what I'm interested in is the... the etymology of folklore. Etymology is part of linguistics, but it's not the whole of it, and I wouldn't use the same word to describe both things.

[ksol1460.livejournal.com]

Ah, okay, I think I see what you mean. By the way, our first college course in this kind of thing was "Folklore and Linguistics", and it is definitely known that there's an overlap. One of our instructors said that the "lore" part was knowledge imparted through tradition. He had a great rant about what "tradition" meant and didn't mean!

You are looking for the etymology of stories and songs as well as expressions, and that's a key part of folklore -- you hear a jump-rope rhyme in the playground and you think "That's not how we said it when I was a kid", and that sets you off to you look for all the variations. There is a book out by Peter and Iona Opie, it's called The Lore and Language of Schoolchildren, that covers that type of thing.) (One reason Gabe suggested you watch Songcatcher is to get a glimpse of that type of fieldwork in action, although it tends to get subsumed in the rest of the story.)

[conuly]

I need to get off my butt, and then sit back *down* on my butt, and read the Opies' books already, don't I?

[rantinan.livejournal.com]

But but... did you use the hoola hoops you used to catch the robbers to shackle the robbers together into convict labour chains? Or was that strictly an Australian thing?

P.S. Using hoops to catch robbers in games of cops and robbers showing up in rural Australia and NYC and I've never head of it being played like that ANYWHERE else. that is both freaky and awsum

[conuly]

No. We didn't make convict labor chains. I think we just dragged whoever it was back to the nearest stoop and told them to stay there. Which they didn't, of course, requiring them to be caught again.

[gingembre.livejournal.com]

LMAO - Maybe we had a visitor, someone who came from your place (or from ours to yours) and shared this innovation...similar to how we brought Quack Dilly-o-so to Wavre (Belgium).

And, convict chains...no BUT I WISH WE HAD! That sounds AWESOME!! :-)

[conuly]

It's part of The Folk Process at work. *nodnodnod*

But more likely two independent kids looked at the hula hoops and had a bright idea, is all. I'm a bit surprised that rantinan hasn't found anybody else who's done that, though. I'd've thought that catching people with hula hoops was the obvious thing to do with them!