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ANCELET, Barry Jean (University of Louisiana at Lafayette) Begging in the Ballpark, Blogging for a Chicken, and Running in the Hall: Mardi Gras in Evolving Communities. BARRY JEAN ANCELET Mermentau wagon (photo: Barry Jean Ancelet) A number of studies, from Leroy Ladurie’s history of the breakdown of carnival in 16th century Romans1 to Geertz’s penetrating examination of Balinese cockfighting2, have shown that very real social issues can underlie ritual performance. This sort of deep play is clearly at the heart of the South Louisiana Mardi Gras, in which ongoing family and community relationships and tensions inform, challenge, reflect and ultimately reaffirm the tradition and the community itself3. 1 Emmanuel Le Roy Ladurie, Le carnaval de Romans, trad. Mary Feeney, Paris, Gallimard, 1979. 2 Clifford Geertz, The Interpretation of Cultures: Selected Essays, New York, Basic Books, 1973. 3 Barry Jean Ancelet, “Falling Apart to Stay Together: Deep Play in the Grand Marais Mardi Gras”, Journal of American Folklore, vol. 114, no 452, Spring 2001, p. 144-153 ; Barry Jean Ancelet. “We Love Our Mardi Gras: The Social Implications of the Mardi Gras and How We Read It”, paper presented at the 1 What has come to be called Mardi Gras is a masked, brightly colored begging procession that occurs on the day before Ash Wednesday, the first day of Lent, a period of fasting and sacrifice in preparation for Easter. This traditional festival is one of several similar rituals that occur in the yearly cycle between the death of the old year (such as the ancient Samhain or the more contemporary Halloween) and the rebirth of the New Year (such as Easter or May Day). These rituals have common elements that express the death and rebirth symbolism characteristic of this period that runs roughly from the end of the Fall harvest to the beginning of Spring planting. Some of these celebrations add lively color to the otherwise drab winter landscape, from green Christmas trees with brightly colored balls to the brightly colored costumes of Mardi Gras. Some add warmth and light to this otherwise cold, dark time of the year, in the form of jack-o’-lanterns, Christmas lights and Yule logs, New Year’s bonfires, Mardi Gras flambeaux, and Pascal candles. Many feature ceremonial food and drink gathered by begging processions, such as Halloween candy, Christmas cookies, Mardi Gras gumbo and Easter eggs. Some of this ceremonial food is loaded with symbolism, such as the black eyes and cabbage on New Year’s Day, the bean (or baby) in the King’s cakes between Epiphany and Mardi Gras, and the brightly colored eggs and chocolate bunnies on Easter Sunday. During these moments, the air is filled with the sounds of gaiety during this otherwise mournful time, from Christmas carols to carnival laughter. American Folklore Society annual meeting, Memphis, October 1999 ; and Barry Jean Ancelet. “ Le Carnaval de Basile : The High Stakes of Deep Play”, American Folklore Society, October 1998. See also Carl Lindahl, “One Family’s Mardi Gras: The Moreaus of Basile”, Louisiana Cultural Vistas, vol. 9, no 3, 1998, p. 46-53; and “The Presence of the Past in the Cajun Country Mardi Gras”, Journal of Folklore Research, no 33, 1996, p. 101-129; as well as the documentary film Dance for a Chicken: Mardi Gras in South Louisiana (Pat Mire, 1993). 2 Two related, but essentially different, versions of the Mardi Gras came to Louisiana when France began to develop its colony in 1699. The one that most people know is the urban version, such as that which is found in New Orleans, as well as a few other smaller sister cities, including Lafayette, Houma, Mobile, and Baton Rouge. Like its urban counterparts in Europe, it is processional in nature, involves ritual disguise and role-playing, and has aspects of ceremonial begging. Parades of floats with masked and costumed riders go through the streets disrupting ordinary life and providing a moment of gaiety to those lined alongside the route who beg for beads and doubloons with the classic refrain: “Throw me something, Mister!” The less known version is the rural version that preserves some of the features of its rural European antecedents. This questing procession of masked and costumed participants on horses and wagons leaves town or a community center early in the morning, winds through the surrounding countryside under the control of a capitaine and his assistants, and returns late in the afternoon to eat and dance until midnight. Some are all male, some all female, some mixed. Their costumes reflect ancient as well as contemporary parodies. Conical hats reflect European and African influences; mitres and mortarboards reflect a traditional scorn for medieval and contemporary institutions; venerable roles are preserved in contemporary versions of the French paillasse and the colonial nègre et négresse. Some masks take on more modern characters. This motley crew visits farmsteads to sing, dance and clown for the