Vol. 2 No.10
January 1979
The Centre for English Cultural
Tradition and _L anguage
The Centre for
English Cultural Tradition and Language
The Centre for English Cultural Tradition and Language, (formerly The Survey of
Language and Folklore, founded in the Department of English Language at the
University of Sheffield in 1964 ), is a comprehensive ongoing research project which
aims to collect material on all aspects of language and cultural tradition throughout
the British Isles. The material gathered by the Centre in the form of tape-recordings,
written reports, questionnaires, manuscripts, documents, books and printed sources,
photographs, films, video recordings, drawings and items of material culture, is
deposited in the Centre's Archives at the University of Sheffield, providing a basic
resource for reference and research. The nucleus of a reference library has been
assembled in the Archives, which also house a n4_mber of important original
monographs and dissertations on various aspects of language and cultural tradition.
A substantial body of data on language and communication is now on file, including
detailed information on regional and social dialects, slang and colloquialism, blason
populaire, occupational vocabulary, proverbs and sayings. A comprehensive retrieval
classification is being prepared to facilitate access to material in the Archives, and
the first section of this classification, covering the whole field of communication, is
now completed.
In association with colleges of education, schools and other interested groups and
individuals in many parts of the British Isles, the Centre sponsors and directs
numerous projects in the general field of children's language and folklore. In addition,
it is conducting a systematic investigation of traditional verbal social controls,
concentrating attention on the verbal constraints used by adults in controlling the
behaviour of children.
Other sections of the Archives include information on calendar and social customs
and the rites of passage and on various aspects of belief, traditional health systems,
and the lore of cosmic phenomena, plants and animals. Local and aetiological
legends, anecdotes and jokes are also well represented.
Material is being assembled for a wide range of projects in the field of traditional
drama, with special reference to geographical distribution and textual variation,
context of performance and the influence of chapbook texts. A considerable amount
of fieldwork has been carried out and has revealed a number of previously unrecorded
texts and many details of performance. The Archives also include representative
material on folk music and dance.
In the field of folklife, the Centre is conducting a nationwide study of the traditional
lore and language of food. It is also assembling a collection of English costume. The
substantial material culture collection administered by the Archives includes a wide
variety of individual items representative of both indoor and outdoor traditional
occupations, pastimes, arts and crafts. The collection includes a considerable amount
of urban industrial material, in addition to that from rural areas. Special collections
include workshop displays of basketmaking, knifegrinding, silversmithing and filecutting,
in addition to handicrafts, furniture and domestic equipment. Many of these displays
are available for hire.
The Centre also contributes to both the postgraduate and undergraduate programmes
in the Department of English Language at the University of Sheffield. The Department
offers an undergraduate optional course in folklore, and postgraduate students may
read for the degrees of M A in English Cultural Tradition and Language (by examination),
and M A and PhD in language and/folklore (by dissertation). The Centre is also actively
involved in the M A course in African Studies offered by the Department of English
Literature, and the University . Certificate in English Cultural. Tradition.
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FOLrLO RE
January 1979
Vo1.2 No.10
Contents
Order and Disorder in the Playground
Andrew Sluckin
Four Possible Factors in the
Formation of Bound Expressions:
The Case of "Up She Comes" in
Newfoundland Culture
Michael Taft
10
Meat-Cut Terms:
a check -list
C S Upton
25
A Checklist of
Newfoundland Expressions
J D A Widdowson
33
Aspects of Urban Legend as
a Performance Genre
Georgina Smith
41
Achebe: The Literary Function of
Proverbs and Proverbial Sayings in
Two Novels
Chukwuma Okoye
45
Sources of Luo Oral Literature
Elizabeth Knight
64
Traditional Drama 1978
P S Smith
69
Reviews
1
72
The Centre for English Cultural
Tradition and .L anguage
C. E. C. T. A. L. Publications
Full details of the publications of the Centre for English Cultural Tradition
and Language are given on the inside back cover of this issue .
Now available:
C.E.C.T.A.L. FACSIMILES No . 1
Morrice Dancers at Revesby (from a manuscript of 1 779) .. . .. . ... 75p .
(inc. postage and packing)
This 36-page reprint from the unique manuscript presented to the British
Museum by Lady A. B. Gomme (BM Add. MS 44870, 20.10.1 779) is
reproduced by permission of the British Library Board, with an Introduction
by M. J. Preston, M.G. Smith and P . S. Smith.
The Revesby play is one of the most frequently cited examples of traditional
English drama and this manuscript remains an important historical document
in the formulation of early theories regarding folk plays in the British Isles .
Also available from the Centre:
A Peak District Calendar of Events: Annual Events, C ustoms and Folklore
by Brian Woodall
* 80p .
* 25p.
Peak Cavern by Brian Woodall
The Cutlery Industry in the Stannington Area
* 95p.
by D J Smith
A Sheffield Heritage: An Anthology of Photographs and
* 95p .
Words of the Cutlery Craftsmen by C A Turner
*POSTAGE AND PACKING EXTRA
©The Centre for English Cultural Tradition and Language,
University of Sheffield, 1979.
ISSN No . 0307-7144
No part of this journal may be reproduced in any form
or by any means without permission from the Editor.
Order and Disorder in the Playground *
Andrew Sluckin
"Children talk about torture a lot ... But children believe pain is
an effective way to control people, which it isn't except in a
localised short-term sense. Now the secret Pentagon history reveals
that plenty of high-powered American adults think so too, some
of them college professors. Shame on them for their ignorance."
from Kurt Vonnegut Jr. in Wampeters, Foma and Grandfalloons
Kurt V onnegut Jr. usually provides a stunningly accurate picture of the
sad state of his fellow humans, but for once a portion of his writing
reveals an undue pessimism. Deplorable though it is that many pillars of
American society believe that the basis of social control is pain, it is a
trifle unjustified to blame their ignorance on a supposed failure to grow
up. For if one is to believe the ethogenic standpoint within social science,
then the social world of both adults and children is envisaged to be a
construction, and the product of two processes. On the one hand there
is "social make-believe in preparation for social action", and on the other
there is a process of "the creation and maintenance of social order by
ceremonial means" (Harre, 1974, p.246). It is this latter aspect which I
shall consider here. In particular Harre claims, mainly on the basis of the
work of the Opies (1959, 1969), that although the content of the adultadult and child-child worlds differ, their methods of management are
essentially the same, and this rarely involves torture as a source of control.
Children have a battery of much more sophisticated methods at their
disposal and my own observations of these have made it possible to
explore some of the abilities that are necessary to cope in the playground
world.
Collecting the material
The study was based at an Oxford first school which serves the local
working class community. Built before the turn of the century, the two
tarmac play areas would nowadays be considered cramped. Since my
aim was to describe the range and frequency of the many playground
activities, the methods employed were more rigorous and less flexible
than those needed for the collection of folklore. During two months of
playtimes each of the sixty 5 and 6 year old infants was observed for a
*
I should like to acknowledge both the helpful comments of Felicity Jones and John
Widdowson of The Centre for English Cultural Tradition, Sheffield, and those of the
staff and pupils of New Hinksey First School, Oxford.
1
total of 12 minutes, and each of the thirty 7 and 8 year olds for 24 minutes.
As well as this some actual speech was recorded and there were talks to
each child about the many aspects of playground life. These chats were
able to provide insights into some of the concepts they use in thinking
about the playground, but were not taken to be totally reliable descriptions
of their life in it.
The origin of social order
Despite the work of the Opies, it still seems to be a popular belief among
many teachers and parents that all the children do at playtime is "rush
about", and that the days of the "nice quiet traditional games" are long
since past. In reality the children's activities reflect a rich, complex and
forever changing folklore. Furthermore, judging by the small amount of
time that the children in my Oxford study spent in aggressive activities,
the normal state is one of order though there are occasions when this
relative calm is threatened. The percentage of time spent in aggressive
activities (fights, teasing, arguments) was less than 4% for infant boys,
infant girls and junior girls, and 7.8% for junior boys.
What abilities in individuals lie behind the attainment of any social order?
To quote Harre again: "any form of activity involves an almost continuous
stream of solutions to certain kinds of problems that beset the microsocial
order". Firstly, the influx each term of a few new children to the school
calls for "the need to quickly run up some sort of viable relationship with
them, a socially constructive solution", and secondly, "the problems
created by threats and challenges to an existing fragment of order call for
socially maintaining solutions". This points towards a psychology of the
playground that on the one hand reveals the range of problems that
children face, while on the other illuminates the methods by which they
are resolved. I shall mainly discuss this latter aspect and outline two main
ways in which order is maintained. Firstly, there are solutions that
somehow "play about" with the meaning of a situation, i.e. by changing
it. A second method is the appeal to some ritual or ceremonial solution,
such as invoking a convention, using verbal ritual ("bagsee''and the like)
or claiming to "own" a game.
Solutions that change the meaning
In one episode of fighting the children displayed quite a sophisticated
solution to problems of order; one that Harre (1974, p.252) calls
situational discounting or redefining the meaning of the situation or
action so as to ameliorate the consequences.
2
Two brothers, Jack (8:0) and Richard (9:0) were seen fighting. Whereas
the younger had a closed mouth and was swinging his arms in earnest, the
older brother had an open smile and instead of punching he merely defended
himself against the blows. Smith (1974) clearly describes these two
behavioural patterns; the first as real fighting and the other as pretend
fighting, and shows them to be motivationally distinct. Very quickly a group
of eleven children gathered round and they too seemed to perceive the
difference in motivational state between the two children. From this group
one girl shouted "Cry mercy Richard, cry mercy Richard!" "Mercy" is a
game that many junior girls play in which the children interlock fingers,
squeeze hard until one cries "mercy", whereupon the other immediately
released her grip. Presumably this was an appeal to Richard to redefine the
meaning of the action in the belief that should he utter this magic word
Jack would stop fighting. In the event Richard did not try this; perhaps he
did not know about the rules of "mercy", perhaps he had not heard the
suggestion or perhaps he just chose to ignore it. Within a minute the group
started up a chant, with each child imitating the actions of a referee in a
wrestling match. The count went from ONE, right up to TWENTY-ONE
before the two children disengaged, though there is no way of knowing
whether this was because of or despite the chant. Perhaps the group of
children were trying to provide a game context in another attempt to
redefine the situation. When the fight did end Richard ran away fast and
discussed with two other children why he did not like to beat up his own
brother.
Although the first attempts to redefine the situation did not work and we
cannot be sure about the second, this episode makes it clear that even at
seven and eight years some of the children are aware of this type of solution
to a problem in the playground. At a later date many of the children were
asked whether ~f you said "mercy" in a real fight the aggression would
stop. Nearly all thought not, which if true, means that while we can admire
the grasp of ethogenic principles displayed by the girl who made that
suggestion, she still has some lessons to leam before gaining full competence
in the art of redefining the meaning of situations.
Situational discounting can also be used to cope with less extreme threats
to order, and in the following example it is the meaning of the action that
is changed, rather than the "scenery" around it.
Kathy (6:7) is playing hopscotch with Christine (5:11) and a junior girl.
Junior girl to Kathy: "Hey, you're out"
Kathy: "It doesn't matter, we're only little"
What could the older girl say?- "No, you're not little, you're nearly seven"
3
seems possible though unlikely. By redefining her actions as those of
someone of tender years who cannot fully grasp the requirements of the
game, Kathy has effectively maintained her right to play as she pleases.
Solutions that restate the meaning
Restating the meaning of a situation can be seen both as a solution to
problems which occur when some of the children are not completely
sure of what the meaning is, as well as a way to counteract another child.,s
attempt at situational discounting. Of the examples belO"'N in the first the
message is "it's pretend", while in the second the allocation of roles is
restated.
Colin (5:1): "Let Batman shake hands"- Colin thumps Kevin.
Kevin (5:3): "You don't do it really"
Dylan ( 5:3) is taking part in a "spiderman" role-play, and another
participant tries to drag him away. He screams, "No, I'm no
Spiderman, don't take me to gaol".
Solutions that discuss the implications of the meaning
Sometimes merely restating the definition of a situation is not enough,
for the participants already know it is "hopscotch" or "tig", but disagree
about the implications that this definition has for legitimate action.
(An example from hopscotch)
Clive (6:10): "I've got five chances"
Junior boy: "No, you don't have five chances in hopscotch"
(An example from tig, 6 year olds)
"You pushed me over, that's not fair, I'm not 'it'"
Should the children still fail to agree as to the proper course of action
then the game is likely to break up. In the first example of an argument
over what is allowed in hopscotch a fight ensued, though the outcome
was not so serious in the following episode among a group of seven and
eight year old boys.
Craig (8:4): "You've got to run trackways, you can't do that,
you can't turn back.''
Di (8:3):
"That's your rules."
Craig:
"He's not playing, he's breaking the rules.
We were going to play until Di spoiled the rules.
We can't play, none of you can."
Di: (to other children) "Let's go somewhere else."
4
Solutions that formulate a meaning
In contrast to playing about with the meaning of a situation as a remedial
measure, a skilful child can choose in advance a particular setting for his
actions. Thus the child who wants to obtain food from a playmate might
approach with an outstretched palm and say, "I'm your friend, let me have
some". By formulating the situation as one of a "test of friendship" rather
than merely being hungry, the other child now finds it very difficult to
refuse such a request.
Similarly, a child may suggest a particular way of choosing "it" so that he
can manipulate the actions. Whereas the infants invariably apportioned
roles in a "flash" either by accepting a role "You be 'it'" or by volunteering themselves, "I'll be Batman", the juniors used much more traditional
methods. These ranged from the "chance" methods of dipping to the
skilful "last one to the wall's 'it'". The attendant psychological question
is why such methods should be attractive at this age, provided of course
that this infant-junior difference is a general feature of playground life.
A hint is given by the eminent Jean Piaget whose study of children playing
marbles has shown that at around six or seven years they are becoming
more and more rigid in their attitudes towards rules. This may make them
more likely to accept the outcome of a dip whatever it is. Yet the
folklorist, Kenneth Goldstein, suggests another side to the story. His
ethnographic studies of counting-out in Philadelphia have shown how
children are also leaming that these situations offer ample opportunity for
manipulation. By correctly formulating the situation and its meaning a
child may be able to avoid being "it".
Ceremonial solutions involving a rule or convention
Dottie (8:4) and four infant children were quietly playing "Grandmother's
Footsteps" (see Opie and Opie, 1969, p.l94). Dottie as the grandmother
stood against the wall, while the others tried to reach her by taking steps
only when she had her back turned. Along came Chris (7:4) and Duncan
(3:3) who joined in without asking permission. They seemed to be trying
to disrupt the game by pushing the other children and taking enormous
steps while Dottie had her back turned. Just as these two boys were about
to reach Dottie and take over from her the role of grandmother, a little
girl arrived and asked, "Can I play?". Dottie seemed relieved to be able to
shout "Get back, someone else is playing" and both boys obeyed
immediately. That they did so I found surprising since these two seemed
clearly intent on disrupting the game, and their compliance must attest
to the social force of the convention to which Dottie appealed - on the
5
arrival of a new player the game m ust start afresh with all the players
against the wall. Certainly the grandmother's strategy earned her a longer
time in that coveted role.
Ceremonial solutions - the use of verbal ritual
One of the most striking differences between watching the infants and the
juniors in the playground was the arrival with the latter of various forms
of verbal ritual. For example, Opie and Opie (1959) claim that the word
"bagsee" and its variants are in general use throughout Britain as a means
of gaining possession, claiming precedence and avoiding.
The following examples clearly show how "bagsee" may be used to claim
a favoured role. The first three of these come from episides in which
Carol, a junior girl, is playing with a number of younger girls and in each
case she has just made a suggestion about what to play.
Carol ( 8: 3) "Bagsee be mother" (in a pretend role episode)
"Bagsee dutch girl" (in a dancing game)
"Bagsee Mrs Luddington (Head Teacher)
You be the children.
Turn around, turn around, you like me."
Marie (7:11)"Bagsee me go down first" (in leapfrog).
Avoiding a certain role could be achieved with the same formula, and most
of the children told me of the rhyme "Turn around, touch the ground, bagsee not it".
Similarly the formula "Bagsee not including him" avoids the need to play
with an unpopular child.
Most playground games do not have such a rich rule structure that they
can specify beforehand the legality of the many unusual circumstances
that may arise during the playing. One way around this is to use bagsee to
state extra rules or conventions. Thus, before a game of Bulldog (description
in Opie and Opie, 1969, pp.138-142) children were often seen to shout
in quick succession
"Bagsee no counting" (Disallowing the convention that you can
count to 10, if they're not out of the ring you can go in and tig them)
"Bagsee no guarding" (You can't stand over someone until they
leave the circle)
"Bagsee no following" (You can't keep going after the same person)
"Bagsee no tigging in the air" (If you are about to be tigged you cannot
jump in the air and be safe).
6
This last convention seemed to act more in the favo ur o f the person
who invoked it and m any o f th e children complain ed about Clifford who
"cheats because w h e n you t ig him he says he's in the air when h e isn't".
T here is a delic ate b alance between order and disorder, for the u se of
such c o nventions offers t w o possibilities. On the one hand t hey c an a c t
t o red uce possible future conflict by making clear just what is allowed ,
w hile o n the other han d, they can be used by "unscrupulous" individuals
t o m anipulate others whilst effectively denying them the right of appeal.
Another convention is brought into play when a child crosses two of his
fingers on each hand and says "I've got crucems". This is a local Oxford
word and in other parts of the country they use such words as keys,
barley, skinch, cree, kings, fainites, scribs and crosses, and many others
(Opie and Opie, 1959, p.149). The child in question expects to gain
temporary respite from a game in order to "do up a shoe-lace", or "go
to the toilet". Yet one girl told me that she would say crucems when she
didn't really need to go to the toilet and never arrived there; in this way
she escaped being tigged in Bulldog. Only four junior children had not
heard the word 'crucems' and nine told me that it was used specifically
during "lurgi tig", "if you've got crucems you can't get the fleas".
According to the Opies the initial source of infection was the 9th
November, 1954 edition of "The Goon Show" and the name has stuck
ever since.
A number of episodes gave the impression that bagsee and crucems do
not have the same social force. Thus on two occasions I heard the
inventive utterance,
"Bagsee no crucems".
And the children themselves sometimes seemed unsure in which situations
crucems was legitimate.
Nicola (8:7):
Child No.1:
Child No. 2:
"Don't keep coming and tigging me if I've got crucems"
"I've got crucems"
"There's no crucems allowed; get stuffed"
Two other ritual words were "mercy" which has already been mentioned
and "taxi" which was incorporated into an intricate signalling system.
The thumb is first dabbed on the tongue, placed on the forehead with the
whole hand perpendicular to the head and palm outstretched and lastly
the word "taxi" is uttered. The meaning is that someone has passed wind,
or in common parlance, farted. I am told that there is a lack of decent
studies of the indecent or scatological side of children's folklore.
7
Ceremonial solutions- owning a game
Although verbal ritual allows the clearer statement of what is allowed in
any activity, there may still be the problem that a number of children all
try to use these conventions at the same time. One solution to this is the
fact that in many activities one child is "the boss". I was told that since
he "decides" or "owns the game" this endows him with the sole power
to "make all the suggestions, choose who can play and chuck people out
if they don't behave themselves". At times the solution to disorder is
dictatorship as for example with the child who "forces" the others to
accept him as "it" when "it" is prestigious by claiming "It's my game".
Invariably such powers of "ownership" land on the same children, those
easily identifiable leaders in the playground, and it is very much an
empirical question as to just what qualities they must possess to fulfil
such a role.
