Children's Folklore Review
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CFR_11covers.indd 1 ELIZAB E TH TUCK E R Non-Profit Org. CHILDREN ’S FOLKLORE REVIEW U.S. Postage BINGHAMTON UNIV E RSITY PAID DE PARTM E NT OF ENGLISH Permit No. 4 Hanover PA BINGHAMTON , NY 13902-6000 C HILDREN ’ S F V OLUME OLKLORE 2011 33 R EVIEW 10/31/11 8:50:24 AM CHILDREN ’S FOLKLORE REVIEW ED ITOR : ELIZAB E TH TUCK E R BOOK RE VI E W ED ITOR : LI CORNF E L D ED ITORIAL BOAR D : JAY ME CHLING , PRISCILLA OR D , AN D SIMON J. BRONN E R TH E CHIL D R E N ’S FOLKLOR E RE VI E W (ISSN: 0739:5558) is published once a year by the Children’s Folklore Section of the American Folklore Society, with support from the Dean’s Office of Harpur College at Binghamton University. Subscription orders should be addressed to Priscilla Ord, 414 High Earl’s Road, Westminster, MD 21158. Checks should be made payable to “American Folklore Society/CFS.” Current subscription rates are $10.00 for USA addresses and $15.00 for non-USA addresses. Back issues are available. CHIL D R E N ’S FOLKLOR E RE VI E W regularly publishes articles on all aspects on children’s traditions: oral, customary, and material culture. In addition CFR will consider articles dealing with the use of folklore in children’s literature, children’s folklore and education, children’s folklore and popular culture, and similar topics. Articles are referreed and are indexed by the MLA and other major bibliographers. CFR retains copyright for all articles but gives permission for reprinting with no charge. Manuscripts submitted for consideration should conform to the author-date format of the Chicago Manual of Style (2003). Manuscripts should be submitted as Word documents; illustrations should be submitted in “jpeg” or “tif” form with a resolution of 300 dpi or higher. Send manuscripts to Elizabeth Tucker, [email protected] (Department of English, Binghamton University, Binghamton, NY 13902-6000). Books for review should go to book review editor Li Cornfeld, [email protected]. CHIL D R E N ’S FOLKLOR E SE CTION OFFIC E RS 2010-2011 PR E SI de NT : SP E NC E R GR ee N PAST PR E SI de NT : ELIZAB E TH TUCK E R SE CR E TARY -TR E ASUR E R : PRISCILLA OR D AE SOP COMMITT ee CHAIR : KATH E RIN E SCHRAMM OPI E COMMITT ee CHAIR : ROS E MARY VOHS Cover photo: Like father, like daughter: hair’s family tapestry. Neal A. Lester with daughter Jasmine Z. Lester. CFR_11covers.indd 2 10/31/11 8:50:25 AM CHILDREN ’S FOLKLO RE REVIEW VOLUME 33 2011 PUBLISHED BY THE CHILDREN ’S FOLKLORE SE C TION O F THE AMERI ca N FOLKLORE SO C IETY WITH SU pp ORT F ROM THE DE A N ’S Off I C E O F HA R P UR COLLEGE A T BINGH A MTON UNIVERSITY CFR_2011_R.indb 1 10/31/11 8:57:34 AM CONTENTS FROM THE EDITOR . 5 NA S C ENT FOLKLORE : COMMUNI ca TION A ND AESTHETI C S IN IN fa N C Y KATHARINE R. M. SCHRA mm . 7 FA THERS A ND THEIR AF RI ca N AMERI ca N DA UGHTERS : HA IR PIE C ES CRE A TING TIES TH A T BIND NEAL A. LE S TER . 27 SIDEW A LK SONGS , JUM P -RO P E RHYMES , A ND CL ap -HA ND GA MES O F AF RI ca N AMERI ca N CHILDREN MONA SALOY . 35 GENETI C BUBBLE WR ap KARIN PHILLI ps . 45 FA ILING TO FLY , BUT FREE FA LLING : JUM P ING A S A FORM O F CHILDHOOD RELE A SE PA M ELA WEINTRAUB . 47 THE App RO P RI A TION O F A COMMER C I A L TR A DEM A RK : THE GOLLIWOG A S A CULTUR A L MA RKER ROBERT MACGREGOR . 51 CO-WINNER O F THE 2011 WILLIAM WELLS NEWELL PRIZE DIS A STROUS ALTERN A TIVES : BOY SC OUT DIS A STER STORIES A ND LEGENDS A ND IM A GINING THE NA TUR A L WORLD SP ENCER LINCOLN GREEN . 67 CHILDREN ’S FOLKLORE SE C TION : 2010 ANNU A L MEETING . 77 NOTES A ND ANNOUN C EMENTS . 79 CONTRIBUTORS . 81 CFR_2011_R.indb 3 10/31/11 8:57:35 AM FROM T HE EDI T OR ELIZ A BETH TU C KER As this thirty-third volume of Children’s Folklore Review goes to press, I feel excited about the high level of achievement that has resulted in its contents. This year we have two winners of the William Wells Newell Prize: Spencer Green, author of “Disastrous Alternatives: Boy Scout Disaster Stories and Legends and Imagining the Natural World,” and Steve Stanzak, author of “Manipulating Play Frames: The Yo Momma Joke Cycle on YouTube.” Both of these outstanding essays would have delighted William Wells Newell, who held children’s creativity and tradition conservation in such high esteem. Because of space limitations, this issue just contains Green’s essay; Stanzak’s will appear in volume 34. Besides one of the two Newell Prize-winning essays, this volume of Children’s Folklore Review contains other extremely