residents and to collect the ingredients for the communal gumbo eaten later that evening back in town. Some give rice, flour, onions, or money, but ideally the offering is a live chicken which the participants are expected to capture in the open field despite their varying states of ritual 3 inebriation, providing an important part of the chaotic play associated with the visits. There is also an interesting tension between beggar and outlaw as the masked riders charge farmhouses and play mock terror games with hosts and visitors, and hold up their captured chickens in obvious gestures of triumph. In the versions where horses are used as transportation, Mardi Gras provides the opportunity to display horsemanship. Riders race to the host house from the road when the capitaine waves his white flag to signal that permission to visit has been granted. During the visits, riders often dance while standing on their horses. On the other hand, some participants are riding for the only time during the year on horses being ridden for the only time during the year. The predictable results are part of the humor and clowning that characterize the day. Music is provided by live musicians who follow along in a wagon or by tapes played over loud speakers mounted on an accompanying vehicle. The walking pace of the horses limits the number of potential visits that can occur in a typical day. The number of homesteads in the countryside has dwindled over the last few decades as people have moved off family farms and into towns. Now many horseback Mardi Gras celebrations must supplement their gumbos with store-bought chickens to feed the growing numbers of riders at the end of the day. Non-participating spectators who come from the community, other towns, and other states and countries now to watch the increasing popular festivities also inflate crowds. Like Cajun culture in general, the traditional Cajun Mardi Gras celebration is both historical and modern, with roots in our French past as well as in the contemporary social structures that have evolved as a result of the cultural and ethnic fusion that has occurred here in South Louisiana. Like its urban counterparts in New Orleans, Lafayette, Houma, 4 Baton Rouge and other cities, the country Mardi Gras can dazzle photographers, documentary filmmakers and fieldworkers alike. Masking and costuming traditions based on intense parody and inversion, equally intense improvised dramatic play, and athletic chicken chases and whipping rituals can be so intriguing and engaging that they capture all of our attention. But as Carl Lindahl4, Dana David5, Patricia Sawin6, and Carolyn Ware7 have pointed out, Mardi Gras is essentially an intimate social event that defines and is defined by its community, its petit monde. The people who participate in this event are the ones who show up to help fix each other’s fences and raise each other’s barns. They are the same ones who once took part in community butchery co-ops and showed up by invitation at house dances. In order to understand the whole event, one must take into account the whole scene. Events that occur before and after, alongside and beyond the spectacular play can be at least as important to the nature of the visits. This paper explores ways that three evolving communities are negotiating or renegotiating their traditional South Louisiana Mardi Gras runs, historically a strong expression of social solidarity8. In Mermentau, Mardi Gras organizers are innovating ways to visit several local towns in an effort to reflect their expanded sense of community. In Fiquetaïque, people from far and wide who are connected primarily via cyberspace have developed a hybrid run that uses web sites and email contacts to gather 4 Lindahl, 1998. See also Carl Lindahl, “The Presence of the Past in the Cajun Country Mardi Gras” Journal of Folklore Research, vol. 33, 1996, p. 101-129. 5 Dana David, “De-Carnivalised Laughter in the Tee-Mamou Run”, paper given at the American Folklore Society annual meeting, Portland, October 1998. 6 Patricia Sawin, “Transparent Masks: The Ideology and Practice of Disguise in Contemporary Cajun Mardi Gras”, Journal of American Folklore, 2001, vol. 114, p. 175-203. 7 Carolyn E. Ware, “Reading the Rules Backward: Women, Symbolic Inversion, and the Cajun Mardi Gras Run”, Southern Folklore, 1995, vol. 52, p. 137-159. 8 This study is based on fieldwork conducted throughout these negotiating communities. Interviews where held during different Mardi Gras events with the collaboration of the following participants and organizers: 5 participants who then visit a geographic community. And finally, in Acadiana High School, students have developed a run that addresses their sense of community in the school setting. These solutions are based on improvised tradition, bending typical notions of historically continuous authenticity, striving for true authenticity rather than what is only “authentic-like9” or faux-thentic.
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