Conclusion
I have outlined a model for looking at the social world of the playground,
one that has arisen from my own observations and talks to children at
an Oxford First school. Bearing in mind the conclusions of the Opies as
to the similarity of playground life throughout Britain, there should be at
least some possibilities of generalisation.
The framework owes much to the ethogenic standpoint that any studies
of the origins of adult competencies must aim t o account for the
developmental changes in the way the child understands and manipulates
his world. Psychologists should no longer talk of children's abilities as
if they can exist in splendid isolation. Any ability that a child has is used
in a social setting, be it that of the classroom or the playground. Indeed,
if we wish to understand the cognitive abilities necessary to cope at
playtime, then we must be prepared to examine in detail this world.
No doubt the story will be complex and it is my guess that if it is told
at all it will be through the co-operation of experts in many fieldsanthropologists, folklorists, historians , linguists, psychologists, to name
but a few. Certainly one feature of that world which shines through is
that children no more use torture than do their teachers.
8
References
Goldstein, K S (1971), "Strategy in Counting Out: An Ethnographic Folklore
Field Study", in; The Study of Games, E Avedon a~d B Sutton-Smith, eds.,
John Wiley, London.
Harre, R. (1974), "The conditions for a social psychology of childhood", in
The integration of a child into a social world, M PM Richards, ed.,
Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.
Opie, 1., and Opie, P. (1959), The Lore and Language of Schoolchildren,
Oxford University Press, Oxford.
Opie, I., and Opie, P. (1969), Children's Games in Street and Playground,
Oxford University Press, O~ford.
Piaget, J. (1965), The Moral Judgement of the Child, The Free Press, New York.
Smith, P. (1974), "Ethological Methods", In: New Perspectives in Child
Development, ed. B M Foss, Penguin, London.
Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. (1975), Wampeters, Foma and Granfalloons, Panther.
Note. Since writing this article in 1976, I have made many more
observations and greatly elaborated the concepts with which to
analyse the episodes. The final product, of which this article was
merely the first step, will appear as a book in late 1978 under the
title Growing up in the Playground (Routledge and Kegan Paul).
9
Four Possible Factors in the Formation of Bound Expressions:
The Case of "Up She Comes!" in Nevvfoundland Culture
Michael Taft
One of the most interesting and exasperating features of human language
is the "bound expression"; that is, the proverb, proverbial phrase, or
idiom.l Defining these expressions and separating them from "unbound"
speech has plagued folklorists and linguists alike. The history and derivation
of expressions was one of the life-long tasks of Archer Taylor.2 Herzog
and Blooah pioneered in the study of the function of bound expressions, 3
and more recently the structure of these expressions has been investigated
by a number of scholars.4
In this brief study, I should like to explore the problem of the formation
of bound expressions. How do these expressions come about, and why do
some phrases take on greater significance than the sum of the individual
words from which they are composed? Why is a given expression a bound
expression within a culture?
Starting sometime in 197 4, I began to hear the expression "up she comes"
being shouted by Newfoundlanders in various contexts. I wondered where
this phrase came from, what it meant, and what was its significance to the
shouter and to those who heard it shouted. I began to ask people if they
had heard the expression, in what contexts they had heard it, and what the
expression meant to them.5 From my questions, as well as from my own
observations, I learned much about the place of this expression within
Newfoundland culture. At the same time, I became aware that there _were
several factors which might account for the formation of "up she comes"
as a bound expression in the speech of Newfoundlanders.
The primary contexts in which this expression is heard is in a bar (especially
a bar with a live band), at a concert, and at a dance . For example, at various
times throughout the performance of a band in a bar, members of the
audience would shout out, quite spontaneously, "Up she comes:" One
person I spoke to described a Memorial University of Newfoundland
concert at which the phrase was shouted a number of times as beer bottles
flew across the concert hall. In another incident, a man at a community
dance in a Newfoundland outport turned to a complete stranger and
said, in a quiet and knowing voice, "Up she comes."
Given these reports, the phrase seems to function as a shout of revelry,
as something to yell when one is having a good time or when one is in a
10
boisterous and carefree mood. This expression has the further function,
I believe, of bringing cohesion to a group of strangers who all find
themselves in the same situation. The shouter of the phrase announces it
to everyone, to those he knows and to those he has never seen before.
Not everyone in the crowd may have heard the expression before, but
they all accept it as an appropriate phrase, given the context in which it
is shouted. As will be shown, however, different individuals may have
different ideas of why the phrase is fitting.
"Up she comes," then, is an inclusive phrase, rather than an exclusive
one. Lawrence G Small has described the function of exclusive expressions
in a Newfoundland community; expressions based on local incidents
which function as in-jokes, separating members of the community from
outsiders, who have no way of knowing what these expressions refer to. 6
"Up she comes," however, does not function primarily as an in-joke, and
first-time hearers of the phrase revel in it, enjoy it, and immediately associate with it, though they may have no idea where the expression comes from
or why someone should be shouting it. This, I think, explains why one
stranger would turn to another at a community dance and speak the phrase;
that act of expression immediately forms a tie between the two strangers
who find themselves at the same dance, but who have no other associations
with each other. The phrase, then, is not an in-joke, nor is it a shibboleth,
but rather it functions to include outsiders within a newly-forming group.
But what is there about "up she comes" that should make it act in this
manner?How did the phrase come about and what is its significance to
the people who both shout it and hear it? Why should this particular
group of words have formed itself into a bound expression? In answering
these questions, I should like to concentrate on four factors which might
have contributed to the formation of this expression within Newfoundland
culture: reinforcement, psycholinguistic associations, phonesthemic
associations, and idiom-proneness.
Reinforcement
Perhaps the-most important factor in the formation of a bound expression
is reinforcement. The more times that a group of words is shouted, the
more likely will that phrase become a bound expression to those who
have heard it. The continuous repetition of a phrase strengthens and
reinforces the implanting of its message in the mind of the listener, leading
to a greater awareness of the group of words as an entity in itself, and a
bound expression is formed.
Adam Makkai recognised this phenomenon as it applies to the formation
of idioms and referred to it as the "institutionalization" of phrases:
11
"certain remarkable utterances that were once nonce-forms became
institutions by constant repetition on fitting occasions." 7 Liselotte
Gumpel arrived at the same conclusion in her discussion of the effect of
"adequation" on idioms:
However, what happens when a favoured configuration becomes
exposed repeatedly to the same situational context like greeting
and equivalent? Most languages carry stock sentences for this
purpose; certain set phrases come to be anticipated rather than
actively composed and subsequently construed. An anticipated
sense fails to undergo unique constitution since it is predetermined
in whole blocks of words. These words identify with the adequation
on hand, thus shifting the intersubjective foundation to the latter
rather than the single constituents .... When this happens, a
referential reversal has set in: the objective referent obtrudes on
syntax with a concomitant loss in intrinsic constitution. The
correlates cease to interact dynamically. Instead, they hold a sense
which has been reinforced directly by the adequated content. Such
is the structure of the idiom .... 8
In order to determine whether the phrase "up she comes" has been
reinforced in the minds of Newfoundlanders, we must look at the history
of the phrase. The immediate source for this expression is found in the
popular culture of the island. A well-known group of local Irish
entertainers called the Sons of Erin include a comic monologue in their
performing repertoire. This monologue is entitled "The Letter,"
supposedly written by an Irish mother to her son. The recitation is
composed of a series of traditional fool jokes and tall tales, and one joke
in the monologue has as its punchline the phrase "up she comes" :
Dear Son- (that's me)
Just a few lines to let you know that I'm still alive and well. I'm
writing this letter very slowly, for I know that you can't read too
quickly. You won't recognise the house when you come homewe've moved. Our new house is standing on its own- the rest of
the block fell down. We had great difficulty in moving, especially
the bed. The man said he wouldn't let us take i t - on the bus.
Wouldn't have been so bad, only your father was sleeping in it at
the time. Our new neighbours are keeping pigs -we got the wind
of it yesterday. It only rained twice last week - first for three days
and then for four. It was so windy that one of our hens laid the
same egg three times. I got my appendix out - and a dishwasher put
in. Our new washing machine is not working, for last week-I put
12
three shirts into it, pulled the chain, and I haven't seen them since.
Your sister is still nursing across in England. I sent her some clean
underwear, for she wrote and told me she has been in the same shift
since Christmas. Your other sister is still going with the same fellow
she was when you left. He gave her a lovely ring with three stones missing. Your father has given up biting his nails -we hid his teeth.
He also has a new job with five hundred people under him- he's
cutting the grass in a cemetery. I'm sending you that new overcoat
you wanted, but I'm cutting the sleeves and the buttons off to cut
down on the postage- you'll find them in the pockets. Your Auntie
Mary has had the baby. I don't know if it's a boy or a girl, so I can't
tell if I'm an uncle or an aunt. We're running very short of laxatives.
Last night I had to sit your little sister Mary on the ponny and tell
her ghost stories. I have bad news for you, son. Your first cousin has
passed away . As you know he was working for Guinness's Brewery.
Last week he fell into a vat of Guiness and died from the alcoholkinning
a-poisoning [sic]. But true to form, he got out six times - to go for a
pee. We also had a letter from the undertakers last week, saying, "If
the last instalment wasn't paid on your grandmother's funeral, up she
comes!" Your little brother lit a fire in the front room yesterday, and
your daddy smacked him- we don't have a fireplace in the front room.
We also went to Dr Menton's, and he told me to take a long glass tube
with a funny ball at the end of it, stick it in me mouth, and keep it
shut for five minutes. Your father offered to buy it from him. I have
to go now, son , as the plumber is coming to fix the pipes, and there's
an awful smell from your loving mother.
P.S . I would have enclosed the thirty-five dollars I owe you, only I'm
already after sealing the envelope.9
As already noted, the Sons of Erin are a very popular group in Newfoundland
and they have made regular appearances in bars and at concerts throughout
the island. Invariably, this comic monologue is requested by their audiences,
and, at the appropriate moment, the group and audience alike shout '"Up
she comes!" Thus, the phrase has become well-known to those who have
attended bars and concerts where this group has performed.
But only a small percentage of Newfoundlanders have actually seen the Sons
of Erin in person . The phrase, however, has reached the ears of the general
population through the mass media. The Sons of Erin produced a recording
which includes the comic monologue (see footnote 9), complete with the
punchline "up she comes." This recording was advertised for several months
13
on local television, and the one excerpt which was played during the
commercial was the "up she comes" segment of the recitation.
Again, however, only a small portion of the public bought the recording,
and the advertisement was relatively low-keyed and short-lived. The
greatest reinforcement factor is a television commercial for Blue Star beer;
the jingle for this commercial is sung by the Sons of Erin (although they
are not identified), and the very last line of the advertisement is "up she
comes'':
Blue Blue Blue Star, the beer that's in demand.
You can take a toast to Newfoundland with a Blue
Star in your hand.
Up she comes! 10
There are at least two variants of this advertisement: in one, the jingle is
sung while a beer bottle is uncapped on the screen, and the phrase "up
she comes" is shouted as the commercial fades off the air; in another
version, the phrase is shouted by the Sons of Erin as the screen shows
them raising their glasses in the manner of a toast.
This advertisement has had a very long run on local television and, unlike
the commercial for the Sons of Erin recording, continues to appear on the
screen. Because Blue Star beer is the sponsor for many televised sporting
events and other highly popular programmes, the phrase has become known
and reinforced in the minds of a great many Newfoundlanders. Note that
in the Blue Star commercial, the original "exhumation" joke has been
eliminated and only the punch line remains . It is not surprising, therefore,
that many people on the island recognise the phrase, but have never heard
it in its original narrative context.
I stated earlier that the immediate source for "up she comes" is found in
Newfoundland popular culture: in bar acts, on a recording , and in advertisements. This does not mean that the phrase originated with the Sons of Erin
performance. This comic monologue is almost certainly an old music hall
or vaudeville routine, although I have not yet traced its source in these
contexts. In addition, this recitation has been printed many times and is
common in the xerographically transmitted broadsheets, disseminated in
what Dundes and Pagter have called the "paperwork empire." 11 Although
Dundes and Pagter do not include a copy of this monologue in their book,
three versions may be found in Orr and Preston under the title, "A P o lish
Mother Writing to Her Son." 12
Interestingly, I have come across a typescript broadside in Quebec City
entitled, "Lettre d'une maman 'Newfie' a son fils ," which seems to be a
14
translation from the English.13 In the northern part of the state of Maine
in the United States, which borders on the province of Quebec, there is
apparently a broadside in circulation entitled, "A Quebec Mother's Letter
to Her Son," although I have not yet obtained a copy of this version of
the monologue.14
In addition to these sources, the phrase "up she comes" or phrases very
much like it have long been a part of the local oral traditions of certain
outports in Newfoundland in the context of fishing or, as will be discussed
shortly, in bar or dance situations. Whatever the history of the phrase is,
however, its immediate sources are of much more importance than its
earlier sources in explaining the island-wide popularity of this expression.
Similarly, Archer Taylor showed that the phrase "Let them eat cake,"
although centuries old, achieved currency and popularity in North America
through a play and a song entitled, "Let Them Eat Cake," written by
George and Ira Gershwin in 1933.15 This same phenomenon has occurred
in the case of "up she comes."
Thus, over the last three years, this phrase has been heavily reinforced in
the minds of Newfoundlanders. But this factor does not entirely explain
why "up she comes" has become a bound expression. There are many
popular comic monologues in Newfoundland.16 In addition, it is the aim
of every advertiser to implant a phrase or idea in the minds of television
viewers, and thus there are many commercials with snappy and memorable
lines and jingles.
Psycholinguistic Associations
Another factor in the formation of bound expressions is the psycholinguistic
associations which accrue around phrases. In order for a phrase to become a
proverbial or bound expression, it must become loaded with meaning and
significance beyond its literal message. Katz and Postal recognised this
phenomenon when they characterized the general nature of idioms as "any
concatenation of two or more morphemes whose compound meaning is
not compositionally derived from the meanings of the concatenated
morphemes .... "1 7 Thus, the entirety of the phrase becomes much greater
than the sum of its parts.
For any bound expression, the connotations of the phrase are of much
greater importance than its denotation; for example, the phrase "kick the
bucket" is more often understood as connoting "to die" than as denoting
"to strike a pail with one's foot." Indeed, over a period of time, the
denotation of a bound expression often disappears, as Chafe has pointed
out: "Often the source of an idiom is well-formed at the time the idiom
15
arises, only to pass out of the language of the idiom's users while its ghost
remains as the idiom's literalization." 18
In the case of "up she comes," many more people recognise the phrase
than know its origins or literal meaning. The three words, .!!.2 she comes,
divorced from any text, have little meaning in themselves, and largely
because of the ways in which the phrase has been reinforced in the
minds of Newfoundlanders, the denotation of this expression - "the
exhumation of one's grandmother" -has virtually withered away, leaving
only an array of connotations or psycholinguistic associations.
In describing the nature of idioms, Adam Makkai coined the term
"psychological rhyme," which accounts for the associational nature of
bound expressions: "Rhyme, then, in the present sense, has a rather
different meaning here; let it stand for 'a set of preter-logical motivations
based on degrees of similarity and metaphorical extensions of earlier
adjacent, or associated meanings'."19 He distinguishes at least two "classes"
of psychological rhyme according to whether or not the connotation of a
phrase is clearly and recognizably derived from its literal meaning. Thus,
"blackbird" is clearly derived from "a black bird" (p.21), whereas the
phrase "hot dog" meaning a "frankfurter on a bun" is not clearly derived
from "a high temperature canine" (p.21).
In order to discover the original, literal meaning of a "class two" bound
expression such as "hot dog," one must conduct an etymological investigation. In Makkai's words, this class of psychological rhyme is "characterized
by the fact that the image is borrowed in one fell swoop in order to express
the content the idiom came to signify in the original age or place of its use"
(p.21). The phrase "up she comes," however, fits neither class one nor
class two psychological rhyme categorizations, since its original, literal
meaning was not "borrowed in one fell swoop" to express the revelry and
anti-social behaviour of the bar context. Any link between "the exhumation
of one's grandmother" and bar-behaviour would, I believe, be entirely
facile.
The phrase "up she comes," then, would seem to be a third class of
psychological rhyme, in which the original, literal meaning of the phrase
was not borrowed to make the bound expression; rather, the phrase was
first "stripped" of its denotation and only then borrowed for use as an
expression of revelry. The "up she comes" of the "exhumation" joke and
the "up she comes" of the shout of revelry are homophonous, but they
are semantically different. In the "exhumation" joke, the word ..!!..Q is
locative and directional, indicating "above ground" as opposed to "below
ground"; she refers to a "female human being," and more specifically to
16
a "dead grandmother"; comes indicates movement, and more specifically
"the shifting of a passive or inanimate object from place A to place B by
an active, animate agent." As will be shown, none of these meanings can
be attributed to the associations which the expression of revelry brings to
mind.
The highly specific meanings in the phrase of the "exhumation" joke,
once stripped away, leave the expression temporarily "empty" of meaning.
Thus, when shouted in a bar or at a dance, hearers of the phrase are free
to fill this semantic void with a variety of meanings based on psycholinguistic
associations. For an inclusive phrase, the "emptier" its denotation, the more
easily is the expression accepted and interpreted by first-time hearers in a
group. Once the specific denotation of "up she comes" had been stripped
away, the phrase became especially suitable as an inclusive, bound
expression because of the inherent ambiguous or "meaningless" qualities
of its lexical components.20
To understand the possible associations which have accrued around this
phrase, we must take a closer look at the primary contexts in which it is
shouted. The bar, dance, and concert are situations in which behaviour
usually considered anti-social and abnormal in other contexts is both
tolerated and expected. Public drinking and open drunkenness, loud and
abusive talk, uninhibited dancing, the overt display of sexuality, and
general rowdiness are all features of the bar, dance, or concert, and are all
to a lesser or greater extent sanctioned and given licence in these conte~.
Firestone and Szwed noted that these same kinds of anti-social activities
are accepted in many mumming situations in Newfoundland.21
The phrase "up she comes" has strong associations with this type of antisocial behaviour. The expression is certainly associated with drinking and
drunkenness through the beer advertisement, but its associations with
alcohol may go beyond this. "Up she comes" has the same "flavour" to
it as such drinking expressions as "bottoms up," "fill 'em up," "drink up,"
and "set up another round." The word~ as used in all these phrases,
seems to imply or be associated with emptying and filling at the same
time - a perfect metaphor for drinking. The word up also beings to mind
the upward motion of arm and bottle in the traditional pose of revelry,
and the phrase seems ready-made as a toast. As already noted, one version
of the Blue Star commercial shows the phrase in conjunction with the
raised-arm gesture of revelry or toasting.
Indirectly linked to drinking is the association of the phrase with vomiting.
The bar, dance, or concert contexts are among the only situations in which
vomiting even approaches acceptable behaviour in Newfoundland, since
17
drunkenness is associated w~ th vomiting in both a physical and a psychological sense.22 Several Newfoundlanders have told me that they associate
"up she comes" with vomiting, and the reverse peristalsis or "coming up"
which defines this behaviour makes this association quite natural.
The phrase also has certain sexual associations. The words up and comes
bring to mind both erection and ejaculation. Given the considerable sexual
licence found in these contexts - body-contact dancing, bawdy humour
from both stage performers and audience, and fairly open and unabashed
propositioning- such sexual connotations of the phrase mav well be in the
minds of many of the revelers. Interestingly, in many Newfoundland
dialects the word she may refer to a variety of animate and inanimate
objects, regardless of their "femininity"- a boat, a fish, a storm, a wristwatch, a task, and so on.23 Given this broader definition of she as "it"
or "thing," the phrase "up she comes" would seem open to more psycholinguistic associations, both sexual and non-sexual, than if she is interpreted
more narrowly as "feminine pronoun."
