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have y'all ever heard of "childlore"? it's the folklore and traditions that are passed from child to child, spanning generations!
remember the cool s? rhymes about killing barney? making origami fortune tellers? jingle bells batman smells? not stepping on the cracks? miss mary mack? the word pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis?
that's childlore, baby!
hey check out my water spell
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Bonus 109: Skipping rhymes, counting chants, and fortune-telling games - Children's oral culture
Children have a shared culture that's transmitted face-to-face in schoolyards, summer camps, and all sorts of places where kids do unstructured play with each other. These chants, rhymes, and games are known as childlore, and they're one of the last vestiges of oral culture in our highly literate society.
In this episode, Lauren and Gretchen get enthusiastic about childlore! We talk about our favourite bits of childlore from our own childhoods, such as skipping/clapping rhymes, counting-off rhymes, and fortune-telling (Gretchen runs the MASH fortuneteller game on Lauren with a linguistics twist). We also talk about tracking down the sources for "All Right, Vegemite!", a compilation of Australian children's chants and rhymes from Lauren's childhood, selectively choosing to pass on less racist and sexist versions of the rhymes, the relationship between childlore and memes, as well as research from folklorists and anthropologists on childlore around the world. Listen to this episode about childlore, and get access to many more bonus episodes by supporting Lingthusiasm on Patreon. You'll also get access to the Lingthusiasm Discord where you can share some of your own childlore, and see how much it differs from other lingthusiasts!
In the end of August, when melon and watermelon season is ending, it used to be very popular to make these lanterns out of watermelon and melon.
In Mallorca (Balearic Islands), it was a very widespread tradition until the 1960s. Adults emptied melons and watermelons and scratched the surface to make drawings and some holes and put a candle inside to turn it into a lantern for children to play with. The scratched parts of the skin are so thin that they are translucid. The lanterns were also used to decorate the balls that farmers did to celebrate the end of fig-picking season.
This lantern was a toy that children used to play pretending to be the watchman (the watchman/sereno was the man whose job was walking around at night holding a lantern and keys to apartment blocks, and served as a safety reference; for example: walking people home, stopping fights between drunk people, calling a midwife or a doctor when needed, opening the door for people who forgot their keys, chasing after thieves, etc. It was common until the 1970s). Children also sang folk songs about the watchmen while they played with the lanterns.
In the 1960s, when Mallorca moved from being an agriculture-based society to a tourism-based one, traditions like this were abandoned. The towns of Alcúdia and school families associations in other Mallorcan towns still hold an annual Festa de les Llanternes ("Lanterns Festival" in Catalan) where they make lanterns out of summer fruits and children parade the streets carrying their lanterns and singing the watchman folk song.
In many parts of the Valencian Country, children also liked emptying watermelon to make lanterns and sing songs about the watchman.
It still persists particularly in the Ribera del Xúquer and Horta de València areas, and it has also become part of the festivities in places like Albalat de la Ribera and Agres —where every year the town's children hold a parade with their lanterns, accompanied by traditional music—, and Benicarló and Carcaixent —where neighbourhood associations organize yearly workshops to make them.
Photos and information from Ajuntament d'Alcúdia, Vilaweb, Sarau Alcudienc on Ara, Coordinadora d'APIMA de Sa Pobla, El blog de Maria M., Albalat de la Ribera, Etnoblog by Museu Valencià d'Etnologia, and Vilaweb.
WANDERERS, ADVENTURERS, DREAMERS
childlore is so understudied for the fact that it’s literally everywhere. if there’s a playground, there’s myths and legends and rhymes and songs that were born there, passed down and kept alive solely by children who then grow up and forget. while the kids still playing keep the tradition alive
Fellow keepers of tiny humans: have we noticed how into witchcraft and the occult they are? What's up with that?
Like there's so much kidlore that's just ghost stories. They're constantly doing lil rituals and making potions and talismans.
The kids at work have been teaching each other so much spooky shit. Bloody Mary and Charlie Charlie. Light as a feather, stiff as a board. Red door yellow door. A lot of stuff that I learned as a kid too, it's being passed down.
Why is those things and why is the only person talking about it a Christian mommy blogger.