interesting essays. Katharine R. M. Schramm’s “Nascent Folklore” explores the emerging interdisciplinary field of communication and aesthetics in infant behavior; Neal Lester’s “Fathers and Their African American Daughters: Hair Pieces Creating Ties That Bind” explicates the significance of African American girls’ hair; Mona Lisa Saloy’s “Sidewalk Songs, Jump-Rope Rhymes, and Clap-Hand Games of African American Children” examines the wealth of children’s folklore among children in New Orleans before Hurricane Katrina; and Robert MacGregor’s “The Appropriation of a Commercial Trademark: the Golliwog as a Cultural Marker” traces contested representation of a cultural symbol in the United Kingdom. I am proud to add that the two short essays on dangerous games, Karin Phillips’s “Genetic Bubble Wrap” and Pamela Weintraub’s “Failing to Fly but Free Falling: Jumping as a Form of Childhood Release,” were written by two outstanding undergraduate students in my Children’s Folklore class at Binghamton University last spring. This fall we can celebrate the acceptance of all back issues of Children’s Folklore Review by Indiana University’s Scholar Works Web site. I want to thank Jennifer Laherty at Scholar Works for all of her help in making this possible. Now scholars of children’s folklore have access to all of our published material. I want to thank the Dean’s Office at Harpur College of Binghamton University, which generously supports Children’s Folklore Review. I am also very grateful to Kathy Buchta for her fine work on layout/design and to Sheridan Press for its excellent work. Li Cornfeld, our new book review editor, is starting to work on reviews for our next issue. If you would like to review a book on children’s folklore or a related subject, please contact her: [email protected]. Submissions and comments are always most welcome. Please feel free to contact me any time: [email protected]. Thanks very much for your support of our journal. CFR_2011_R.indb 5 10/31/11 8:57:35 AM NAS C EN T FOLKLORE : COMMUNI C A T ION AND AES T HE T I C S IN IN F AN C Y KA TH A RINE R. M. SC HR A MM Whereas just as cultural relativity implies that each human group fashions its own forms of human adaptation and expression and that each has its wonder and beauty (as well as disasters), so with childhood there is an aesthetic for each age, which may be celebrated (or cursed) by adults, rather than simply glossed as an inevitably inferior step on the way to the ‘wonders’ of adults’ civilization, reason, and morality (Sutton-Smith and McMahon 1999, 299), Newborn infants, though weak and inexperienced, are sentient and intending agents (Trevarthen, et al. 1999, 143). The question of when folklore begins is one which is simultaneously philosophical, biological, and psychological. It hinges by implication on what, indeed, constitutes folklore. If we assume that folklore is artistic, communicative, culturally grounded, and socially actuated, something must come before the more recognizable forms of tradition, performance, and identity — a nascent folklore. Not only is there interesting material in the prelinguistic, pre-genre, pre-self arena of infant behavior that recommends itself to our attention as folklorists of children, but we as folklorists can recognize it and comment upon it, using the tools at our disposal. We can engage with proto-cultural agents through an interdisciplinary approach that does not relinquish our qualitative methods for quantitative ones. In what follows, I will discuss the subfield of children’s folklore as a gateway into discussing the broad issues inherent to folkloristics. Once having established a few basic criteria and their quantitative-field counterparts, I will press forward into an interdisciplinary exploration that takes on infant interaction in an ethnographic context, merging the developmental and folk psychological approaches. In approaching the concept of nascent folklore, it may be useful to consider it as a subset of children’s folklore. Children’s folklore is our window through which we study expressive forms shared by children, among children, a protean world which often functions counter-intuitively to adult sensibilities (Sutton-Smith 1999, 6). Its study has come a long way from the thorough collection of text and variant and a preoccupation with “survivals” to incorporate theory that takes into account what William Wells Newell noted well over a century ago — that children’s folklore is both innovative and dynamic, as well as traditional and conservative.