It is more difficult to establish a definite association between this phrase
and the type of aggressive rowdiness which often characterizes the bar,
dance or concert contexts. One person, however, told me that shouts of
"Up she comes!" accompanied the sound of the smashing of a beer glass
in one bar which he attended. Glass-breaking seems to be a well-accepted
aggressive form of behaviour on the island and is generally greeted with
shouts and laughter in the context of the bar, dance, or concert. Another
Newfoundlander told me that the phrase "up she comes" has long been
used in his community to indicate that a fight is imminent; as an example,
he told me that if some troublemakers from another outport invaded a
local dance, people would say "Up she comes!" meaning "It won't be long
before a fight breaks out."
In my search for local, pre-Sons of Erin uses of this phrase, I collected a
practical joke from a Newfoundland student which embodies most of the
psycholinguistic associations discussed above. In a bar, the trickster asks
the dupe if he knows the difference between a ·male and a female beer
bottle. When the dupe says that he doesn't know, the trickster takes his
beer bottle and slams it down on the open neck of the dupe's beer bottle .
This causes the beer to foam and overflow the dupe's bottle . The trickster
shouts, "Up she comes! That's a male bottle," referring to the "ejaculation"
of the beer from the bottle. The student told me that this practical joke
was often used to precipitate a fight: "That's how you start fights in a bar."
In this joke, drink, sexuality, and aggressive rowdiness are all linked to
the phrase "up she comes."
18
The associations with drinking, vomiting, sexuality, and rowdiness give
the phrase "up she comes" psycho linguistic significance well beyond the
three words which make up the expression. The very fact that the actual
denotation of the phrase has, in many cases, disappeared accentuates
these connotative associations and contributes to the formation of this
phrase as a bound expression in the context of the bar, dance, and concert.
As one woman told me, "I don't know what it means, but all I know is
that it's something my husband shouts whenever he comes home drunk."
Phonesthemic Associations
Akin to psycholinguistic associations are phonesthemic associations. In
what ways does the phonetic symbolism of the sounds in a bound
expression contribute to its formation and popularity? The phenomenon
of phonetic symbolism has been recognized since the early part of this
century and both linguists and psychologists have attempted to account
for the ways in which specific phonemes of phonemic clusters accrue
meaning.24
Householder called this feature of language a "phonestheme" and defined
it as "a phoneme or cluster of phonemes shared by a group of words
which also have in common some element of meaning or function, tho
[sic] the words may be etymologically unrelated." 25 Markel and Hamp
prefer the term "psycho-morph": "a non-morphemic sequence of one or
more phonemes for which a 'cultural' meaning can in at least some of its
occurrences be established." 26 Wescott uses the term "phonoseme" to
describe essentially the same phenomenon.27
J
Phonetically, "up she comes" may be represented as I Ap i kArns/. The
two occurrences of I A/ often shade more towards /o I in the speech of
some Newfoundlanders. The /p/ is unaspirated, or perhaps it is more
accurate to say that the aspiration is incorporated into the sibilant ;J;.
The sibilant I shades somewhat towards /s/, but this is largely because
the word she is unstressed. The final /s/ is not completely unvoiced,
retaining some of the voicing of the preceding nasal /m/, but it is not so
strongly voiced as /z/. The intonation pattern of the phrase is generally
up she comes, with especially strong emphasis on the up.
;J
The phonetic properties of this phrase present certain interesting
phonesthemic features, but in order to understand the possible associations
which these features contribute to the formation of the bound expression,
we must again look at the contexts of the phrase. As stated earlier, the
contexts in which this phrase is shouted are marked by abnormal,
aggressive and anti-social behaviour. In terms of everyday life, this
19
behaviour is unsettling and disruptive. Loud talk, overt drunkenness,
dancing, sexuality, and general rowdiness represent unpredictable and
unstable activity. All these actions are a mark of psychological and
social instability, when they occur outside of specifically sanctioned
contexts.
The juxtaposition of a bilabial and a sibilant seem to have certain
phonesthemic associations with instability and disruption, or random and
unpredictable movement and actions. The bilabial /p/ and the sibilant ljl
shading towards /s/ of "up she comes" may well evoke the same
associations of instability and random action as do the following words
and phrases: tipsy, topsy-turvy, upsy-daisy, oops, upset, lopsided, and
upside-down. Most or all of these words and phrases are present in
Newfoundland speech. For example, "Tipsy Eve" is a term for the night
before Christmas or New Years among some Newfoundlanders, and it
refers specifically to the practice of sampling the local home-brewed
beer during the traditional house visits on that night.28 One Newfoundlander I spoke to specifically associated upsy-daisy with "up she comes."
It is interesting that the word flippsying is a Newfoundland dialect term
for the game of jumping from icepan to icepan in a half frozen harbour29;
a game which tests one's skill against the random movement, unpredictability, and instability of the ice
Many of the above words and phrases are especially associated with
drunkenness, but two other words with this /p/-/s/ feature also come to
mind, which are even more closely linked with drunken behaviour:
namely, piss and pass out. There might even be certain sexual associations
with "up she comes" from a phonesthemic point of view, considering
that both penis and pussy exhibit a /p/-/s/ relationship.
The phrase "up she comes" may also contain certain negative or
derogatory phonesthemic associations which would, again, link it to the
general anti-social behaviour expected in the bar, dance and concert
contexts. Markel and Hamp found that the cluster {sp/ had "somewhat
bad; somewhat unpleasant; somewhat ugly" connotations in their
experiments,30 while Householder saw a possible pejorative association
attached to the combination of a velar, a nasal, and an s-cluster (up she
~orne~. 31 Wescott found that a combination of a labial, such as /p/, and
a velar, such as /k/, has certain derogatory connotations in English,32
and, in reference to Newfoundland culture, Widdowson likewise found
that the labial /p/ and /b/ were often associated with "unpleasantness. "33
The back vowels, such as those found in the words .!!.P_and comes, were
found to be symbolic of "dislike, disgust, or scorn" by Jespersen.34
20
Thus, the general phonesthemic associations of the phrase "up she comes"
reflect the atmosphere of the bar, dance, or concert: unpredictability,
instability, disruption, possibly drunkenness and sexuality, as well as
disgust, dislike, ugliness, unpleasantness, and generally negative and
pejorative associations. It would seem, then, that from a phonesthemic
point of view, "up she comes" is well suited to the contexts in which it
is shouted, and thus likely to become a bound expression.
Idiom-Proneness
To what extent are the words _!!Q.z she, and comes, spoken in that order
as a coherent phrase, inherently prone to becoming an idiomatic
expression? Are there certain words and certain justapositions of words
which are more likely than others to be formed into bound expressions
in the English language? In answering these questions, we must look at the factor of "multiple
reinvestibility," as defined by Makkai: "Every natural language has more
'sememes' (i.e. entries belonging in semantic nests) than 'lexemes' (i.e.
expression carriers). Natural languages build their sememe reservoir by
the multiple reinvestment of the lexeme stock in various senses." 35 In
other words, any given word may be invested with a number of different
meanings, as any dictionary will show.
Since idiomatic expressions rely on the ability of new meanings to be
attached to a specific group of words, it follows that the more readily
individual words of a phrase are subject to multiple reinvestibility, the
more likely is the entire phrase prone to becoming a bound expression.
In this respect, "up she comes" is highly idiom-prone. Both the word~
and comes exhibit extreme multiple reinvestibility.
Makkai, in his Idiom Structure in English, tested the multiple reinvestibility
of English words. His results show, among other things, those words which
are most frequently found in English language idioms. In comparing the
phrase "up she comes" with Makkai's findings, I discovered some
interesting correlations. Of all English verbs, come is most likely to be
found in idiomatic expressions (p.200 and p.205 ), and of all the phrasal
verb formants (out, off, down, over, in and other prepositional-adverbial
words), .!!P_is most prone to be a part of idiomatic phrases (p.200 and p.203).
This means that in terms of idiom-proneness alone, the phrase "up she comes"
had a very high probability of becoming a bound expression, once it was
uttered. The very words which make up the phrase gave it a head start
over other possible word combinations in becoming a popular and oftquoted expression.
21
The reasons why an utterance becomes a traditional, fixed form in a
culture are complex. One must look at the context in which the utterance
is performed, how the phrase is spoken, and what its immediate source
is within the culture. I have outlined four possible factors which might
also be considered in answering the question of expression formation :
How much and what kinds of reinforcement is the phrase undergoing in
t he culture? What psycholinguistic associations a ccrue aro und the p hrase,
given the cult ural and performance contexts in which it is spoken? What
phonesthe mic associations are inherent in the phon ological structure o f
the phrase? And what idiom-prone qualities are inherent in the diff erent
elements of the expression?
I do not p resent these four factors as t he only factors in expression
formation, nor even as the most import ant. N o r do I claim t h a t t h ese
four factors e ntirely acco unt fo r the popularity of the phrase " up she
comes." My purp o se in t his brief study has been to show some possible
lines of investigation in t he st udy o f folk speech which have hitherto
been all but ignored b y folklorists, and to indicate that there is no one
factor , and thus no o ne answer, to the question of why a phrase should
become a bound expression in a culture.
Footnotes
1
I should like to thank Vi t Bubenik, Georgina Smith, and Larry Smith of
Memorial University of Newfoundland and John D A Widdowson of the
University of Sheffield for their help in this study. An abridged version of this
paper was read at the Annual Meeting of the Folklore Studies Association of
Canada, Fredericton, New Brunswick, 1 June 1977.
2
See Archer Taylor, Selected Writings on Proverbs, ed. Wolfgang Mieder,
FF Communications, No.216 (Helsinki: Suomalainen Tiedeakatemia, 1975).
3
George Herzog and Charles G Blooah, Jabo Proverbs From Liberia: Maxims
in the Life of a Native Tribe (London: Oxford University Press for the
International I nstitu t e of African Languages and Cultures, 1936 ).
4
Two recent structur al st u dies are Pierre Crepeau, "La Definition du Proverbe,"
Fabula, 16 ( 197 5 ), 28 5-304; and Alan Dun des, "On the Structure of the
Proverb," P roverbium, No.25 (1975), 961-73.
5
Because many of my questions and observations involved the exploration of
somewhat anti-social behaviour in Newfoundland, all my sources and
informants must rem ain a nonymous.
6
"Traditional Expression in a Newfoundland Community: Genre Change and
F unctional V ariability, " Lore and Language, 2, No.3 (1975), pp.15-18.
7
Idiom Structu re in English , J anua Lingu arum, Series Maior, No.48 (The Hague
and P a ris: Mouton , 1972 ), p.170.
22
8
"The Structure of Idioms: A Phenomenological Approach," Semiotica, 12
(1974), 20. "Adequation" is the process whereby a purely iconic or symbolic
image is projected onto an objective reality.
9
Sons of Erin, The Town I Love So Well, one 12 inch, 331/3rpm phonodisc,
Erinson Records ERN 1100s.
10
I should like to thank Mr Fred Milley and Labatt Breweries of Newfoundland
Ltd. for permission to reprint this jingle. According to Mr Milley, the advertisment was first shown on air in 197 4 and has been re-shot several times since then.
11
Alan Dundes and Carl R Pagter, Urban Folklore From the Paperwork Empire,
Memoir Series, No.62 (Austin: American Folklore Society, 1975).
12
Cathy Orr and Michael J Preston, eds., Urban Folklore from Colorado: Typescript
Broadsides, University Microfilms, No. LD 00069 (Ann Arbor: Xerox University
Microfilms, 1976 ), pp.62-64.
13
I am indebted to Ronald Labelle of Universite Laval for bringing this version to
my attention.
14
I must thank Lisa Feldman of the University of Maine at Orono for telling me of
the existence of this version.
15
"And Marie Antoinette Said ... ," Revista de etnografia, 11 (1968), 246.
16
See Wilfred W Wareham, "The Monologue in Newfoundland," in The Blasty Bough,
ed. Clyde Rose (Portugal Cove, Nfld.: Breakwater Books, 1976), pp.196-216.
17
J J Katz and P M Postal, "Semantic Interpretation of Idioms and Sentences
Containing Them,'" Massachusetts Institute of Technology Research Laboratory of
Electronics Quarterly Progress Report, No.70 (1963), p.275.
18
Wallace L Chafe, "Idiomaticity as an Anomaly in the Chomsky Paradigm,"
Foundations of Language, 4 ( 1968 ), 121.
19
"The Cognitive Organization of Idiomaticity: Rhyme or Reason?" Georgetown
University Working Papers on Languages and Linguistics, 11 (1975), 16.
20
For a discussion of the function of ambiguity in idiomaticity, see Uriel Weinreich,
"Problems in the Analysis of Idioms,'' in Substance and Structure of Language,
ed. Jaan Puhvel (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1969), pp.40-46.
21
Melvin M Firestone, "Mummers and Strangers in Northern Newfoundland," in
Christmas Mumming in Newfoundland: Essays in Anthropology Folklore, and
History, ed. Herbert Halpert and G M Story (Toronto: University of Toronto
Press, 1969), pp.67-68; and John F Szwed, "The Mask of Friendship: Mumming
as a Ritual of Social Relations,'' in Christmas Mumming, pp.104-18.
22
For a discussion of vomiting as a sanctioned activity in a culture very different
from that of Newfoundland, see Charles Hudson, "Vomiting for Purity: Ritual
Emesis in the Aboriginal Southeastern United States,'-' in Symbols and Society:
Essays on Belief Systems in Action, ed . Carole E Hill, South Anthropology
Society Proceedings, No.9 (Athens, Georgia: Southern Anthropological Society,
1975), pp.93-102.
23
23
Information on Newfoundland dialects is taken from the Newfoundland
Dictionary Centre at Memorial University of Newfoundland (hereafter NDC).
24
A pioneering linguistic study in this area is Edward Sapir, "A Study in
Phonetic Symbolism," Journal of Experimental Psychology , 12 (1929),
225-39. For a good survey of the psychological approaches to this subject,
see Insup Kim Taylor, "Phonetic Symbolism Re-examined," Psychological
Bulletin, 60 (1963), 200-09.
25
Fred W Householder, "On the Problem of Sound and Meaning, An English
Phonestheme," Word, 2 (1946), 83.
26
Norman N Markel and Eric P Hamp, "Connotative Meanings of Certain
Phoneme Sequences," Studies in Linguistics, 15 (1960-61 ), 55.
27
Roger W Wescott, "Labio-Velarity andDerogation in English: A Study in
Phonosemic Correlation," American Speech, 46 (1971), 123-37.
28
Information from the NDC.
29
Information from the NDC.
30
"Connotative Meanings of Certain Phoneme Sequences," p.53.
31
"On the Problem of Sound and Meaning." p.83.
32
"Labio-Velarity and Derogation in English," pp.123-37.
33
John D A Widdowson, "Aspects of Traditional Verbal Control: Threats and
Threatening Figures in Newfoundland Folklore . " Diss. Memorial University
of Newfoundland 1972, p.52.
34
Otto Jespersen, Language: Its Nature, Development and Origin (London:
George Allen & Unwin, 1922), p.401.
35
"Cognitive Organization of Idiomaticity." p.14 .
24
Meat-Cut Terms: a check-list
C S Upton
Presented below is an outline of the data on meat-cut terminology
which I collected as part of an enquiry into butchering language,
conducted from the Institute of Dialect and Folk Life Studies of the
University of Leeds between 1973 and 19771.
It should be stressed that the data below are not exhaustive of the
findings of the survey, which sought to investigate the variety,
denotation, and etymology of terms for a wide range of meat-trade
concepts. The aim here has been to provide a check-list of meat-cut
terms alone, to make available in a concise form terminology, which,
applying as it does to meat itself, is at the very centre of the trade.
Material is presented in three sections. These deal with terms for beef,
lamb , and pork meat-cuts, each section being headed by a diagram of
the carcass which is the subject of that section. Diagram numbers
(and, in the case of the beef carcass, the letter A also) are used to
identify the subjects of the various lists which each section contains.
However, not all terms in one list are necessarily synonymous. Some
denote different parts of the relevant numbered area on the carcass
diagram. Others are the product of variations in cutting technique,
and consequently denote meat-cuts of varying conformation.
Technical complexities of carcass division cannot realistically be
analysed in so brief a resume as this. (Note, however, that areas 2, 3,
and 4 on the lamb carcass are treated somewhat more exactly, since
two broadly distinct cutting techniques must be identified.)
While a broad denotative synonymy may be assumed between the
terms in a list, therefore, the reader should be wary of inferring the
absolute synonymy of those terms. Recourse to material already
gathered on the subject of meat-trade language will clearly answer
many of the questions raised by the lists 2. Nevertheless, such is the
extent of the field under investigation that it is apparent that much
work remains to be done before a complete lexis of meat-cuts can
be felt to have been gathered, or all the implications of that lexis
can be considered to be understood.
1. For a discussion of the findings of this survey, see C S Upton, 'The Language
of the Meat Trade: A Survey of Terms Used by a Selected Sample of Butchers
in the United Kingdom', unpublished PhD thesis, The University of Leeds, 1977.
2 . See the findings of the survey mentioned in note 1 above. Also known to be
concerned with the study of meat-cut terms are J S L McKee of The Scottish
Hotel School, The University of Strathclyde, Glasgow, and J W Strother of The
Meat and Livestock Commission, Milton Keynes. Published works which are of
help in the interpretation of terminology include Meat Technology, by Frank
Gerrard, The Complete Book of Meat, edited by Frank Gerrard and F J Mallion,
and The Meat and Livestock Commission's Technical Bulletins numbers 17 and 24.
