Gus Snedeker - Celebrations Throughout the Year: Holiday Folklore

Celebrations Throughout the Year

Holiday Folklore

North American Folklore for Youth

An Apple a Day: Folk Proverbs and Riddles

And to All a Good Night: Christmas Folklore

Black Cats and White Wedding Dresses: Folk Customs

Campfire Songs, Ballads, and Lullabies: Folk Music

Celebrations Throughout the Year: Holiday Folklore

Heroes, Fools, and Ghosts: Folk Tales and Legends

Quilts, Rag Dolls, and Rocking Chairs: Folk Arts and Crafts

Sirens and Smoke: Firefighters Folklore

Tell Me a Story: Family Folklore

Youre It! Tag, Red Rover, and Other Folk Games

Celebrations Throughout the Year

Holiday Folklore

Gus Snedeker

Mason Crest

Copyright 2013 by Mason Crest, an imprint of National Highlights, Inc. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission from the publisher.

Printed and bound in the United States of America.

First printing

987654321

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Snedeker, Gus.

Celebrations throughout the year : holiday folklore / Gus Snedeker.

p. cm.

ISBN 978-1-4222-2495-3 (hardcover) ISBN 978-1-4222-2486-1 (hardcover series) ISBN 978-1-4222-9260-0 (ebook)

1. HolidaysJuvenile literature. I. Title.

GT3933.S62 2012

394.26dc23

2012012236

Produced by Harding House Publishing Services, Inc.

www.hardinghousepages.com

Cover design by Torque Advertising + Design.

Contents

by Dr. Alan Jabbour

W hat do a story, a joke, a fiddle tune, a quilt, a dance, a game of jacks, a holiday celebration, and a Halloween costume have in common? Not much, at first glance. But theyre all part of the stuff we call folklore.

The word folklore means the ways of thinking and acting that are learned and passed along by ordinary people. Folklore goes from grandparents to parents to childrenand on to their children. It may be passed along in words, like the urban legend we hear from friends who promise us that it really happened to someone they know. Or it may be tunes or dance steps we pick up on the block where we live. It could be the quilt our aunt made. Much of the time we learn folklore without even knowing where or how we learned it.

Folklore is not something thats far away or long ago. Its something we use and enjoy every day! It is often ordinaryand yet at the same time, it makes life seem very special. Folklore is the culture we share with others in our homes, our neighborhoods, and our places of worship. It helps tell us who we are.

Our first sense of who we are comes from our families. Family folklorelike eating certain meals together or prayers or songsgives us a sense of belonging. But as we grow older we learn to belong to other groups as well. Maybe your family is Irish. Or maybe you live in a Hispanic neighborhood in New York City. Or you might live in the country in the middle of Iowa. Maybe youre a Catholicor a Muslimor youre Jewish. Each one of these groups to which you belong will have its own folklore. A certain dance step may be African American. A story may have come from Germany. A hymn may be Protestant. A recipe may have been handed down by your Italian grandmother. All this folklore helps the people who belong to a certain group feel connected to each other.

Folklore can make each group special, different from all the others. But at the same time folklore is one of the best ways we can get to know to each other. We can learn about Vietnamese immigrants by eating Vietnamese foods. We can understand newcomers from Somalia by enjoying their music and dance. Stories, songs, and artwork move from group to group. And everyone is the richer!

Folklore isnt something you usually learn in school. Somebody, somewhere, taught you that jump-rope rhyme you knowbut you probably cant remember who taught you. You definitely didnt learn it in a schoolbook, though! You can study folklore and learn about itthats what you are doing now in this book!but folklore normally is something that just gets passed along from person to person.

This series of books explores the many kinds folklore you can find across the North American continent. As you read, youll learn something about yourselfand youll learn about your neighbors as well!

The seasons of the year form a circle in time that goes around and around.

H undreds of years ago, people had different ways to measure time. They didnt have clocks or watches. Instead, they used the sun and the stars, the moon and the sky.

They also watched the seasons closely. For them, the coming of winter was a scary time. It meant bitter cold and possibly even death. Not everyone would survive a bad winter. But they soon realized that time moved in circles. Time and time again, the seasons arrived in the same orderwinter, spring, summer, and fall.

HOLIDAYS

The word holiday comes from two words: holy-day. People created holidays because they thought there was something special about certain days. They wanted to honor those days.

A Mexican folktale tells about the creation of day, night, and the seasons. The story says that in the beginning of time, there were two sons. They each wanted to carry the sun. They fought over it, and broke it. The world became dark and cold. The two sons realized they must stop fighting. So they planted themselves on the opposite ends of the Earth. They tried to pass the sun between them, but it was too broken.

The two sons realized they needed help. They asked a great warrior to carry the sun across the sky each day. Each day, he wins the battle, at least for a little while. When hes winning, the sun rises into the sky. When hes losing, it sinks into darkness. This creates both day and night. In winter, the warrior grows weak, and cannot carry the sun as high into the sky.

The Beginning of Holidays

If time moved in a circle, then this meant that days repeated themselves. People could pick out certain days and mark them as important. And once people picked out certain days as important, they started to do the same things every year on that day.

So, for example, when the full moon rose into the sky on a certain day in winter, everyone ate the same food. Or maybe they danced a certain dance. Over time, the things they did on those days became rituals. Rituals are actions that are repeated over and over again, like a pattern. Today, some families go to church on Easter or Christmas. For them, this is their ritual. But rituals dont have to be about religion. Eating hotdogs every Fourth of July can be a ritual too!

BIRTHDAYS

Today, we celebrate birthdays as important holidays.

If you think about it, a birthday is a lot like other holidays! Most people eat special food on their birthday (cake), and do special things too (like open presents). Like other holidays, your birthday is a special day that only happens once a year.

When you blow out candles on your birthday cake, you are taking part in your very own holiday!