• We have updated the guidelines regarding posting political content: please see the stickied thread on Website Issues.

Immigrant Folklore in Britain

Jape89

Jape89

Gone But Not Forgotten
(ACCOUNT RETIRED)
Joined
Dec 1, 2013
Messages
32
Question that's been sitting in the back of my mind for some time while reading about British folklore and urban legends over the years and particularly the more modern ones: what such things have groups of modern immigrants (West Indians, South Asians, Eastern Europeans) brought with them to our weird shores and how have they developed?

Does anyone have any info or books to point to?

I'm getting driven a little batty because typing in immigrant+urban legend and such into google inevitably leads simply to pages and pages about "stealing our jobs/houses/benefits" stuff. I've found one scholarly article about Jamaican folklore coming over post-Windrush but its behind the JSTOR pay wall.

I'm very interested to learn about such beliefs and how they've adapted to their new home. Any even vague leads are very welcome.
 
Jape89 said:
I've found one scholarly article about Jamaican folklore coming over post-Windrush but its behind the JSTOR pay wall.
Click to expand...

Have you tried looking at scholarly journals in the public library? Should be free from there. Also if there's a university library nearby you can often use those. There might be more articles available once you start searching.
 
Good point escargot, I think I will. I just assumed there must be some stuff online but if not why not do yourself, eh?
 
I bet school playgrounds are pretty fertile grounds for cross-cultural story pollination. We need a contemporary Katharine Briggs on the case to collect some.

As a small example, one of my best friends at school was Iranian. When we told ghost stories in the playground, hers often involved Jinns. The best bits of her stories got cannibalised by the rest of us and re-told with our own amendments. She did the same with ours (a heady mix of Hammer Horror, Stephen King, and British folklore).
 
Two things come to mind, both a little vague, and both involving religion.

One is the tales of Hindu statues (such as one of their elephant-like Gods) apparently drinking milk in a temple. I believe one of these stories is supposed to have originated in a British temple, and was seen by many Hindus as an authentic miracle. (I had an educated middle-class British-Indian friend who told me his wife believed in it).

Then there are the claims of Allah's name being found in halved pomegranates and the like. I have a feeling that one of these stories originated in Leicester and was featured in Fortean Times.
 
On the subject of Hinduism, when I was in primary school my best friend came from a Hindu family. They had a domestic shrine to Ganesh, in which little wrapped sweets were left in a particularly tantalising fashion. We were told - and totally believed - that there was no point in our trying to eat these sweets because Ganesh has already sucked all the flavour out of them. What we were seeing was but the earthly husk, which would be flavourless.

Clearly just a ruse to baffle small sweet-stealing children but we believed it totally, and would recount it to other kids as a kind of magical truth.
 
UnknownUnknown said:
We were told - and totally believed - that there was no point in our trying to eat these sweets because Ganesh has already sucked all the flavour out of them. What we were seeing was but the earthly husk, which would be flavourless.

Clearly just a ruse to baffle small sweet-stealing children but we believed it totally, and would recount it to other kids as a kind of magical truth.
Click to expand...

Just as an aside, I'm not so sure about it being a ruse! Many people swear up and down the food tastes different, much blander, after having been offered to the deities or spirits, compared to the food meant for themselves. The documentary A Month Of Hungry Ghosts even addresses this, with passersby taste-testing the food.
 
That's amazing! I thought we were just being conned.

I've lived with this story a long time, moving from the unquestioning belief of childhood to the equally unquestioning cynicism of adulthood (which I thought was simply being worldly wise to the convenient lies of adults).

Thankyou for reminding me that things can be more complex than they first appear. And that just because something disuades kids from stealing sweets, doesn't mean that it doesn't also have the potential to be literally true.

Thanks for reintroducing the possibility of wonder!
 
Ulalume said:
Just as an aside, I'm not so sure about it being a ruse! Many people swear up and down the food tastes different, much blander, after having been offered to the deities or spirits, compared to the food meant for themselves. The documentary A Month Of Hungry Ghosts even addresses this, with passersby taste-testing the food.
Click to expand...

Anything to do with the Chinese Hungry Ghosts festival?

On another aside: I guess that lucky charms/amulets are something more readily adopted by members of 'host' cultures
 
Ulalume said:
That's my job! (Well, maybe not so much a job as a "life purpose" ;))



The film follows the festival in Singapore, specifically.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Month_of_Hungry_Ghosts
Full of fascinating tidbits. I highly recommend it.
Click to expand...
It was on the other day in Hong Kong but passed me by. A couple of years ago I went to one of the opera performances; the front row of seats is left empty for the ghosts to sit in...
 
Jape89 said:
Question that's been sitting in the back of my mind for some time while reading about British folklore and urban legends over the years and particularly the more modern ones: what such things have groups of modern immigrants (West Indians, South Asians, Eastern Europeans) brought with them to our weird shores and how have they developed?

Does anyone have any info or books to point to?

I'm getting driven a little batty because typing in immigrant+urban legend and such into google inevitably leads simply to pages and pages about "stealing our jobs/houses/benefits" stuff. I've found one scholarly article about Jamaican folklore coming over post-Windrush but its behind the JSTOR pay wall.

I'm very interested to learn about such beliefs and how they've adapted to their new home. Any even vague leads are very welcome.
Click to expand...

I'm married to a 1st generation chap from south Asia and have in-laws and friends here in the UK too but have yet to hear any fusion modern tall tales and ULs. I'll let you know if I do!

I know that the character of Anansi (the clever spider) has made it over in children's books during the past couple of decades, via w. Africa and then the Caribbean - he/she might be worth looking up?
 
AnonyJoolz said:
I know that the character of Anansi (the clever spider) has made it over in children's books during the past couple of decades, via w. Africa and then the Caribbean - he/she might be worth looking up?
Click to expand...

I think the Spider-God was in the recent TV series American Gods, if that counts as Western mainstream (it's a cult show, but not a religious cult show). Based on a Neil Gaiman novel.
 
GNC said:
I think the Spider-God was in the recent TV series American Gods, if that counts as Western mainstream (it's a cult show, but not a religious cult show). Based on a Neil Gaiman novel.
Click to expand...


Yes. Gaiman featured Anansi in both American Gods and as the catalyst for his novel Anansi Boys (funnily enough).
 
AnonyJoolz said:
I know that the character of Anansi (the clever spider) has made it over in children's books during the past couple of decades, via w. Africa and then the Caribbean - he/she might be worth looking up?
Click to expand...

I certainly remember reading books about Anansi at school about 25 years ago.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top