25
A
A:
side, side bee f, side of beef
A
(front): fore, fore beef, fore leg, fore quarter, fore quarter beef,
fore quarter of beef, shoulder, shoulder of beef
A
(back): hind, hind beef, hind of beef, hind leg gigot, hind
quarter, hind quarter beef, hind quarter of beef, hip, quarter,
top
1:
clod, neck, neck beef, neck of beef, neck end, pole end, scrag,
first part of shoulder, stocking
2:
arm, arm brisket, · soft brisket, bosom, clod, clod of beef,
gorister, gullet, kernel, marrowbone, neck, neck beef, flank end
of the neck, round bone, scrag, sloat, sticking, sticking piece,
sticking and clod
1 + 2: clod, clod and sticking, neck, neck beef, neck of beef, neck
and clod, neck end, neck and sticking, scrag, sticking, sticking
of beef, sticking piece, sticking vein, long sticking, short sticking
3:
blade, blade bone beef, top blade, chain· steak, chine steak,
lower chine, chuck, chuck of beef, chuck steak, crop steak,
feather steak, back ribs, shoulder, shoulder cut, shoulder piece,
shoulder roll, shoulder steak, spaul
4:
blade bone, blade steak, point end brisket, chuck, clod, cross
cut, ladder staves, leg mutton cut, leg of mutton cut, thick
plate, thick rands, rib, ribs, flat ribs, short rib, thick rib, thick
rib of beef, thick flat rib, top rib, top ribs of beef, runner, thick
runner, score, shoulder, shoulder of beef, shoulder cut, shoulder
steak, thick of beef
26
5:
hough, fore hough, leg of beef, shin, shin beef, shin of beef, fore
shin, fore quarter shin
6:
best end, breast, breast side, brisket, brisket beef, brisket of
beef, bosom, bosom end , bosom end of the brisket, middle
brisket, middle of brisket, nose end, nose end brisket, next cut
to the nose end, brisket point, point end, point end brisket,
point end of brisket, point end of the brisket, whole brisket,
butcher's goose, poor man's goose, nug end, plate, set of ribs
7:
best end brisket, breast side, brisket, brisket beef, brisket of
beef, mid brisket, middle brisket, whole brisket, brisket flank,
flank end brisket, flank end of the brisket, flank, flank beef,
flank of beef, heart spoon, plate, plate of beef, rand, set of ribs,
sweet rib, sweet ribs, thick end
8:
middle draft, heart's pool, heater end, box heater, Jacob's
ladder, leg mutton cut, leg of mutton cut, plate, thin rands,
best rib, flat rib, flat ribs, middle rib, thick rib, thin rib, thin rib
of beef, thin ribs, top rib, top ribs, rib roast, runner, runner
beef, thick runner, thin runner, shoulder, shoulder piece of
beef, shoulder steak, thin end
9:
blade, blade end of the chine, chine, chine beef, chine of beef,
chine end, fore chine, lower chine, chuck, crop, rib of crop, ribs
of crop, find .end, leg of mutton cut, leg of mutton cut of beef,
rib, rib of beef, ribs, ribs of beef, back rib, back ribs, fore rib,
boneless fore rib, fore ribs, fore ribs of beef, middle rib, short
ribs, standing ribs, thick end rib, top rib, top ribs, rib roast,
fore rib roast, shoulder_ shoulder cut, shoulder steak
10:
best end, best end rib, chine, chine beef, chine of beef, thick
end of the chine, leg of mutton cut, leg of mutton cut of beef,
rib, rib of beef, ribs, ribs of beef, back ribs, fore rib, middle rib,
short ribs, standing rib, standing ribs, top rib, top ribs, wing rib,
wing end, wing end rib, wing end of the rib, rib roast, side
roast, rib end of sirloin, sirloin, point sirloin
11:
sirloin roast, sirloin, sirloin beef, bottom end of sirloin, double
sirloin, thin end sirloin, undercut sirloin, wing end, wing end of
sirloin, wing end of the loin, wing rib, wing ribs
12:
bed, flank, flank beef, flank of beef, flank end of the sirloin,
hind quarter flank, thin flank, lap, mid runner
27
13:
fillet, fillet beef, fillet of beef, fillet steak, Pope's eye steak,
striploin, undercut, undercut of beef, undercut steak,
undermeat
14:
chump, fry steak, frying steak piece, heugh bone best steak,
heugh bone fillet, hip, hip bone, hip bone steak, hip steak, junk,
pin, pin bone, pin steak, Pope eye, Pope's eye, Pope's eye steak,
rump, rump of beef, rump steak, best rump steak, rump steak
piece, steak piece, steak piece of rump, best steak piece, best
steak, steak bone
15:
aitch bone, aitch bone piece, haunch bone, hip, insteak, izal
bone, izen bone, lip,' double round, rump, rump end, rump end
joint, rump joint, rump steak, corner rump, middle rump, top
rump, shine, steak piece, steak piece of rump, tag, topside
16: high end, hindlift, underlift, round, bottom side, bottom side
round, bottom side of the round, double round, lean half
round, rump, rump steak, silverside, silverside of round, slift,
tail of beef, taildraft, under buttock, underside
17:
cocked hat, half leg, hindlift, round, double round, fat half
round, rump, rump steak, topside, top side round, topside of
round
18:
bed, bed of beef, bed piece, buttock, crown, feather, first
cutting, thick flank, fleshy end, top lift, loins end, mouse,
rump, rump steak, top rump, side steak, split piece, T-beef,
T-steak, top of beef, topside, undercut, undercut of the round,
white, white beef, white of beef
19: hock, hough, hough hind, hind hough, leg, leg beef, leg of
beef, shin, shin beef, back shin, hind shin, hind quarter shin
28
B
3
6
5
1:
neck, neck lamb, neck of lamb, neck of mutton, neck end,
neck scrag, scrag, scrag end, scrag end neck lamb, scrag end of
neck, scrag end of the neck, scrag neck
2:
best end neck, best neck, blade chops, middle, middle neck,
middle neck of lamb, middle of the neck, middle of the necks,
middle neck chops, neck of lamb, scrag (see also 4 below)
3:
(in piece): best end, best end crop, best end neck, best end of
neck, best end of the neck, best neck, rib end of loin, thin end
of the neck (see also 4 below)
3:
(cut up): chops, best chops, best end chops, best end neck
chops, best end of neck chops, best end of the neck chops,
chine chops, cutlet chops, neck chops, rib chops, cutlets, lamb
cutlets, neck cutlets (see also 4 below)
1 + 2 + 3: crop, neck, neck lamb, neck of lamb, Welsh fashion neck
lamb, whole neck, scrag, target
"
4:
(English and Welsh informants' cutting): shoulder, shoulder of
lamb
4:
(Scottish and Northern Irish informants' cutting): best end of
neck, best neck, back rib, rack, shoulder, (rack chops, shoulder
chops, stewing chops)/ five bones, round bone, round bone
chops, runner, runner of lamb, runner of mutton/ shank, fore
shank, lamb shank/ breast, brisket
5:
breast, breast lamb, breast of lamb, thick end of breast, flank,
lap, lap lamb, lap of lamb, waistcoat, navvy's waistcoat
29
6:
(in piece): loin, loin lamb, loin of lamb, double loin, double loin
end of loin, middle loin, single loin, thin end, thin end loin
6:
(cut up): chops, cutlet chops, loin chops, double loin chops,
middle loin chops, single loin chops, cutlets
7:
(in piece): chump, chump of lamb, chump end, chump end of
fillet, chump end gigot, chump end gigot of lamb, chump end
of loin, chump end of the loin, fillet lamb
7:
(cut up): chops, boneless chops, broad chops, chump chop,
chump chops, leg chops, noisettes
8:
(in piece): centre cut gigot, centre cut of leg, fillet, fillet lamb,
fillet of lamb, fillet cut, fillet end, fillet end of leg, half leg
fillet end, leg fillet end, fillet leg, fillet of leg, middle fillet,
leg, middle cut gigot, middle cut gigot of lamb, middle
cut of leg
8:
(cut up)": fillet chops, gigot chops, leg chops, middle leg chops,
cutlets, leg cutlets, leg slices
9:
gigot lamb, half leg, knuckle, knuckle end, knuckle end of leg,
half leg knuckle end, leg knuckle end, leg (knuckle) end, knuckle
leg, leg, leg lamb, leg of lamb, leg end, shank, shank of lamb, half
leg shank, shank end, shank end gigot, shank end gigot of lamb,
shank end leg, shank end of leg, shank end of the leg, half leg
shank end, shank of leg
8 + 9: gigot, gigot lamb, gigot of lamb, whole gigot, leg, leg lamb, leg
of lamb, full leg, whole leg, whole leg lamb, whole leg of lamb
30
c
1:
(lower jaw): chap, Bath chap, pig's chap, chawl, chowl, cheek,
pig cheek, pig's cheek, choller, French ham, head meat, jowl,
jowl of head
1 : (upper part): cheek, pig cheek, pig's cheek, eye piece, eye piece
of head, high pieces, face, head, head meat, half head, pig head,
top head, skull
2 : blade, blade bone, chain, chine pork, chine of pork, collar, crop,
crop of pork, thick crop, fore end, neck of pork, neck end,
neck end of pork, rack of pork, shoulder, shoulder pork,
shoulder of pork, back rib shoulder of pork, spare rib, spare
rib of pork, spare ribs, sparrib, sparrib pork, sparrib of pork
3 : thick belly, best end, breast, breast and hand, hand, hand of
pork, hand and spring, round bone chops, runner of pork,
shoulder, shoulder pork, shoulder of pork, half shoulder, middle
shoulder
4 : hand, hock, pork hock, fore hock, pork fore quarter hock,
hough, pork hough, fore hough, knee, pig's knee, knuckle,
pestle, shank, shank of pork, pig's shank, fore shank, shin
5 : foot, pig foot, pig's foot , knuckle, trotter, pig trotter, pig's
trotter
6 + 7: (in piece): best end, best end chops, best end neck, best end
neck chops, best end of neck, best end of neck chops, best end
of the neck chops, best neck, best neck chops, chine, light end
of crop, loin, loin pork, loin of pork, pork loin, double loin,
middle loin, middle of the loin, short loin
31
6 + 7: (cut up): chops, pork chops, loin chops, double loin chops,
double loin pork chops, middle loin chops, single loin chops,
spare rib chops, cutlets, pork cutlets, light end slices
8:
belly, belly pork, belly of pork, thick end of belly, thick end
belly pork, thin belly, breast, draft, draft of pork, belly draft,
flank, flat, flat pork, flat of pork
9:
(in piece): chump, chump pork, chump of pork, chump end,
chump end of fillet, chump end loin, chump end of loin,
chump end of the loin, chump loin, fillet, gigot pork, leg end,
rump, thick end of loin, top end leg
9:
(cut up): chops, broad chops, chump chops, leg chops, thick
loin chops, pork slices, sliced gigot pork, pork steaks
10:
(in piece): gigot centre cut, cutlet, fillet, fillet pork, fillet of
pork, pork fillet, fillet cut leg of pork, fillet end of leg, leg
fillet end, fillet leg pork, fillet roast, first fillet, first fillet pork,
leg fillet, middle fillet, middle fillet of pork, top fillet of pork,
leg, half leg, middle leg, middle cut gigot, middle cut of gigot
10:
(cut up): gigot chops, leg chops, cutlets, leg roast, slices, leg
slices, sliced gigot pork, pork steaks
11:
gigot, pork gigot, hock, hind hock, hough, pork hough, knuckle,
knuckle pork, leg knuckle end, half leg knuckle end, leg, leg
pork, leg end, bottom leg, bottom end leg, shank leg, shank,
shank of pork, shank end, shank end pork, shank end gigot,
shank end of leg
10 + 11: gammon, gigot, gigot pork, gigot of pork, pork gigot, ham,
leg, leg pork, leg of pork, full leg, large leg, whole leg, whole
leg of pork
32
A Checklist of Nevvfoundland Expressions
J D A Widdowson
Preliminary research and fieldwork in various aspects of Newfoundland
speech during 1962 and 1963, coupled with the general lack of
information on the vocabulary of the province, prompted me to d evise
an experimental checklist of some common local expressions. The
checklist, which was produced in duplicated form in the Department of
English at Memorial University in January 1964, consisted of a hundred
tentative definitions of individual words, each glossed by one or more
forms already recorded in the few published glossaries and in my own
fieldwork. The definitions and glosses were drawn for the most part
from four principal sources: George Patterson, "Notes on the Dialect
of the People of Newfoundland," Journal of American Folklore 8
(1895), 27- 40; 9 (1896), 19- 37; 10 (1897), 203- 213; G. A. England,
"Newfoundland Dialect Items", Dialect Notes 5, Part 8 (1925), 322346; P. K. Devine, Devine's Folk Lore of Newfoundland, St John's,
1937; L. E. F. English, Historic Newfoundland, St John's, (1955),
pp. 29 - 35. Supplementary examples from fieldwork, including a few
questions on such specific forms as past tenses and intensifiers, were
then added to the source material.
The aims of the checklist were to investigate how many of the forms
listed in the sources were still in use, to obtain information on their
variation and semantic range and to learn something of their
geographical distribution. Although the focus of the enquiry was
lexical, an attempt was also made to elicit some very general information on phonology by giving possible variant pronunciations in normal
orthography in the list of forms following some of the definitions.
The checklist was then mailed to the majority of larger schools and to
a few librarians and other individuals throughout the province, together
with an informal letter which explained the checklist and its aims and
asked correspondents to assist in the collection of material. This letter
pointed out the need to record the older usages still remembered and
suggested that older people would be of particular help in providing
information for this specific project.
33
The letter referred to "a series of checklists" and the original intention
was to prepare several such lists, relying largely on distributing them by
mail to interested people. The rapid development of research and
fieldwork in Newfoundland language and folklore from 1964 onwards,
however, made all those of us who were concerned with this work
incre.asingly aware of the drawbacks of using postal questionnaires. The
small percentage return of questionnaires distributed by mail is a
limiting factor in itself. More disquieting, however, are the obvious
shortcomings of the experimental checklist itself. In general, for
example, the suggested definitions proved inadequate, as did the
attempts to discover some of the local pronunciations. Nevertheless,
these inadequacies were revealed by the replies received and so in part
justified the aims of the checklist. The format and procedure used in
the checklist were designed to be as informal and straightforward as
possible. Those using it were simply asked to circle the forms known to
them or to their informant, and this procedure usually proved effective,
even in cases when several forms were circled as glosses for the same
definition. Correspondents were also invited to add synonyms, variant
pronunciations and other forms not specifically requested in the checklist itself. Biographical information was also kept to a minimum.
Of the 139 replies received in 1964, 115 were returned by mail from
some 80 different communities in Newfoundland and Labrador.
Colleagues and students at the University completed the remaining 24
checklists in 1964. A further 144 were completed between 1965 and
1971 (1 in 1965, 109 in 1966, 21 in 1967, 13 in 1971) by students in
English and Folklore courses and also during my own fieldwork. The
collected data was augmented by further details volunteered by various
colleagues and students. Much of this material was indexed by Maxwell
Collett and Gervase Hurley during 1967 and it is hoped to present some
analysis of the data at some fu~ure date. The material has already
been excerpted for the Dictionary of Newfoundland English.
Because of the paucity of published information on Newfoundland
vocabulary, it is felt that the publication of the experimental checklist
here may serve a useful purpose. At the same time it will give
permanency to the original duplicated document, and also, I hope,
stimulate comment and criticism. The checklist is reproduced here in
its original form, apart from a few minor corrections. The original
checklist is identified by the MUN Folklore and Language Archive
designation Q64B, C/L 1 W. The revised version printed here is
designated Q64B C/L 1 W-64, rev. 75.
34
CHECKLIST OF NEWFOUNDLAND EXPRESSIONS
1. Please circle the word(s) used by your informant in each group.
2. Add any other words used by your informant which have similar
meanings to those listed but which are not actually on the List.
3. Please add any other details or explanations which might help us
after each group.
EXAMPLE: TO SHAKE WITH COLD: bibber, bivver~shiver
1. SMALL, YELLOW, EDIBLE BERRY, GROWING CLOSE TO THE
GROUND: bake-apple (Please add other terms):
2. TO BOIL FISH IN THE CAN: bath
3. VERY THIN PIECES OF KINDLING WOOD: bavvins, bavvens,
bayvins, chobies, chovies, shobies, shovies, spills, spalls, spells, splits
4. SMALL, CREEPING INSECTS IN BEDS ETC: bedflies, bedbugs,
lice, bugs, lops, greybacks, saddlebacks
5. TO STAY; REMAIN: bide, tarry, stay
6. CROSS; PEEVISH: billacy, binnacy, binecky, binicky
7. LONG-HANDLED SWEEPING UTENSIL: beesom, beezom, bisn,
bism, broom, brum, brosh, brush
8. TO SHAKE WITH COLD: bibber, bivver, didder, shiver
9. Do you use BOGIE to mean: a small stove in the home (or on ship);
piece of wood put in the stove; stick for stirring paint etc; the Devil;
some kind of frightening figure
10. A !\.fEAL IN THE EARLY MORNING: braffus, breffus, breakfast,
breakfas, breakfus
11. HARD BREAD; SHIP'S BISCUIT: bread
12. TO BUSTLE; HUSTLE: husk, firk, fadge
13. CROOKED; BENT: cam, cam-crooked
14. STICK FOR MIXING CAKES, PORRIDGE ETC: chem, chim,
shem, shim, ladle, mundel, old mundel, porridge-stick, leydat
15. LARGE PADDED SEAT FOR TWO OR MORE PEOPLE:
chesterfield, couch, daybed, settle, sofa
35
16. SQUARE HOLES IN CHIMNEYS FOR ODDS AND ENDS:
clayvies, clavvies
17. SHELF OVER MANTELPIECE: clayvy, clavvy
18. C U T OR SLICED, AS WITH A HATCHET : cleaved, clivd, cleft,
clift, clove
19. A BREW; STEW: coction
20. HARD ; SEVERE: cowly
21 . ENERGETIC ; FAST : cozy
22 . TO GRIND WITH THE TEETH: cranch, craunch, crunch, m u n ch ,
scranch, scraunch, scrunch
23 . SMALL PIECE OF DRY WOOD : crannic k , chronic, crunnick
2 4. STUNTED , WE A THERBEAT EN TRE E: crannick , chronic ,
crunnic k , r ampike, starrigan
2 5. TO CHOOSE : cull
2 6. T O C U R L : curdle
27. THE DEVIL: Bad Man, Black Man, Old Boy, Old Man, Old Nick,
Old Scratch , Old H ornie, Satan, The Devil, Old Fellow
28. HE
INTO T HE WATER: dived, dove, doved
29. PUDDING WITH FRUIT IN: figgy duff, figgy dough, figgity
pudding
30. LARGE SPARK: blanker , flanker
LARGE SNOWFLAKE: blanker, flanker
31. TO STEAL: flip, flop, prig, swipe
TO GO FAST : flip, flop
32. THIN, LEATHER SHOELACE: fong, thong, lace
33 . THE PLACE WAS
(in an uproar ; state of disorder): all in
a reeraw /flop tio njrookery /upr oar; out of kilter /kelter
34. TO MOVE THE HANDS OF THE CLOCK FORWA RDS: to flog
the t ime t o
35. RED-HAIRED: foxy, foxy-haired, fox-haired; carrot-top
36. DISH OF WHEAT BOILED IN MILK AND FLAVOURED:
frumitty, frume nty, frumatty
36
37. COVER OF BOOK: farrell, farl, varl
38. JOKER: ONE WHO TAKES A RISE OUT OF HIS NEIGHBOUR
ETC: gladger, gladyer, gledger, gledyer
39. STRAPS ETC FOR SUPPORTING TROUSERS (worn over
shoulders) : gallows, galluses, suspenders, braces
40. LEGS: gams
BACKSIDE: gam
41 . WOOLLEN SWEATER : gimp, gansy, ganzy, guernsey, guernzey,
gayunsy, gayunzy
42. TO SWALLOW : glutch, gulch, swalli
DIFFICULTY: glutch, gulch
TO SWALLOW WITH
43. THE MOUTH: gob
4 4. F OOLISH P E RSON: T ERM OF GENERAL REPROACH: dodtrel,
dod tril, dott re l, d ottril , dumbell, bostoon, gommel, gommil,
gommerel, gomm eril, guffie, joskin, kenat, nokes, sappy-head,
ownshook, oonshook, scoopendike, scrumshy , omaloor, omadaun,
omadhaun, oonshick, t angier. (Please give details of meanings)
scut, sleveen, sno t, stunpoll, st unpole
45. GODPARENT: gossip, gozzib
46 . NIGHTMARES: the diddies, the hags, the old hags, yaps, y ons,
nightmares
47. POOR OR SICK PERSON DESERVING SYMPATHY: angishore ,
poor angishore, hangashore, poor hangashore, kenat, pilgarlic, bum,
slink
MISERABLE, WEAK PERSON: angishore, poor angishore,
hangashore, poor hangashore, kenat, pilgarlic, b u m, slink
48. AXE: hatchet, axe
49. HEARTH STONE: heart rock, hearth rock, flag
50. HE
THE ROCK: heaved, hove, hivd, hoove, hooved
51. STOVE-OIL: ile, stove-He, hile, stove-hile, oil, stove-oil, hoil,
stove-hoil, kerosene, karosene
52. BOOTS: hocks
53. CASE FOR NEEDLES AND THREAD: house wife, huzzif, hussif,
huzzive
37
54. COMMON SENSE: gumption, humgumption
55. MAN DOGGED BY BAD LUCK: jader, jinker, jinx
UNSUCCESSFUL SEALING CAPTAIN: jader, jinker, jinx
ONE WHO BRINGS BAD LUCK: jader, jinker, jinx
56. DEVICE FOR CATCHING FISH, JERKED UP AND DOWN:
jig, jigger
SCALES OR STEELYARDS FOR WEIGHING: jig, jigger
BACKSIDE: jig
57. TO QUEER, SPOIL: jink, jade, jinx
58. PEOPLE WHO DRESS UP ETC. AT CHRISTMAS, HALLOWEEN
AND OTHER TIMES: jannies, johnnies, mummers, old fools,
oldteaks, darbies, fools, morgans, jennies
59. A SHORT COAT: joycie, joyzie
60. SOFT BREAD: loaf, boughten bread
61. DISH OF SALT MEAT, VEGETABLES, SHIP'S BISCUIT ETC:
lobscouse, scouse, lobscoose, scoff, skilly
62. FOOLISH: loowardly, fond, foolish, stunned
63. DRUNK: maggotty, tight, corned, full to the horn, three sheets in
the wind, three sheets to the wind
64. EAR: lug
HANDLES ON SIDE OF BARREL ETC: lugs
65. SERIOUS COURTING: mashin
66. CHILD BORN OUT OF WEDLOCK: ILLEGITIMATE CHILD:
merrybegot, merry-me-got, moonlight child, moss child, come-bychance
67. TO REMEMBER: mind
68. TO PESTER, CONFUSE, UPSET: moider, midder, moither, mither
69. SMALL WATER-CASK: monkey
70. TO PLAY TRUANT: mouch, mooch, go on the pimp, play hookey,
meech, meesh, moush, moosh, slinge, monch, monsh, muff, muck
LOAFER; IDLER, muff, muck
TO LOAF, IDLE: muff, muck, mouch, mooch, moush, moosh,
meech, meesh
38
71. HARD CAKES OF FLOUR, MOLASSES AND SEAL FAT:
pantiles
72. SMALL, SLOPING TEA-KETTLE: pompey, piper, tea-piper,
kettle, kittle, tea-kettle, tea-kittle
7 3. SMALL BUCKET: peggin, piggin, pudgel, spudgel
74. COMB FOR THE HAIR: rack
75. HE
THE DROWNING MAN: saved, sove, soved
76. A BIG MEAL: scoff, fongo
77. CHILLED OR NUMBED WITH COLD: scrammed, scranned,
starved
78. SMALL, THIN PANCAKES: gandies, damper-boys, dough-boys,
duff-boys, platters, platers, flatjacks, flapjacks, slap-me-asses,
fritters, slitters, bang-bellies, turnovers
79. TEA-KETTLE (LARGE): slut
80. TAINTED, SPOILED: smatchy, spiled, spoiled
81. OLD MAID: snaz
82. LARGE NAILS SUCH AS THOSE USED IN BOOTMAKING:
frosters, sparbles, sparrables, sperrables
83. TAP ON A BARREL: spigot, spile
84. CHAPPED BY THE COLD: sprayed, chapped, chepped
85. UPPER LEATHER OF SHOE, strad
86. DIRTY, SLOVENLY WOMAN: streel, trollop, beater
87. FOOD OR DRINK GIVEN TO MUMMERS ETC: some Christmas,
Christmas, berry-ocky, berry-orky, squattum
88. SCREWDRIVER: turnscrew
89. TO FOOL A PERSON: douse
TO GIVE A QUICK BLOW: douse
90. QUEER FEELING WHEN SICK: droll
91. THE TIME JUST BEFORE SUNSET: duckies, duckish, between
the duckies
92. TO EMPTY: empt
39
93. DIRTY, UNTIDY: fowstie, frowzie
MOULDY: fowstie, frowzie
94. TOADSTOOL: fairy, fairy cap, black man's cap
95. CRAZY ; MENTALLY UNSTABLE: gobby, cracked, foolish, fond
96 . MEAL (LIGHT SNACK) AT ELEVEN A .M .: elevener, snack,
sneck, mug-up, lunch, lonch
GLASS OF GROG ETC ON SHIP AT ELEV EN A.M . : eleven er
97. BUILD ING WHERE HORSE S ARE KEPT: barn, shippen, shippon
BUIL DING WHERE COWS ARE K E P T: barn, cowhouse, shippen,
shippon
BUILDING WHE R E PIGS ARE KEPT: pig-pound, pig-pen, hogpound, hog-pen, sty, pigsty
BUILDING WHERE HAY ETC. IS STORED: barn, cowhouse,
shippen, shippon
98. I WAS
PLEASED TO SEE HIM: right, very, some
99. PLATFORM ON WHICH YOU STEP JUST OUTSIDE THE
FRONT DOOR: porch, gallery, bridge, stoop
1 00. LIGHT MEAL ANY TIME OF THE DAY: snack, sneck, prog,
mug-up, lunch, lonch, fourer, nunch, grub
PLEASE ADD ANY FURTHER DETAILS (e.g. comments, items of
interest, local customs, traditions etc) IN THE SPACE BELOW, AND
COMPLETE THE FOLLOWING DETAILS:
Name of informant:
Age:
Community where hom and raised:
Present place of residence:
Has informant moved to many places or stayed mostly at place
of birth?
