Children’s Material, Jokes

    We have been discussing the fact that tales socialize children, so that they learn the important distinctions in a culture. While we are on this subject, we are going to take a detour from studying only oral lore and discuss children’s folklore in general. Not only does it support what we are saying about tales, but it also shows how difficult it is to truly separate one type of folklore from another in the artificial way we must to study lore.
    
Children and Ritual:
    There is a great proliferation of rituals in childhood as well as significant participation of children in ritual. Russian rituals surrounding childhood include:
    1) saving the hair from a child’s first haircut;
    2) shaving a child’s head at age 3;
    3) saving the first tooth that a child loses;
    4) saving the caul, if the child is born with one.

    In addition, as we have seen, children perform important ritual acts in yearly and life cycle rituals. For example:
     1) Christmas: Russian children carol and also find the star that indicates the feast can begin/the sun has been reborn;
    2) Ivan Kupalo: children’s game reenacts the yearly cycle, which makes the fields productive;
    3) Rusalie: a young girl plays the role of the rusalka and brings her fertility to the fields;
    4) Troitsa: the children throw the bird cookies into the fields to improve fertility;
    5) Wedding: a young boy is placed on the bride’s lap, so that she will have many sons; the bride’s youngest brother takes the red beauty from her head.

Why do you think that children play such important roles in these rituals?

Children’s games:
     In addition to tales, games also help children learn important skills:
    1) physical skills by playing: jump rope (agility, endurance); jacks (dexterity); hopscotch (balance); chase games (speed, agility); Red Light, Green Light (physical control, balance); clapping games like Miss Mary Mac (dexterity);
    2) mental skills by playing: Go Fish (memory); counting out games like One Potato and Engine Engine (math skills); Simon Says (alertness); hangman (vocabulary); squares (cognitive visual skills); clapping games  (verbal skills and alertness);
    3) social skills by playing: Simon Says (obedience); house (male/female roles); hide and seek (control of laughter); Mother May I (politeness as well as may versus can); Old Maid (female roles). All of these games also teach children how to formulate and obey rules.
    
Now, think about these games in another way. What skills are taught by some games that parents/adults may not want them to learn? We will discuss them in class.



Riddles:
    Riddles are odd genre because they both codify and break down structure. Traditional riddles often deal with mundane things like eggs, air, man, etc. They are not used in stressful situations, but are like cultural metaphors or code, like time is money. They imply a particular cultural perspective to everyday things. If one does not recognize them, it indicates that one is not part of a culture. For this reason, riddles are often used to indicate that one is part of a group. In Russian weddings, the best man had to answer riddles correctly before he could take the bride from the home. In wartime, riddles were used to try to trap suspected spies. In addition, children use their riddles to test at what stage other kids are in. For example, if you only know the answer “a newspaper” to what is black and white and red/read all over, you have not passed a certain stage in childhood. If a child knows other answers, s/he is more sophisticated.

Jokes:
    To this point, we have discussed folklore primarily as a structuring device to give reassurance and unite a group when there is an anomalous situation. However, jokes destructure the existing order rather than build up structure. They deal with subjects that are sensitive and yet need to be coped with. We will discuss these issues in terms of the jokes that you have provided.
    Jokes are highly patterned and structured. Much like we saw in material culture, there are motifs and variations. This is one reason why we can remember so many. For example, there is the motif of travelling salesman jokes, 3 types of people in a boat jokes, light bulb jokes, blonde jokes, etc. The variation is in the punch line.

Legends:
    As you know, the legend is the prose equivalent of the ballad. Like the ballad, it is variously perceived to be true and untrue. Traditional Russian legends deal mainly with interaction with place spirits or evil spirits. We have those type of legends, as well as those that deal with superhuman figures like Paul Bunyan. Both Russians and Americans have contemporary urban legends, which we will also discuss. Like jokes, legends deal with sensitive subjects. Whether or not they destructure or create structure will be up to you to decide in class.