Principal occupation:
Education grade (if any):
40
Aspects of Urban Legend as a Performance Genre
Georgina Smith
The ubiquity of urban legends attests to their attraction as a performance genre. In performance, however, the basic nature of such legends
can represent a source of conflict for the narrator. This paper proposes
that in their redactions of urban legends, individuals resolve such
conflict by "distancing" formulae - verbal and physical devices which
set the problematic content of the legend at an acceptable remove
from the performer.
Urban legends combine belief, spatial and temporal immediacy and
gruesome or psychologically loaded 1 subject matter. For some individuals, this "closeness" and involvement can only be permitted expression
thJ:ough some mediating detachment of the teller from the tale. A
performer has three possible choices in communicating a narrative held
in her or his repertoire in the form of an urban legend:
1.
It can be told as an anecdote attached to the narrator, and thus
incorporated into her or his presentation of self. 2
2.
It can be semi-incorporated, by attaching it to a relative, named
friend or local character - the degree of incorporation varying
with the closeness of the relationship existing between the
performer and the "participant" named in the narrative.
3.
It can be "distanced" or detached from the performer by giving no
source for the narrative - even to the exclusion of self-linking
introductory formulae such as "I heard ... " or " X told me . . . "
In performance, these options provide a finely-graduated continuum of
involvement of the teller with the content of the narrative. Although
urban legends have all too rarely been published in transcript form,
some examination of the general workings of this process is possible.
From Susan Smith's collection of nine narratives, 3 it is apparent that
only one urban legend - the fairly innocuous "Vanishing Hitchhiker",
appears in semi-incorporated form, attached to a girlfriend's best friend
and her father. Of the others, all of which involved more problematic
content, six begin with the formulaically detaching-'There was ... ' and
two are distanced by linking them to non-specific participants- 'A guy
and his girlfriend' and 'Two girls'.
41
From the variants of the "Chinese Restaurant" legends collected by
P. S. Smith, G. Shorrocks and the writer,4 it was found that narrators
would, on initially recounting the story, not give their source, although
when questioned, a peer or named colleague could generally be cited.
In the case of this legend, it seemed that the conflict between the
enjoyment of foreign food and fear of its strange and even unknown
ingredients could only be resolved by distancing through an impersonal
performance which, however, retained its "involvement" by utilising a
detailed local setting. 5
It has been suggested by Linda Degh and Andrew Vazsonyi, that
distancing, 'the fading of the personal element' is symptomatic of
decreasing degrees of proof or even expressive of doubt in memorate
forms. 6 The association of problematic content with memorate-type
possibilities of performance can, however, be seen to reduce the general
application of this principle.
Depending on the context of the performance, distancing can take very
elaborate forms. The performer, his or her audience, the setting of the
performance and the content of the legend are major dynamics in this
process. Further, where there is complementary performance, in which
two or more individuals are exchanging narratives, the need to maintain
the level of interaction and to participate equally or dominate is a high
priority. In such a situation, the requirement of following a topical
cluster, 7 may, for example, involve the performer in a complex decision
about the form in which a narrative held in her or his repertoire is
recounted.
The dynamic effect of context and level of communication on performance of urban legends is exemplified in the following description of a
retelling of such a narrative as part of normal discourse. During a dinner
party conversation between one American, one Canadian and three
English acquaintances, interaction had taken the conventional form of
discussion of the weather, in which all, as guests, had participated.
When the subject of "Rag stunts", B was raised, however, as a
phenomenon generally found in British universities, the flow of interaction came to be dominated verbally and temporally by the English
participants. Various forms of narrative were introduced, notably
anecdotes and · memorates. Although the American contributed a
"hazing" legend, however, the Canadian, whilst giving every sign of
wishing to maintain his part in the interaction, could not follow the
topical cluster of performance directly, having no Rag stunt or hazing
42
narratives in his repertoire. Taking the break in the pattern of narrative
caused by the hazing legend, but following the overall university topic
and legend form, however, he told a version of the "Cadaver's Arm".
In this variant, medical students cut the penis off a corpse and go to
the men's room of a popular bar. When one of the bar patrons goes into
the room, a student stands in front of the urinal holding the severed
penis out of his trousers, as though about to urinate. After a few
moments, the student makes a great show of wrenching off "his" penis
and flinging it to the other side of the room, yelling, "Well you never
did work anyhow!"
On a purely social basis, such a narrative, recounted in mixed company
during a meal, was an obvious source of possible solecism. The narrator
was clearly aware of this, but was also strongly motivated to participate
in the interaction and maintain the level of communication. To distance
himself from the subject itself and its possible inappropriateness in such
a social context, the narrator used an elaborate series of verbal and
physical devices. Recognising firstly that he was breaking the cluster,
but indicating his wish to participate, he began:
"Well, I don't know anything about that, but, [pushing back his
chair from the table and thus modifying the social requirements
of his role as a dinner guest] ''there's this story- I don't know
if its true, it may not be. I don't know exactly when it was, but
some medical students ... "
Later he explained that he had originally heard the legend in more
precise detail, naming the bar and also the university involved, and
setting the incident just before he began courses there. With this
information available to him, it is clear that it would have been possible
for him to have performed the legend in any of the three forms
outlined earlier. The context of this performance, and the subject
matter of the legend, however, led him to choose elaborate verbal and
physical distancing formulae to preface its narration.
It may, of course, be argued that performers of legends who employ
distancing formulae are simply recounting a text exactly as it was
transmitted to them, or have implicit perceptions of the form of such
narratives which lead them to use particular prefacing fonnulae. When
asked about their use of names, non-specific characters or other aspects
of distancing, however, informants have almost invariably said that in
the case of some narratives, they were reluctant to link named
characters or someone they knew with the subject matter described.
43
The form of leg~n~ is free, and is thus capable of performance using
a variety of linguistic styles and devices. The availability of distancing
formulae allows the extent of detachment between the performer and
the events described to be adapted over a wide range according to the
context of performance and psychological involvement with the
content of the legend. This flexibility thus emerges as a considerable
dynamic in the performance, transmission and generation of this
potentially conflict-laden genre.
NOTES
1. This aspect of legend is more comprehensively discussed in Alan Dundes, "On the
Psychology of Legend", in American Folk Legend: A Symposium, ed. Wayland D.
Hand (Los Angeles and London: University of California Press, 1971), p~.21-36.
2 . Although some interchange of fabulate and memorate has been identified in
repertoire studies (see for example, Robert S. McCarl, Jr., "Smokejumper
Initiation : Ritualized Communication in a Modern Occupation", Journal of
American Folklore, LXXXIX (1976), 58), I have as yet found no examples of
urban legends occurring as memorates, though this option exil?ts as a possibility in
performance.
3 . Susan Smith, "Urban Tales", in Folklore of Canada, ed. Edith Fowke (Toronto :
McClelland and Stewart, 1976), pp. 262-68.
4 . A research project aimed at collecting all variants o f this urban legend is presently
being undertaken by Graham Shorrocks, Paul Smith and Georgina Smith. SeeP. S .
& M . G. Smith, "Chinese Restaurant Stories" , Lore & Language, I, 6 (1972), 15
and f urther notes in Lore & Language, I, 7 (1972), 25; I, 9 (1973), 20 ; II, 3 (1975) ,
30.
5 . William Hugh Jansen in his stimulating discussion of legend as a widespread
contemporary phenomenon ("Legend: Oral Tradition in the Modern Experience",
in Folklore Today : A Festschrift for Richard M . Dorson, ed. Linda Degh, Henry
Glassie and Felix J. Oinas (Bloomington: Indiana University, 1976), 265-272)
suggests that as a genre they involve "a sense of proprietorship" which is common
to both audience and narrator. The evocation of common experience of place can
be seen as an important contributory factor in thiS interaction .
6. Linda Degh and Andrew Vazsonyi, "The Memorate and the Proto-Memorate, "
Journal of American Folklore, LXXXVII (1974), 231.
7. For a further discussion of this phenomenon in narrative performance see Katherine
Young, " Indirection in Storytelling", Western Folklore, XXXVII ( 197 8 ), 46-55. ·
8. The public practical jokes perpetrated by ~niversity students during the period of
licence in aid of charity known as "Rag Week" . Examples of some of the better
known rag stunts are described in F. A. Reeve, Varsity Rags and Hoaxes
(Cambridge: Oleander Press, 1977).
44
Ache be: The Literary Function of Proverbs
. and Proverbial Sayings in Tvvo Novels
Chukwuma Okoye
I
The Igbo have a rich tradition of verbal lore of which the following are
the primary categories: folktales; legends; myths ; proverbs; idioms ;
witticism; folk drama, oration, song and verse; and what might be called
formalised folk speech. The last category would include title names,
phatic communion or greetings, nicknames (good or bad) and certain
"set phrases" or formulas. Two examples of set phrases are Umuofia
Kwenu and ekene m unu, which are used to open and close a formal
public address respectively. Another is onye weteli oji weteli ndul,
a usual opening formula for kola-blessing ritual. In their anthology,
lgbo Traditional Verse~ R. N. Egudu and D. N. Nwoga identify seven
categories of Igbo folk verse: praise poems, invocation, incantation,
dance poems, relaxation poems, satirical poems and dirges. But their
list is not exhaustive. In relation to our theme folk oration is very
important; but unfortunately little attention has been paid to it in the
current upsurge of research into Igbo folklore.
The perpetuation of culture is perhaps the most unconscious function
of folklore. Other obvious functions of Igbo verbal art are bound up
with the education of the young; entertainment; instruction and social
control; initiations and culturalization; and the enrichment of language
and self-expression.
It is difficult to say which of the various verbal art forms is the most
popular~ The proverb, folktale and folksong seem to be the most
popular among the Igbo. The proverb and folktale cut across dialectal
boundaries; but every community is rich in its own folksong. People
can be heard singing different types of folksongs daily - on the farm
and other places of occupational activity; during dances and entertainments; on the way to and back from the stream, at the village
squares and homes , etc. Modernization has reduced_the popularity of
folktales since little children who would otherwise gather round to
listen to, and to tell, folktales at night now have to read or engage in
some other activity not considered "idle". But the proverb retains its
place and dignity.
45
The Igbo set great store by proverbs and the effective use of language;
among elders it is indispensable~ Without it therefore the discourse of
adult fictional characters in a novel about Igbo society in Okonkwo 's
and Ezeulu 's milieu loses the hallmark of authenticity. If Roland Christ
knew this, he would probably not have blundered into declaring
Ache be as "meaninglessly proverbial"~ Since proverbs are distillation of
the time-honoured wisdom of the race, they are quoted to validate and
fortify statements, to invest an idea or disputed fact with ancestral
authority. Orators are held in high regard, and age-grades choose
spokesmen with great care. This is not surprising among a tenaciously
republican people who practise primary democracy, and who, as a rule,
insist that every man, every group, that has a vote and a voice must be
heard in every assembly before any binding decision is taken. This
republican spirit affects the use of language. There is no prize for
irrelevant padding, rhetorical flourishes or cheap praise of king or chief,
for there is no king, dictator or overlord? In a trial the jury is always
composed of many people , not a one-man-judge affair, and the need for
clear, direct, unexaggerated, precise and concise, yet evocative and
colourful language can hardly be overemphasized. What one says and
how one says it determines o ne's fate. A loss could mean exile or death.
In such a situation the terse epigrammatic nature of the proverb,
coupled with the many cultu ral values it encapsulates, makes it an
indispensable tool. It is impossible to reach distinction in oration
without a h igh measure of virtuosity in the use of proverbs, since in
public address it is one of, if not actually the most effective of
rhetorical d evices. The prover b, the Igbo insist, is the palm oil with
which words are eaten- and that not only in the distant past but also in
pre sent day Igbo so ciety.
II
In T h ings Fall Apart and A rrow of God 7Achebe uses some one hundred
and thirty one d if f erent proverbs , over o ne hundred of w hich are in the
la t ter novel. Some of these proverbs are used repeated ly in both novels.
The proverb about the toad !3for example , is used by three different
characters in Arrow of God and twice in Things F all A part. These
p r overbs, like any other, have thr e e levels of meanings: the philosophical,
contextual, and literal. A chebe n ever appeals to the literal. The
p hilosophical points up the ge neral truth . Achebe in tegrates philosophical and contextual import. At the literal level some proverbs merely
evoke imagery. Thus while the proverb about t he puppy which tried to
answer two calls at once and broke its jaw gains force in a proper
context, at the literal level it merely conjures up imagery - though of a
truly poetic kind.
46
Arrow of God is about one hundred pages longer than Things Fall
Apart. But it is not just its length that accounts for the larger number
of proverbs in it. In Arrow of God there are serious conflicts,
disputations, events and relationships which make the frequent use of
proverbs inevitable. There is, for example, the Ogbazulobodo episode consequent upon the second burial ceremony of Aneto's father
(pp. 279-284 ). In the short incantatory invocation or gnomic boast
characteristic of the Ogbazulobodo, Obika utters -twenty-five proverbs .
(pp. 282-283), more proverbs than there are in the whole of Things
Fall Apart. Also the type of characters matters. In stature and language,
Ezeulu and Nwaka have no close approximations in Things Fall Apart.
Obierika may measure up to Akubue but the latter's position makes
him a vehicle for a greateJ flow of proverbs. He uses over fifteen
different proverbs; Obierika only two; Ezeulu thirty!
All proverbs are explainable by means of substitution of correct
analogues, and are therefore metaphorical. But some of the proverbs
are, as it were, more metaphorical than others in terms of their referential or literal meanings. Their literal meanings are not realisable; they
are couched in figurative language which is not expressive of actual
possible life events. Thus the first three of the following proverbs are
statements of observable facts in contrast to the last two which are not:
When the mother cow is chewing grass its young ones watch its
mouth. (Tp 6 4) If a child washed his hands he could eat with
kings. (Tp 8) The outsider who wept louder than the bereaved.
(Ap.60 Tp.167) The puppy which attempted to answer two calls
and broke its jaw (A p.232) Darkness is so great it gives homs to
a dog. (Ap.282)
It is difficult to classify Achebe's proverbs under a few headings. Some
of them have equivalents in distant cultures. For example "As soon as
you shake hands with a leper he will want an embrace", is the Igbo
equivalent of the English "Give him an inch and he will take a mile",
while "The flute player must sometimes stop to wipe his nose" readily
recalls "He who preaches the Gospel must live by the Gospel!" The
proverb abqut the flute player is in fact used in a religious context in
the novel (App.145-149) . . But it would be wrong to classify the
proverbs a.S either universal or culture-bound on that basis. Every
proverb is a universal statement and at the same time culture-bound,
like language itself. Moreover, the classifier may not have enough knowledge of other cultures to know which proverbs of the reference culture
47
have equivalents in them. Besides, differences among human groups are
no pointers to the sameness of human experiences and world view
which languages reflect and aspects of which are reduced to memorable
forms in proverbs. It is also difficult to classify Achebe's proverbs
according to their subjects. In a sense there are as many subjects as
there are proverbs! Classification according to function is not simple
either. How, for instance, would one classify "When mother-cow is
chewing grass its young ones watch its mouth"?
Generally, however, Achebe's proverbs are capsules of moral, social
and spiritual values, or simply traditionally accepted expressions of
commonsense observation. Many express the need for ideal conduct and
moderation; some, like the one just quoted, belong to the commonsense observation class. The proverbs are not expressed as commands,
neither are the ideals they embody hard to attain. This does not,
however, mean that in every context in which they are used a clear
course of action is discernible. What constitutes ideal conduct, for
instance, may be disputable in some contexts. One of the interesting
things about the proverbs is the variability of their contexts, with the
result that opposing parties could validly use the same proverb to
buttress their claims by applying it in different contexts. Alternatively
one could cite a different proverb to confute another's viewpoint, as
the conflict between Nwaka and Ezeulu shows. In some instances the
proverbs relate to experiences in successful living.
Most of the proverbs are spoken in conversations by the characters
themselves; only a few appear in authorial comment, report, narrative
or narrated monologue. But few though they are, I think they are
pointers to Achebe's own implicit judgement.
Some of the proverbs which seem so simple on the surface have great
philosophical depth. To this group belong the proverbs which, as it
were, def~e, often in seemingly contradictory terms, the relationship
between man and the spirit world. A study of the proverbs would reveal
much about Igbo beliefs, attitude to life and world view which pervade
both novels. The Igbo believe strongly in personal effort, in individual
destiny, in the capacity of the individual, and firmly endorse the will to
achievement. This is expressed in the proverb onye kwe chi e kwe -
if a man says yes his chi also says yes. But there is always need for
moderation. The Igbo therefore set a limit to the inordinate overreacher
by warning: "No man can rise beyond the destiny of his chi".
But proverbs feature in the two novels.
48
One of the disadvantages which the proverbs suffer in translation is
that some of their stylistic devices, especially terseness and euphony,
are denied much of their native force. Onye kwe chi e kwe is a fair
example. It is also noteworthy that in spite of the abundance of
proverbs, certain types are not used in certain fields of discourse. For
example, legalistic proverbs are not used in the trial in Things Fall
Apart. There would be nothing unpardonably wrong if Uzowulu
opened his case by saying awo anaghi agba oso ehihie n 'efuP or for the
defence to open with it. But a close study of the statements of
Uzowulu and Odukwe would reveal the insistence on relevance, brevity
and directness. In so important a trial (Egwugwu compose the jury)
there is little room for embellishment, and a proverb such as the above
would be irrelevant. The presence of the Egwugwu as judges takes good
care of whatever sense of importance either might want to attach to the
quarrel by using such a proverb. Achebe does not use proverbs
indiscriminately, he uses them judiciously. It is not so much the field
of discourse that determines the use of a proverb as it is the immediate
context. Proverbs are therefore used aptly, effortlessly, unobtrusively,
instinctively - as in daily life.
III
In spite of adverse criticism1? Bemth Lindfors' study remains a very
important signpost on Achebe's use of proverbs. He identifies some of
the essential functions of proverbs and tries to relate Achebe's language
to the aura of authenticity which surrounds the novels. Its shortcomings are those we associate with inspired pioneer studies. Achebe
himself states the primary functions of the proverb:
"Those who wonder why literate Africans take so little interest
in collecting their proverbs may not be fully aware that proverbs
by themselves have little significance. They are like dormant
seeds in the dry-season earth, waiting for the rain. In Igbo they
serve two important ends. They enable the speaker to give
universal status to a special and particular incident and they are
used to soften the harshness of words and make them more
palatable." 11
The literary use of proverbs must therefore be seen in the context of
Achebe 's use of language. Five main literary functions are easily
identifiable, with the necessary qualification that the proverb does not
perform any of these in isolation since it is, as Ruth Finnegan
accurately notes, "just one aspect of artistic expression within a whole
49
social and literary context. " 1 2 The reference to social context is very
important if only because inadequate knowledge of it could lead to a
misinterpretation of the proverb in relation to themes, values, and
beliefs of the reference culture.
(a) Proverbs are pointers to themes and values.
(b) They contribute immensely to Ache be's artistic realism;
he uses them in order to recreate the past credibly,
authentically.
(c) Some proverbs lend themselves to ironic, sarcastic and
satirical uses.
(d) They are useful in characterization.
(e) Proverbs are pointers to individual, group and communal
responses to situations.
The central theme of the two novels is change; they are concemed with
the responses of Umuofia and Umuaro to .an alien culture. The
acceptance of the alien culture would inevitably alter former pattems
of life. The proverbs in Things Fall Apart emphasise the need for
moderation, coexistence, tolerance, commonsense, communal cohesion,
individual and communal responsibility, and the importance of personal
effort and material achievement.
"Let the kite perch and let the eagle perch. If one says no to
the other, may his wing break. (pp 17-18) When a man says
yes his chi also says yes (p.25) Looking at a king's mouth one
would think he never sucked at his mother's breast (p.24) If
a child washed his hands he could eat with kings. If one hand
brought oil it soiled the others. (p.114) Eneke the bird said
that since men have leamt to shoot without missing, he has
leamt to fly without perching." (p.20)
Okonkwo is the tragic hero. Current interpretations of his dilemma see
him as an energetic man struggling against a too powerful adversary, his
fate. Abiola Irele, one of the insightful critics of the tragic in Achebe,
sees this fate as symbolised by Okonkwo 's chi1 ~ Bemth Lindfors shares
the same view but adds a denial: "This adversary is not the white man. "14
The validity of the denial is disputable. The concept of Okonkwo
struggl~g against his chi loses much of its significance if it is not tied to
the situation which gives fate victory over the tragic hero. The situation
is the activity of the new culture which gives a final irretrievable twist
50
to his flaws. The tragedy of the individual Okonkwo derives from his
lack of capacity for change. Change is brought and symbolised by the
Christian culture and white administration and Okonkwo is bitterly
opposed to both. The excesses of the new converts and Mr. Smith make
confrontation and disaster inevitable.
"What is it that has happened to our people?" Okonkwo asks
in anger. "We must fight these men and drive them from the
land." (p.159)
In terms of mere material success Okonwo was not at war with his chi,
for in spite of exile he progressed. He returned quite prosperous, adding
"two new wives" to his family. Hence his feeling that his hitherto
seemingly unco-operative -chi seems to be "making amends". The only
big bone in the throat of the new Okonkwo is not his chi but the new
culture which has set up new values and a higher authority than the old
order in which alone his aspirations can be fully realised. He therefore
cannot will himself free of fierce opposition to it, even when he does
not do violence to its representatives. He was, for instance, cautious
enough to spare Mr. Brown when the latter visited him despite the sad
subject of his visit- the conversion of Okonkwo's son, Nwoye. But he
did not offer him any seat, and did warn Mr. Brown never to take such
a risk again.
Moreover, part of what we imply when we argue that "Okonkwo is
crushed because he tries to wrestle with his chi" is that he should have
accepted life as he found it rather than make conscious effort to change
it. Okonkwo represents, among other things, the will to achievement,
an affirmation of the Igbo faith that every man is his own salvation. His
fall is not an a priori demonstration of Umuofia's acceptance of fatalism.
Neither does the proverbial anecdote about the nza imply it. At the
heart of the latter is a warning against the intoxicated overreacher which Okonkwo is not.
Again, Okonkwo's (tragic) loyalty is not just to himself and his aspirations, but even more to his community; he assumes responsibility not
merely to save himself but Umuofia as a whole. It is precisely because
he has risen to the rank of a living guardian of the land that he assumes
this responsibility. His sense of communal responsibility, his desire to
maintain communal cohesion and preserve the integrity of traditional
culture, is the altar upon which he immolates his life.
It is the supreme irony of Things Fall Apart that in his struggle to
hinder change Okonkwo was not only at odds with the colonial
51
administration but was also set against the current of thought in
Umuofia, and against a fundamental principle of the culture he sought
to defend, a principle enunciated by the Egwugwu (pp 171-172) and
implicit in the proverb "Let the kite perch and let the eagle perch -'',
Both Umuofia and Umuaro show that when there is a genuine need for
change whoever lacks the capacity for it must either remain isolated or
give way because rigidity at such a time is anti-progress, anti-life.
Okonkwo was therefore alone, although he had many sympathisers:
"There were many in Umuofia who did not feel as strongly as
Okonkwo about the new dispensation. And even in the matter
of religion there was a growing feeling that there might be
something in it after all." (p.161)
Okonkwo is not a philosopher. He lacks the vision to see the futility of
his heroism. The two proverbs onye kwe chi e kwe and "A man
cannot rise beyond the destiny of his chi" provide a cultural screen
against which his struggles can be seen, and make his fall all the more
pathetic by showing us one of the valid mainsprings of his great
material and spiritual aspirations.
Okonkwo's fall is personal and symbolic; it is the fall of an individual in
a given circumstance; thematically it is the drama and symbol of the
inevitability of change. That change is witnessed by those who
cautiously chose to wait-and-see; the underdogs who selfinterestedly
revolted against the old order; and those who having tasted of the
benefits of the new dispensation, or simply out of fear chose tolerance
and coexistence. To the Igbo the fear or the calculated tolerance of a
greater power is not so much an instance of cowardice as it is a matter
of commonsense, of intelligent appraisal. Patience and tolerance
become even the brave. Such patient tolerance could be vital to
physical survival which often eludes the quick-acting brave man of a
fiery temper. Thus Ezeulu uses two important proverbs to instruct and
warn his courageous and quick-tempered son, Obika:
"We often stand in the compound of the coward to point at
the ruins where a brave man used to live. The man who has
never submitted to anything will soon submit to the burial
mat." (p 139)
Okonkwo lacks his father's only redeeming feature, creative
imagination, even if Unaka does not use that imagination to achieve
material greatness. Very much like Obika, though by far greater (and
52
older) Okonkwo is simply the man of action, not of a profound
reflective capacity- unlike his intimate and faithful friend, Obierika.
In the light of others' reaction it would appear that Okonkwo broke off
like the wing of the more unaccommodating of the two birds: "let the
kite perch and let the eagle perch; if one says no to the other let his
wing break." But it should be noted that the proverb is not used in the
context of the dissonance between Okonkwo and the new dispensation,
not even in a situation of conflict. The elder Nwakibia used it while
praying for Okonkwo, and contextually the reference is limited to the
natives of Umuofia.
It is in Arrow of God that many proverbs cluster round the main
themes. Here the emphasis is on responsible behaviour, ideal conduct,
communal well-being, tolerance and the need for change:
"If the lizard of the homestead neglects to do the things for
which its kind is known, it will be mistaken for the lizard of
the farmland. (pp 20-21) When an adult is in the house the
she-goat is not left to suffer the pains of parturition on its
tether (p 21) A man who sends a child to catch a shrew must
also give him water to wash his hand. (p 87) We are like the
puppy in the proverbs which attempted to answer two calls
at once and broke its jaw. (p232) A man who knows his
anus is small does not swallow an Udala seed. (p 87) A man
who brings home ant-infested faggots should not complain
if he is visited by lizards. (p 72) A man must dance the dance
prevalent in his time. No man, however great, is greater than
his people." (p287).
The proverbs that touch upon responsibility and propriety of conduct
outnumber those on any other single subject. One of them, the second
on the list, is used four times. In Arrow of God proverbs are used in
contexts in which they "clarify conflict", "sound and reiterate themes"
as Lindfors says. They specify two aspects of responsibility. First a man
is responsible for his own action, a corollary of Igbo belief in individualism. A more strident proverb than Achebe's which expresses the same
view is onye ji isi kota ebu, ya ka ebu ga-agbaJ.-5 Secondly, a man is
expected to behave responsibly. Unlike Okonkwo, Ezeulu, the tragic
hero, is intellectual. But he is opinionated and powerdrunk. Nwaka's
violent opposition to Ezeulu derives partly from his awareness of the
Chief Priest's growing power mania. His fall too arises from resistance
to change.
53
On Ezeulu's return from the prison the community expected him to eat
the left-over yams and declare the harvest season open. But the priest,
spoiling for vengeance, and bolstered by an exaggerated estimate of his
powers, would not. As the crisis deepens the elders meet him twice and
assure him that they would be wholly responsible for any mishap that
might arise from his eating the yams:
"You will be free because we set you to it, and the person who
sets a child to catch a shrew should also find him water to wash
the odour from his hands. We shall find you water." (p.260).
Ezeulu, however, refuses to be communalized and traditionalized, and
holds fast to a unique personal vision of religious sanction and
propriety of action:
"Leaders of Umuaro, do not say that I am treating your words
with contempt; it is not my wish to do so. But you cannot say:
do what is not done and we shall take the blame." (p.261)
But we know, and Ezeulu knows, that the community has the power it
claims, as witness the first coming of Ulu:
"As he approached the centre of the market place Ezeulu re-enacted
the first coming of Ulu and how each of the four days put obstacles
in his way. 'At that time' he said, 'when lizards were still in· ones and
twos, the whole people assembled and chose me to carry their new
deity. I said to them: "Who am I to carry this fire on my bare head?
A man who knows his anus is small does not swallow an Udala seed."
'They said to me, "Fear not. The man who sends a child to catch a
shrew will also give him water to wash his hand." 'I said: "So be it."
'And we set to work. The day was Eke; we worked into Oye and
then into Afo. As day broke on Nkwo and the sun carried its
sacrifice I carried my Alusi and, with all the people behind me, set
out on the journey. A man sang with the flute on my right and
another replied on my left. From behind the heavy tread of all the
people gave me strength." (pp.87-88)
Ezeulu now chooses to carry his Alusi without the "heavy tread of all
the people" which is the true and only source of strength both for
himself and Ulu.
By resorting to the proverb the elders impersonalise their appeal and
invoke the aid of tradition and an accepted vital communal value. They
make their stand stronger and clearly indicate that the priest is complicating a simple matter which the community is quite capable of
54
accommodating. For a people whose life is a happy integration of the
material and the spiritual, religion is a down-to-earth affair, relevant in
terms of practical needs. A god is revered to the extent it serves a man's
needs, and an Alusi (tutelary deity, like Ulu) could be abandoned if it
failed the community, unaccountably. It is to this grim fact that Ofoka
aludes:
"Let me tell you one thing. A priest like Ezeulu leads a god
to ruin himself. It has happened before." (p.266)
The example of Aninta is no fiction: "And we have all heard how the
people of Aninta dealt with their deity when he failed them. Did they
not carry him to the boundary between them and their neighbours and
set fire on him?" (p.33) Ogba, the tutelary deity of An_inta, was burnt
and its priest driven away because "he turned round to kill the people
of Anin~a instead of their enemies" (p.l97).
Ezeulu's conduct is considered irresponsible: "He would rather see the
six villages ruined than eat two yams" (p.266). The deity exists for the
welfare of the six villages, not in honour of some abstract, mystical
principle. One of the characters condemns Ezeulu by quoting his own
proverb for him: "I reminded hi~ of his ~aying that a ~an ~ust
dance the dance of his time." (p.266) Ezeulu's image is that of a priest
who:
"behaves like the farmland lizard; strives to win judgement
against his clan; behaves like the adult that leaves the she-goat
to suffer the pains of parturition on its tether; seeks a
companion that acts exactly like himself; and, perhaps above
all, refuses to dance the dance of his time- like Okonkwo .
Consequently he brought himself and Ulu to ruin to the
delight of the Christian community."
Unlike Things Fall Apart, Arrow of God features serious interpersonal
conflicts. One of such conflicts creates occasion for confusion among
the elders. They are therefore likened to the proverbial puppy which
attempted to answer two calls and broke its jaw. That confusion is both
particular and symbolic, for it symbolises the confusion of values which
attends a situation of cross-cultural contact. The people have become,
as it were, uprooted in the wake of the new, and are no more sure of
what standards to apply as the old has become increasingly inadequate.
But if the elders were confused during the Nwaka-Ezeulu debate- a
debate which involved relationship with the colonialist as they did not
understand his ways - they were not confused over purely domestic
55
issues. In such conflicts, proverbs are valid pointers to issues at stake.
In the conflict between Ezeulu and the community they provide a
standard against which the action of the priest may be judged.
Proverbs certainly contribute to the total effect of authenticity one
feels on reading both novels. Realism in the novel can be seen from at
least three perspectives: authenticity in speech and thought processes;
authenticity in characterization; authenticity in action and setting.
One of Achebe's claims to artistic greatness is his peculiar ability to
simulate and articulate resonantly in English the speech patterns of the
Igbo language and culture.
Proverbs are used by elders or by a person acting in the position of an
elder among younger ones. People of the same age-grade use proverbs
among themselves. We note for instance, that Unachukwu, who belongs
to the age-grade immediately above theirs, talks to the members of
Omumawa age-grade with the air of superiority. "I speak to you as your
elder brother," he tells them. He goes on to advise them on the need for
caution and moderation in dealing with the white man, emphasising his
invincibility:
''I have travelled in olu and I have travelled in Igbo and I can
tell you that there is no escape from the white man. He has
come. When Suffering knocks at your door and you say there
is no seat left for him, he tells you not to worry because he
has brought his own stool. The white man is like that." (pp.104-105)
Again Nweke Ukpaka, more perceptive than many other Omumawa
members, resorts to proverbial language to curb unnecessary excesses
among his angry peers:
"What a man does not know is greater than he. Those of us who
want Unachukwu to go away forget that none of us can say come
in the white man's language. We should listen to his advice.Only a foolish man can go after a leopard with his bare hands.
The white man is like a hot soup and we must take him slowly
from the edges of the bowl. - For if we give him cause he will
rejoice. Why? Because the very house he has been seeking ways
of pulling down has caught fire of its own will." (pp.105-106)
In both instances proverbs serve the double function of instruction and
social control.
Proverbs are used in moralistic talk. Here the two functions mentioned
by Ache be unite indissolubly. Emphasis is on moderation, the golden
56
mean. In Arrow of God Akuebue gives a good example of the
traditional judicial-moralistic talk - too long to be quoted
(pp.122-124). The moralistic judge pricks both parties, shows that
neither is faultless, where such is the case. His first concem is to calm
emotions: "It is the pride of Umuaro ", Akuebue says, "that we never
see one party as right and the other wrong." A possible fault is loss of
patience. But the elder (Ezeulu) must be told his fault as gently as
possible. Thus Akuebue first charges Obika to show that "a man
always has more sense than his children". What he sees as Ezeulu 's
essential error could be put proverbially, "If a man sought a companion
who acted exactly like himself he would live in solitude." (Ap.114)
But that would have been out of character in the context of a father
angry with his son, just as it would have been improper for Nwaka
during the emergency meeting to use the proverb about the wasp in a
reference to Ezeulu, his anger notwithstanding. Akuebue, like the
typical, experienced elder, resorts to the flattering proverbial image of
a "great compound" where diversity is the rule, and concludes:
"That is why we say that whatever tune you play in the compound
of a great man there is always someone to dance it. I salut e you" .
The last sentence is a transliteration of a set formula for closing an
address directed at one person e kene m gi.
But if elders generally use proverbs, the elder in a commanding position
breathes them like air. More than one quarter of all the proverbs in
A rrow of God come from Ezeulu. He hardly ever opens his mouth
without dropping some. The consequences of the abomination
committed by his son whom he wilfully sent to the Christian School
and Church must be faced squarely because "a man who brings home
ant-infested faggots should not complain if he is visited by lizards".
(p. 72) Conversation between elders is laced with proverbs. The Igbo
in fact have a saying that among the initiated the proverb is the sole
vehicle of communication. And indeed when a young person is around
e lders do use almost only proverbs to ensure that the "stranger" does
n ot understand. Sometimes the "stranger" could be an adult or even
an elder, because unless the listener knows the context he would not
b e able to make meaning out of the proverbial exchange. In the two
n ovels Akuebue and Ezeulu come close to the ide~ of talking only in
p roverbial language. Akuebue has just asked Ezeulu to break a kolanut:
57
" 'That cannot be. We do not by-pass a man and enter his
compound'. 'I know that', said Akuebue, 'but you see that
my hands are full and I am asking you to perform the office
for me.' 'A man cannot be too busy to break the first kolanut
of the day in his house. So put the yam down. It will not run
away.' 'But this is not the first kola of the day. I have broken
several already.' 'That may be so, but you did not break them
in my presence. The time a man wakes up is his morning 'All
right' said Akuebue. I shall break it if you say so.' 'Indeed I
say so. We do not apply an ear-pick to the eye.' "(p.130)
Achebe's effort is directed at not merely telling a story but also making
the characters talk like Igbo characters. The conversation is credible
because it is absolutely in character. It is like a piece taken from actual
life experience. Apart from proverbs there are other characteristically
Igbo turns of speech: "I ask you to", "my hands are full", "It will not
run away", "indeed I say so". The only phrase that sounds "foreign"
in the entire dialogue is "perform the office for me". An elder is very
likely to say: "and I ask you to break it". On the other hand Achebe is
writing in English; "perform the office for me" is idiomatic English and
a richer rendering, indicating that it is not simply the breaking of the
kolanut that matters.
In public address proverbs are used with great effect.16 Speakers
marshal arguments and use proverbs to clinch them, to universalise their
conclusions and make the knots hard to untie. In Arrow of God Ezeulu
and N waka are the master orators. The overall effect here, as in the
conversations and narrative passages, is to make the thought processes,
language, utterances and characters authentic. But it should be noted
that even in oration, the powerful effect achieved and the realism which
informs each speech are not dependent upon the proverbs alone,
although proverbs indubitably provide a referential framework of ideas
and issues at stake.
Users of proverbs do not necessarily live according to the value content
of the proverbs, but may merely invoke them to justify their stands in
disputes. Ezeulu in his speech urging the people against a war with
Okperi tries to arouse the elders' sense of responsibility by quoting the
proverb about the she-goat bearing her young on the tether; he
compares Umuaro to the proverbial Nza who ate and drank and
challenged his chi to a single combat. Nwaka, however, notes that
"Wisdom is like a goatskin bag; every man carries his own". (p.l9)
"Let us not listen to anyone trying to frighten us with the name of Ulu.
58
If a man says yes his chi also says yes". Nwaka carried the day, but
Umuaro lost the war. There is an irony in Nwaka's use of the chi
proverb. Chi is a personal guiding spirit, not communal. It is properly
invoked in individual action; Ulu stands for the entire community.
An individual could use a proverb to justify his action. In Things Fall
Apart elder Nwakibia uses one to justify his refusal to give yams to
soliciting but unworthy young men. "When I say no to them they
think I am hard hearted. But it is not so. Eneke the bird says that since
men have learnt to shoot without missing, he has learnt to fly without
perching." (p.20) Ezeulu quotes the same proverb to bolster his
decision to send Oduche to school. ~ (Ap.55) Perhaps we are inclined to
agree with the two elders.
But the fraudulent man too lays claim to proverbial sanction . When the
diviner-doctor Aniegboka appropriated the sacrificial hen, he
announced, "Even the diviners ought to be rewarded now and again. Do
we not say that a flute player must sometimes stop to wipe his nose?"
(Ap.149). By appropriating the hen, in spite of his unsolicited
assurance that "we must do things as they are laid down", Aniegboka
commits sacrilege because he is expected to kill and bury the fowl in
the pit, not take it away. In such a case, the dichotomy between
language and truth is fully revealed so that proverbs become ironic
comments on the views and conduct they are invoked to validate.
Satire is a form of severe verbal punishment aimed at "killing the spirit"
of the victim by putting him or her to shame. A very common type is
the satirical song. In Arrow of God, the prisoners satirize the warders:
"When I cut grass and you cut what's your right to call me
names?" (p.67)
In Things Fall Apart the satire is directed against the Kota' and his
master:
"Kotma of ash buttocks
He is fit to be a slave.
The white man has no sense,
He is fit to be a slave." (p.158)
Given the proper context some proverbs have sharp cutting edges. One
of them is applied to Okonkwo to humiliate him because of his
arrogant brusqueness in dismissing a less successful opponent at a
meeting: "The oldest man present said sternly that those whose palmkernels were cracked for them by a benevolent spirit should not forget
59
to be humble." The effect was immediate: "Okonkwo said he was sorry
for what he said and the meeting continued." (p.24) Social control is
effected through a satirical use of the proverbs. Another satirical ·
proverb is used in a similar context in both novels. It is applied to two
over-enthusiastic new converts, Enuch and Good country, who are
described as "Outsiders Who choose to weep louder than the owners
of the corpse." (Ap.60; Tp.l67) The proverb however, does not deter
the victims from continuing in their ways. Unlike Okonkwo, they have
laid claim to a new culture in which the sanctions of the old have no
hold. Indeed their goodness and effectiveness as converts are now
measured by the degree of violence they can do to the old.
Finally language is used to individualise characters. In a historical novel
the use of language for such a purpose is important and could easily
flaw a novel. It would be out of character, for instance , for Obika to
use proverbs to justify his action before his father, Ezeulu.Achebe
shows full awareness of such considerations. Children do not use
proverbs in either novel. Young men use them when arguing among
themselves. Women rarely do. Indeed, in John Munonye's novel The
Only Son, we hear a woman telling another: " We women don't know
how to speak our minds in proverbs. I shall tell you in very plain words
what I have come for". 17
As might be expected, white characters do not use proverbs. The
deployment of proverbial resources is the uncontested prerogative of
the elder who personifies the wisdom of his time. Thus t he u se of
proverbs as it were places characters in categories.
There are at least two ways in which proverbs can be useful in character
study. The first is that the proverbs a character uses may indicate his
image of himself and his view on a given occasion. They could thus
provide a sounding board for the assessment of his actions and
personality. Secondly, the proverbs ·others use to describe him and h is
situation may indicate their reactions to and feelings about him and his
ways. We have already noted the use of proverbs to describe the
excesses of the new converts and how Aniegboka's proverb is telling
ironic comment on his conduct.
In Things Fall Apart the proverbs used in references to Okonkwo point
to relevant character traits - his toughness and fiery temper18 ; his
spectacular achievement and meteoric rise, and his arrogant contempt
of failure.
60
"Looking at a king's mouth one would think he never sucked
at his mother's breast. (an elder p.24). When a man says yes
his chi says yes also (authorial p.25). I cannot live on the bank
of river and wash my hands with spittle. (Okonkwo, p.l50)
Those whose palm kernels were cracked for them should not
forget to be humble. (an elder rebuking Okonkwo). Living
fire begets impotent ash (Okonkwo- fire -lamenting the
character of his converted son, Nwoye- the impotent ash) (p.140).
That Okonkwo is a man of action rarely enamoured of words and not a
reflecting philosopher is perhaps indicated by his lack of recourse to
proverbial wisdom. He uses only three proverbs, two of which deal with
material achievement which obsessed him. In the same way the good
and bad sides of Ezeulu can be known by examining all the proverbs he
uses and those used in references to him. They show his penetrating
wisdom, his mastery of the priestly function, his self-confidence and
resolution. But they also show his tragic limitations. Ezeulu is a great
and magnificent mind - intellectual, perceptive, and visionary. His
priestly function fortifies his moral and spiritual authority. Like most
first rank intellectual aristocrats Ezeulu distrusts the judgement of the
commonalty:
' "What does the clan know?' (he asks Akuebue) 'I have my
own way and shall follow it. I can see things where other
men are blind. That is why I am known and at the same time
I am unknowable.' " (p.163)
But such an attitude is hardly acceptable as a basis for action among
primary democrats.
Perhaps the saddest irony one readily notices about Ezeulu 's proverbs
is that he would have been saved if he had lived according to them.
Unfortunately he sees them as applicable to others, rarely to himself.
The only occasion he tried to bridge this gulf he lacked the inner
humility to act according to his intellectual perception. Some of his
own proverbs which are an ironic comment on himself are:
No matter how many spirits plotted a man's death it would come
to nothing unless his personal god took a hand in the deliberations.
(pp.168-169). A man who does not know where rain started to
beat him cannot know where he dried his body. (p.163). When two
brothers fight a stranger reaps their harvest. (p.162). We often stand
in the compound of a coward to point at the ruins where a brave
man used to live. (p.l3). When an adult is in the house
(p.31).
61
The first proverb is not the least ironic. Applied to the tragic context, it
shows t hat Ezeulu himself (personal god) brought disaster onto his head
by not behaving reasonably, and flouting Akuebue 's proverbial warning
that " N o man can win a judgement against a clan".
The p roverb then is an integral part of the language of the people
Achebe writes abou t. Artistic fidelity requires its use. By using the
proverb Achebe recreates the milieu he writes about with a far greater
degree of auth enticity than would have been possible to achieve
without t he proverbs, and without his skilful simulation of Igbo speech
pattems.
NOTES
1. He who brings kola brings life.
2. Romanus Egudu and Donatus Nwoga, Poetic Heritage: Igbo Traditional Verse,
Nwankwo-lfejika and Co . (Pub lishers ) L t d. , Enugu, Nige ria, 1971.
3. Helen Peters feels that the folktale is " the most popular a n d most w idely
known."
Echeruo, M. J. C. and E . N . Obiechina, " Igbo Traditional Life, Culture a n d
Literature", The Conch, Vol II No 2, September 197 1, 99.
4 . When I was a child it was customary for the little children in my village t o
compete in the exchange of proverbs and riddles. During such competitio n s a
child of seven could recall as many as twenty fi ve p r overbs and r id d les. I n
retrospect I see that exercise (game) as on~ of t he lgbo child's f inest in itiations
into the knowledge and effective use not only of proverbs but also of language
itself.
62
5. Charles R. Larson, The Emergence of African Fiction, Indiana University Press,
1972, pp.14-15.
6. "They asked who the king of the village was, but the villagers told them that
there was no king. 'We have men of high titles, and the Chief Priest and the
elders, they said. ' "Things Fall Apart p.135.
7. Things Fall Apart, Heinemann, A WS, 1962.
Arrow of God, Heinemann, AWS, 1965. All page references are to these
editions. The following abbreviations are used: Things Fall Apart (T); Arrow
ofGod (A).
8. A toad does not run in the day unless something is after its life.
9. "The toad does not run in the day time for nothing." (Tp.19)
10. See Gareth Griffiths, "Language and action in the novels of Chinua Achebe",
African Literature Today No.5, ed., Eldred D. Jones, Heinemann, 1971,
pp.97-98. Lindfors' article is published in African Literature Today, No.1
(1968), 3-18. Griffiths points out the error of regarding the proverbs as "a
continuing pattern of valid judgement on the actions of the novel", and warns
against a fragmented evaluation of the effect of Ache be's proverbial language.
11. A Selection of African Prose compiled by W. H . Whiteley, Oxford , 1964,
p . viii, emphasis mine.
12. Ruth Finnegan, Oral Literature in Africa, O .U.P., 1970, p.393.
13 . Uli Beier, ed., Introductio n to African Literature, Longman, 1967, p.169.
14. African Literature Today, No .1 , 7.
15 . The head which upsets the wasp must be stung by the wasp.
16. See Arro w of God pp .17-22; 30-33; 175-180.
17 . This does not mean that in Igbo culture women do not use proverbs. On the
contrary . In Achebe the contexts- the real determinants of use- provide
little occasion for them to indulge in proverbial rhetoric. See, in contrast,
Onuora Nzekwu , Blade Among Boys, p .116, where Patrick's mother uses a
proverb aptly.
18. Okonkwo was popularly known as the "Roaring Flame," (p.139); "He was
flaming fire." (p.140)
63
Sources of Luo Oral Literature
Elizabeth Knight
The student of African literature often finds himself dealing with a
written work that has its origins in an oral form or that includes allusions
to an oral tradition. It is my aim in this short paper to detail various
studies of oral traditions that help illuminate the works of Luo and related
writers. These include the Acoli, Okot p'Bitek and Taban Lo Liyong,
the Lango, Okello Oculi, and the Kenyan Luo, Jared Angira, Grace Ogot
and Onyango Ogutu.
Okot is his own best commentator. His BLitt thesisl was based on fieldwork from April to October 1962. He provides a very thorough account
of Acoli and Lango oral literature outlining the most important dances otole, bwola and orak -their function, development and demise, proverbs
and folktales with their social setting. Much of this material is repeated
in more concentrated form in Horn of my Love2 and in Africa's Cultural
Revolution3 there are two important additional essays. In "Literature and
Man" Okot outlines the life and works of the Acoli singer Adak too who
features in Song of Ocol and in "Acoli Love" there is more information
on the orak, "get stuck", dance that figures so prominently in Song of
La wino.
In The Poetry ofOkot p 'Bitek4, G A Heron isolates the various traditional
songs Okot employs in his written poem as well as explaining the proverbs
and traditional imagery used. Laura Tanna further supplements this in her
unpublished thesis.5 She shows the significance of the various Acoli songs
Okot uses, examines more proverbs and provides a glossary of all the
Acoli words in Song of Lawino. Most important of all, she includes a
transcript of three interviews with Anywar pa Latim - a close friend of
Okot who features in the dedication in Song of Lawino -who explains
all the A coli references and what he feels they signify to 0 kot.
Further Acoli "orature" is dealt with in Crocodile's Eggs for Supper6 a somewhat popularised version of folktales. Many of these tales are retold
by Okot7 and Taban Lo Liyong8 and Rennie Bere's note at the end of the
book is particularly interesting as regards the function of the tales and
incidental details included in them about Acoli life in general. His comments
agree well with Taban 's as stated in "Traditional African Literature" in
The Last Word. 9 Probably the best general collection of Luo oral literature
so far is found in Keep My Words, 10 although this suffers from lack of
organisation; animal tales are mixed up with rumour and aetiological
stories. Taking up Taban's advice and example in Eating Chiefs and Fix ions,
64
to use oral literature as a basis for written works, L G Oguda K'Okim has
produced So They Say,ll a creative rendering of Luo folktales in verse.
Lango folktales receive poor treatment, in general, being encompassed
within Acoli tales in Okot's thesis and detailed, sometimes inaccurately,
in Wright's "Lango Folk Tales"l2 as they correspond to European,
American and other African models.
Okot p;Bitek's thesis also provides historical and sociological information
about the Acoli and Lango. In substance it differs slightly from the two
previous major works on the Luo due to the late date of Okot's fieldwork.
The great pioneering work is Fr. Crazzolara's The Lwoo,13 an impressive
and highly detailed work appearing in three volumes from 1950 to 1956.
In his stress on the importance of collecting oral information and his
warnings as to the distortions made by, and the fallibility of, witnesses'
accounts he predates Vansina. In a note Fr. Crazzolara advises:
In my view it would b~ preferable if anthropologists or ethnologists
spent less of their precious time in studying the potato fields of
Africans and more with the Lodite, the old and important men, in
order to find out and record all they know. If a long and patient
work of this kind were carried out, I am sure that an extraordinary
amount of historical details could be collected. But this type of
man will shortly exist no more. (p.8)
Over several decades and with a fluent knowledge of Acoli Fr. Crazzolara
has built up a picture of the origin and migration routes of practically all
the Luo groups and clans. His book is in three volumes dealing with Luo
migrations, traditions and clans. The first part includes a detailed account
and interpretation of the most prevalent of all Luo myths - the spear, bean
and bread story that seeks to explain the separation of the Acoli and
Alur (pp.62-6). Taban interprets the same myth in Eating Chiefs, Okot has
an account of it in Religion of the Central Luo and it forms the substance
of Tom Omara's play The Exodus. 14 Information about migrations is
interspersed with details of social structure but this book is really for the
enthusiast and is probably too detailed to be of general use though the
conclusion is well worth looking at.
A more accessible account of Acoli social structures is to be found in F K
Girling's The Acholi of Uganda15, fieldwork for which was done between
October 1949 and August 1950. He analyses Acoli social life in tern1s of
four areas, the household, hamlet, village and domain and this rather dates
the work, this degree of social organisation having largely broken down
now. The work is a very sensitive survey, though, eminently readable and
is cited by Okot himself. Girling deals well with the thorny religious
65
concept o f Jok. The account Okot gives in his thesis shows a much fractured
social order, so m u ch so that much of Girling's sociological detail is related
by Okot in the form of history. He c onse quently presents a less coherent
and detailed pattern of social and political o rganisa tion than Girling.
Some specialist studies worth re a d ing in clude Wright's article on religious
ceremonies of the Acoli16 where his descriptions of, for example, the
birth ceremony are accurate but his interpretations are deb atable . A d d itional
information on material culture of the Lan go and Acoli can b e gleaned
from Tribal Crafts of Uganda .17 Henry Owuar details a number of Luo
love songs 18 and Anyumba focusses on lament songs of the Luo song to
the nyatiti ("harp").19African Indigenous Education 20is a useful survey
of Acoli childhood taking in also belief, games, dances, proverbs, tales
and agricultural activities. The same area is covered for the Kenya Luo b y
S H Ominde.21
Audrey Butt in The Nilotes of the Anglo-Egy ptian Sudan and Uganda2 2
differentiates Acoli and Lango social structures better than Okot but is
inaccurate in her assessment of their religion. The other main work on the
Lango is T T S Hayley's Anatomy of Lango Religion and Groups. 23
Researching from September 1936 to May 1937 he appears to hav e been
the last writer to receive information on the now defunct etogo or age sets
and he accurately, if somewhat tediously, records many clan ceremonies
However his interpretation of religion tends to be coloured by his own
western background. There are a series of articles on the Lango in the
Uganda Journal by Fr. Tarantino.24 One of the most interesting of these
is "Origin of the Lango" in which he sets out reasons to suppose a non-Luo
origin for the Lango and shows how they differ from the Acoli in language
and clan cry.
I have mentioned several times the inaccuracies of foreign interpretations
of Luo beliefs. Probably the best examination of Acoli belief is provided
by Okot in his thesis and in greater detail in Religion of the Central Luo .25
Here he gives information on the Luo migrations, the traditions and taboos
of the clans as well as his own analysis of Jok. For Okot, Jok can only be
explained by its manifestations or the acknowledgement of it in ceremonies
held by the whole chiefdom to guard against national disaster such as
famine or at the family shrine. Acoli religion means more than Jok to him
and he explores the phenomena of witchcraft, sorcery and finally in a
discussion of fate he sees the Acoli as essentially irreligious pragmatists.
He argues his case more fully in African Religions in Western Scholarship 26
where he speaks with distaste of "the hellenization of African deities." A
key figure in this debate is Bethwell Ogot, a Luo himself, who tends to
66
favour the mona principle interpretation of Jok. Part of the debate can
be seen in "The Concept of Jok".27 Ogot's own book History of the
Southern Luo 28 is the most important work on the Kenya Luo. A man
in agreement with Okot and who obtained much help from him is
J K Russell. In Man Without God? 29 he provides a very good , faithful
summary of Okot's views on Acoli religion.
There has been increasing emphasis at Nairobi University on the collecting
of oral information by students but the one work so far produced,Popular
Culture of East Africa 30 is disappointing in its lack of analysis31 though
it is an encouraging pointer in a direction Crazzolara advocated so long ago.
Notes
1
Okot p'Bitek, "Oral Literature and its Social Background among the Acholi
and Lango" (B Litt thesis: St Peter's College Oxford, 1963 ).
2
Okot p'Bitek, Horn of my Love (London: Heinemann, 1974).
3
Okot p'Bitek, Africa's Cultural Revolution (Nairobi: Macmillan Books for
Africa, 1973).
4
G A Heron, The Poetry of Okot b'Bitek (London: Heinemann, 1976).
5
Laura Tanna, "East African Poetry of Assertion: Song of Lawino and Orphan"
(MA thesis: Univ . of Wisconsin, 1972).
6
Rennie Bere , Crocodile's Eggs for Supper and other animal tales (London:
Andre Deutsch, 1973).
7
Okot p'Bitek, Hare and Hornbill (London: Heinemann, 1977).
8
Taban Lo Liyong,Fixions (London: Heinemann, 1969).
Taban Lo Liyong, Eating Chiefs (London: Heinemann, 1970)
9
Taban Lo Liyong, The Last Word (Nairobi: East African Publishing House,
1969) pp.67-81.
10
B Onrango-Ogutu and A A Roscoe, Keep My Words (Nairobi: East African
Publishing House, 1974)
11
L G Oguda K ' Okiri, So They Say (Nairobi: East African Literature Bureau,
1970).
12
M J Wright, "Lango Folk-Tales- An Analysis", Uganda Journal, 24, (1960),
pp.99-113.
13
J P Crazzolara, The Lwoo (Verona: Museum Combonianum No.6, Editrice
Nigrizia, 1954 ).
14
Tom Omara, "The Exodus" in D Cook and M Lee (ed.), Short East African
Plays (London: Heinemann, 1972), pp.47-66 .
15
F K Girling, The Acholi of Uganda (London: H.M.S.O., 1960).
67
16
A C A Wright, "Some notes on Acholi Religious Ceremonies", Uganda
Journal, III, No.3 (1936), pp.175-202.
17
M Trowell & K P Wachsmann, Tribal Crafts of Uganda (London: Oxford
University Press, 19 53).
18
Henry Owuor, "Luo Songs" in Ulli Beier (ed. ), Introduction to African
Literature (London: Longman, 1967).
19
Anyumba, H 0, "The nyatiti lament songs", East Africa Past and Present
(Presence africaine), (1964 ).
20
J P Ocitti, African Indigenous Education. As practised by the Acholi
of Uganda. (Nairobi: East African Literature Bureau, 1973).
21
S H Ominde, The Luo Girl from Infancy to Marriage (Nairobi: East African
Literature Bureau, 1975).
22
Audrey Butt, The Nilotes of the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan and Uganda (London:
International African Institute, 1959).
23
T T S Hayley, The Anatomy of Lango Religion and Groups (Cambridge
University Press, 1947).
24
Fr. A G Tarantino, "The Origin of the Lango" Uganda Journal (1946)
pp.l2-16.
Fr. A G Tarantino, "Lango Clans" Uganda Journal, 13, No.1 (1949)
pp.109-111.
Fr. A G Tarantino, "Notes on the Lango" Uganda Journal, 13, No. 2
(1949) pp.l45-153.
Fr. A G Tarantino. "Lango Wars" Uganda Journal, 13, No.2 (1949)
pp.230-35.
25
Okot p 'Bitek, Religion of the Central Luo (Nairobi: East African Literature
Bureau, 1971 ).
26
Okot p'Bitek, African Religions in Western Scholarship (Nairobi: East
African Literature Bureau, 1971 ).
27
B A Ogot, "The Concept of Jok" African Studies Journal, 20 (1961)
pp.123-30.
28
B A Ogot, History of the Southern Luo (Nairobi: East African Publishing
House, 1967).
29
J K Russell, Men without God? (London: Highway Press, 1966).
30
Taban Lo Liyong (ed.) Popular Culture of East Africa: Oral Literature
(Nairobi: Longman, 1972).
31
See Lyndon Harries, rev. of Popular Culture of East Africa, by Taban
Lo Liyong, Ba shiru, 6, No.1 (1974) pp.86-88.
68
Traditional Drama 1978
A one-day conference on aspects of current scholarship
in the traditional plays of Great Britain, held at
the University of Sheffield,
Saturday, 21 October 1978
P. S. Smith
Traditional drama has been a major focus of British folkloristic research
since the late nineteenth century. Until comparatively recently,
however, discussion has generally concentrated on attempts to
reconstruct the source of the actions of the plays in the religious rituals
of prehistory. Although this orientation and its conceptual basis are still
widely accepted, over the past ten years a growing body of criticism of
origin theory as a framework for research has developed.
A one day conference, sponsored jointly by the University of
Sheffield's Division of Continuing Education and the Centre for English
Cultural Tradition and Language was arranged. The papers given at the
Conference, abstracts of which are given below, represented a range of
these newer approaches. The aspects of traditional drama covered were
the theoretical premises which shape the study of the plays, analytical
techniques and examinations of contemporary performances. These
papers demonstrate the scope of theory and methodology which is now
being used to further understanding of traditional materials.
ABSTRACTS
The Chapbook and the Pace Egg Play in Rochdale
P. Stevenson and G. Buckley
This study describes the Pace Egg tradition in a Lancashire industrial
town where chapbooks and other printed texts have been used by
almost every known Pace Egg team from the tum of the century to the
present day. Discussion includes the way in which the tradition has
altered over the years, and the part that the printed texts have played in
this change.
69
Examination is made of two distinct traditions. Firstly, Pace Egg plays
as performed in the streets by children in Rochdale from early in this
century up to the Second World War. This includes an examination of
the Edwards and Bryning chapbook, and of the fact that very few
references to the plays occur before 1900. Secondly, the Pace Egg plays
as organised by schools and other institutions up to the present day are
described. This section is mainly concerned with the Balderstone
School Play and the Priestnall and Mitchell text.
An analysis of the differences between these two distinct types of
tradition shows that it is the institutionalisation of the latter which is
the distinguishing factor, and not the use of printed texts. Ultimately,
however, despite the fact that there are two types of play and two
different printed texts, all of them are of equal importance to the study
of traditional drama.
Excellent examples: The influence of exemplar texts on traditional
drama scholarship
G . Smith
A survey of the ninety year history of scholarship in the field of
traditional drama reveals that a handful of abnormal texts has had a
disproportionate influence on researchers' interpretations of the form
and function of traditional plays. This paper attempts to reassess the
place of these examplar plays in trad itional drama as a whole, and
suggests an alternative view of plays, treating each as being of equal
importance.
An Approach to Folk Drama Performance
P.K.Harrop
It is intended here to stress the necessity of a performance orientation
in understanding extant traditions of Folk Drama while offering a
critique of the 'new folkloristics' exclusivity of perspective. If we
accept the need for better documentation of traditions as "total
behavioural events" then a working methodology needs to be
constructed. One such methodology is discussed, developed from my
own initial fieldwork in three centres: Antrobus, Bampton and Ripon,
which relates contemporary form and function in terms of the dramatic
event while stressing the need for a diachronic perspective.
70
The Problem of Analysing Folk Play Cast Lists using
Numerical Methods
P. T. Millington
This study is not a mathematical discussion of numerical analysis,
rather it highlights the problems that arise in preparing cast list data for
analysis .
Apart from the need to exclude incomplete cast lists , and the
difficulties of dealing with hybrid characters. the main problems arise
from variations in the naming of characters in sources, since the variant
names for each character have to be unified to permit analysis. These
variations mainly result from informants and/or collectors using names
in the line tags and commentary which do not tally with names given in
the dialogue. If the character is not named in the dialogue, the amount
of variation is even greater.
Several techniques and aids are described which help to resolve these
.Problems,.using examples and statistical data drawn from Nottinghamshire plays.
The Problems of Analysis of Traditional Play Texts:
A Taxonomic Approach
P. S. Smith
One of the major problems of the analysis of traditional play texts is
in finding a method of quantifying the similarity of any pair of texts.
This paper sets out one possible approach to this problem, using cluster
analysis techniques, and illustrates the method adopted , by producing a
taxonomic classification of sixteen T'Owd Tup play texts. The resulting
discussion critically examines the application of this method of analysis
in terms of testing hypotheses regarding the nature of relationships
amongst the texts The particular examples utilised concern the spatia/
temporal distribution of traditional plays.
Research, or just Collecting?
E. C. Cawte
Brand published his Observations on Popular Antiquities in 1777, the
Folklore Society was founded a hundred years ago, but there has been
71
little organised stud y of traditional customs. A contrast needs to be
made between the collection of customs (mere accululation), and
research - the attempt to analyse and draw conclusions.
A suggested outline of standards for research is given which sets out the
b asic requirements for recording field materials in terms of the
informant and the custom itself. The problem is to try to establish what
constitutes a full recording of the nature of the custom, rather than
w hat one personally finds interesting. The record should be as full as
p ossible at an early stage, because later it may be impossible, for various
reasons , to obtain further information.
The Geographical Index of Traditional Customs is discussed. The Index
was begun in 1956 with the object of defining the geographical
distributions of customs and attempting to demonstrate their relationship to each other and to other features of traditional drama.
Revievvs
I.S.E.R. Publications
CHIARAMONTE, Louis J., Craftsman-Client Contracts: Interpersonal Relations in
a Newfoundland Fishing Community, 1970, 64pp., 16 plates, $4.00.
PAINE, Robert, ed., Patrons and Brokers in the East Arctic, 1971, 112pp., $5 .00.
BROX, Ottar, Newfoundland Fishermen in the Age of Industry: A Sociology of
Economic Dualism, 1972, 114pp., $4.00.
LEYTON, Elliott, ed., The Compact: Selected Dimensions of Friendship, 1974 ,
162pp., $5 . 00.
All published by the Institute of Social and Economic Research, Memorial
University of Newfoundland, St. John's, Newfoundland.
The excellent series of publications from the Institute of Social and Economic
Research at the Memorial University of Newfoundland deserves to be much better
known in the British Isles than they have been hitherto. This no doubt reflects the
well-known difficulties of publicising titles from the smaller North American
institutions and organisations which are so often encountered on this side of the
Atlantic and prove a barrier to effective exchanges of views.
The Institute's publication programme, inaugurated in 1966, now extends to more
than thirty titles on various aspects of anthropology, archaeology and sociology,
and also in the fields of economics, geography, folklore and related disciplines.
The publications comprise a series of Studies, a series of Papers, and also a Special
Publications series. The latter includes a social science bibliography for Newfoundland and Labrador and also a Census Atlas of Newfoundland. Although these titles,
and many of the Studies and Papers naturally have a Newfoundland/Labrador
focus the I.S.E.R. publications as a whole also break new ground in their investigation of material from the Arctic and the North Atlantic communities in general,
not to mention the study of social relationships in Ireland, for example, a study
highly relevant to Newfoundland culture in that the majority of settlers hailed
originally from Southern Ireland and the English West Country.
72
The four titles submitted for review reflect the breadth and variety of the I.S.E .R.
publications. Louis J . Chiaramonte gives a fascinating in-depth account of the
complex dyadic relationships between craftsman and client in a small community
on the still relatively inaccessible south coast of Newfoundland. Fourteen case
studies are presented and analysed in detail, a strong point in the whole account
being the verbatim reporting of the transactional conversations themselves. Through
his analysis Professor Chiaramonte is able to develop a generative model of the rules
for making and fulfilling the craftsman-client contracts. Above all this study merits
praise for its clarity and economy, unencumbered by jargon or posturing. This
economy, however, is not achieved at the expense of crucial contextual information, for the context is sketched in throughout the study and one comes to know
the participants in the transactions, brief though the accounts are. The addition of
sixteen excellent photographs of life in the community, including some of the
transactional situations themselves, gives important extra dimensions to the
contextual information and to the study as a whole.
In Patrons and Brokers in the East Arctic Professor Robert Paine, Director of
I.S .E.R. Publications, brings together five papers originally presented at a seminar
at Memorial University in 1967 "at which an anthropological approach to
patronage was used to uncover and explain the grass-roots level of political process
in the Canadian Arctic today". Following his introduction which gives the background to the whole collection, Professor Paine himself contributes a theory of
patronage and brokerage, distinguishing a patron as one "who has the values of his
own choosing" affirmed by a client, and defining a broker as "purveying values
that are not his own" . An understanding of the roles played by patron and broker,
go-between and client in a given situational context is essential to "the work of
mapping the variety of perceptions of strategy . .. ". The four essays which follow,
three of which are derived from fieldwork in the Arctic, take up different aspects of
patronage and brokerage: Georg Henriksen discusses "The Transactional Basis of
Influence: White Men Among Naskapi Indians" and focuses on the differing intermediary roles of the white missionary and storekeeper in a Naskapi community in
Northern Labrador; Milton Freeman investigates "Tolerance and Rejection of
Patron Roles in an Eskimo Settlement", contrasting the response of members of
a small, isolated hunting community to two patrons, one native and one non-native;
Jean Briggs, in an impressive and crisply argued study considers "Strategies of
Perception: The Management of Ethnic Identity", concentrating on the influence
of ethnic identity on the role performance of middlemen - here an Eskimo, a
halfbreed and a white man -in an Eskimo village in the central Arctic; and James
Hiller's paper draws on archive sources for a historical overview of "Early Patrons
of the Labrador Eskimos: The Moravian Mission in Labrador, 1764-1805" and
demonstrates that the missionaries were not only patrons of the Eskimos but also
middlemen, as it were, between the Eskimos and Christ. Professor Paine then adds
a concluding essay which points out that the considerable political and social
changes now taking place in the arctic "will produce a greater number and variety
of links at the level below that of the present local patron roles"- i.e. at the level
of broker and go-between on whom increasing pressures will consequently be
brought to bear.
The continuing importance of the declining fishing industry in Newfoundland is
emphasised in Ottar Brox's study, "Newfoundland Fishermen in the Age of
Industry". He explores the political restrictions on the economic development of
the coastal population in the 1960s, and in particular the dualistic nature of the
Province's economic development- modern technologically up-to-date industries
73
on the one hand, and "economic practices and techniques that appear to be almost
medieval, such as inshore fishing and especially the processing of salt fish" on the
other.
Mr. Brox first outlines the typical household economy of the coastal outports, then
considers fishing as a livelihood, and in the remainder of th e study in vestigates
alternatives to such older traditional ways of making a living and what the barriers
are to the taking up of such alternatives. The final chapt er "Out of Stagnation"
suggests ways in which government intervention might bring about a breaking down
of dualism and therefore a way forward to more meanin gful (and profita ble )
economic activities. He stresses however that such intervention c an o n ly b e
successful "if democratic pressure is put on the governmen t from the o u tport
population, possibly working in coalition with other political elements".
The ten papers which comprise "The Compact" derive ultimately from a colloquium on "The Comparative Sociology of Friendship" held at Memorial University in 1969. Although four of the contributors did not attend the colloquium,
their papers are central to the unifying theme of the book and indeed it is hard to
conceive of its wholeness without them. In his introduction Professor Leyton
notes that the essays "concern themselves largely with a form of social relationship which is more practical than sublime, more social compact than mystical
union". This "notion of friendship as a form of compact between individuals" is a
theme to which the contributors constantly return.
The volume is divided into four sections. In Part I, Robert Paine's article
"Anthropological Approaches to Friendship", originally published in Humanities
VI, 2 (1970) provides a theoretical framework for the collection as a whole, and is
admirably complemented by Cora Du Bois' paper on the comparative study of
friendship patterns. Part II also has two papers: Vernon Reynolds on "Friendship
Among the Primates" and Lionel Tiger's lively and provocative study of "SexSpecific Friendship" in which he concludes that "friendship directly reflects basic
social needs" and suggests the possibility of man's biological predisposition to
certain forms of interaction. In Part III we find four ethnographic studies of friendship in cultures as diverse as those of Northern Papua, Newfoundland, Ireland and
Lesotho, and Robert Paine's second contribution, originally published in Man, New
Series, 4, 4 (1969), "An Exploratory Analysis in 'Middle-Class' Culture" opens up
this section to the wider considerations of the properties of friendship to be identified in each culture. Finally, in Part IV S. N. Eisenstadt assesses the present state
of friendship analysis and outlines some possible directions for further study.
As the first book-length treatment of friendship in modern anthropology this
volume opens the way to further exploration, and one would hope for detailed
case-studies to test and challenge some of the more theoretical points put forward
in these stimulating essays.
As a footnote one must add that all the I.S.E.R. publications are attractively
printed on high quality paper, the hardbacked volumes being stoutly and neatly
bound. Above all, these merits are achieved at remarkably reasonable prices within
reach of students as well as scholars. It is to be hoped that many more books in
these series will be reviewed in British journals, and when better known take their
rightful place on the shelves of British scholars and students to whom they have
much to offer.
G A Dyer
. 74
Centre for English Cultural Tradition and Language publications
LORE AND LANGUAGE, the Journal of the Centre for English Cultural Tradition
and Language, is published jointly by the Departments of English Language and
Linguistics, and the Division of Continuing Education at the University of Sheffield.
It is issued twice yearly in January and July. Back issues are avai~able from the
address below, and can be obtained by filling in the enclosed subscription.
Volume I Numbers 1 - 10 . .
Volume II Numbers 1 - 10 . .
Volume III Number 1 onwards
25p. each
50p. each
£1.00 each
C.E_,. C.T.A.L. OCCASIONAL PUBLICATIONS
No.1
No.2
Castleton Garland
18p.
A descriptive study of the Garland Ceremony held on
29 May each year in Castleton, Derbyshire.
Christmas Greetings 35p.
An illustrated examination of variety and changes
found in Christmas customs.
C.E.C.T.A.L. RESEARCH GUIDES
The Centre is preparing for publication a series of Research Guides on various
aspects of folklore and the first of these is now available.
No.1
Traditional Drama 20p.
The object of the Guide is not to act as a questionnaire, but
rather to give a series of starting points and guidelines through
which a particular topic or aspect of folklore may be investigated.
The suggested areas of investigation into Traditional Drama
outlined in the pamphlet include performance, disguise, costume,
attitude of performers and audience, and relevant background
information on informant, performers and community.
Forthcoming:
No.2
C.E.C.T.A.L., Tape Archive Handbook
C.E.C.T.A.L. BIBLIOGRAPHICAL AND SPECIAL SERIES
No. 1
No. 2
Ballads in the Charles Harding Firth Collection at the University of
Sheffield. A descriptive and indexed catalogue. (Available October 1979)
Chapbooks and Traditional Drama. Part I: Alexander and the King of
Egypt Chapbooks. (Available now) £1.00 (postage extra)
C.E.C.T.A.L. FACSIMILES
No. 1
Morris Dancers at Revesby (from a manuscript of 1779) 75p.
Orders, material for publication, books for review, and all other enquiries should be
addressed to: J D A Widdowson, The Editor, Lore and Language, Centre for English
Cultural Tradition and Language, University of Sheffield, SHEFFIELD S10 2TN.
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