This Glossary was created as a quick reference for users interested in Idaho folklife. It contains community-specific terms collected through fieldwork as well as field specific terminology compiled primarily from the websites of the American Folklife Center of the Library of Congress and the Louisiana Voices websites.
Alaya
Ceiling cloth embroidered and crocheted by Somali Bantu women. Also called matambi.
Bajo Sexto
12 strings musical instrument in 6 double courses used primarily in Texan conjunto and Mexican Norteño music.
Banda
A band, also a Central American brass band
Basque
People who live in Euskal Herria, which consists of 3 French provinces – and 4 Spanish provinces. These provinces flank the Pyrenees and the Atlantic Coast of France and Spain.
Bolero
¾ musical genre and its songs.” There is a particular style of bolero, specifically "bolero ranchero" that is a contrasting form of the Cuban bolero orchestra style of Benny Moré or the Mexican trio style of Los Panchos. It has the rhythm core of bolero, but it is played with mariachi instruments, and I would most likely classify "bolero ranchero" as a popular music style. It is usually harmonically simpler than the other variants of bolero. … ” Juan Dies
Bracero program
A guest worker program instituted by the United States Government to allow for foreign workers to work in the US for a set length of time, while a shortage of labor justified the measure. In place during WWII and the Korean war, the Bracero Programs in agriculture and railroad maintenance and construction provided the necessary replacement workers to the large numbers of enlisted men and women serving abroad.
Braceros
Men who came to the U.S. during WWII from Mexico to work on farms as field hands and on railroads as repair and construction workers.
Button Accordion
Button accordion is a diatonic instrument frequently used by folk musicians and dancers. Small sized with a big sound output, they are portable and, for the most part, the keys follow the pattern of the mouth harmonica. The three-row one is common in conjunto tejano. Basques also use the diatonic accordion – Trikitixa - in combination with the pandereta. Similar in size and sound output to any conventional diatonic accordion, the triki has a different, uniquely Basque tuning system. Commonly, there are 23 keys on the right hand and 12 on the left. The combination of pandereta/button accordion and its music are widely known as trikitixa.
Canción Ranchera
A broad repertory of songs related to ranch life. Canciones rancheras are part of the traditional Mariachi repertory. Their popularity increased with the rise of duetos and trios broadcast on the radio.
Cascarones Decorated
eggshells filled with confetti used during Easter celebrations.
Charros
Mexican horsemen and their cultural traditions. Originally from Jalisco, Zacatecas, Guanajuato, Puebla, Morelia, and Durango, charros have a unique lifestyle and set of practices. Originally an all-male event, Charreadas currently include women, who take part in precision equestrian performances called escaramuzas
Charreada
The charros’ main equestrian event, where. participants parade down the lane on horseback to the sound of Mariachi bands wearing their trajes de charros. It takes place in an arena called lienzo charro and consists of 10 different performances, including reining, bull and bareback bronco riding.
Chicano
All persons born and raised in the United States who are of Mexican/Spanish/Indian ancestry and who maintain close cultural and family ties with Mexico and its regional cultures.
Conjunto or Tejano Conjuntos music and ensemble
The Conjunto - genre and ensemble - developed in the late 1800s in South Texas, where Mexican musicians borrowed the button accordion played by German settlers and combined it with the bajo sexto (12 stringed Spanish guitars), drums, and vocals to create a unique sound. In addition to the instrumentation, the Conjunto repertory incorporated European polkas, schottisches, and waltzes to Mexican Indigenous music to create the unique sound that defines the music of the Texas/Mexico border. Over the years, with the support of the radio, conjunto has become highly popular on the border and anywhere there is a community of Latinos and Chicanos.
Conservatism
All processes, forces and attitudes that result in retaining certain information, beliefs, styles, customs and the attempted passing of those materials. A worldview that doesn't change.
Container gardening
Gardening in small built up areas instead of in a traditional garden plot
Coronas
Crowns used for Quinceañera and wedding ceremonies.
Corridos
Like other forms of Medieval Iberian romance, corridos are eightto ten-syllable ballads of four-line stanzas with an abcd rhyme pattern. They usually relate stories or events of personal experience, local, or national interest -a hero's deeds, a bandit's exploits, barroom shootouts, crimes, and natural disasters. The style calls for the singer to sing at the top of his voice accompanied by a guitar or a bajo sexto in major keys. The rhythm is that of polka or fast waltz without a refrain. Corridos can also be recited.
Corridista
One who writes and or sings corridos
Cumbia
Songs, tropical, salsa, merengue
Day of the Dead
Two-day celebration of All Saints day in Mexico. Families and friends set up home altars to the dead, visit cemeteries to clean and decorate the graves of their loved ones; and make food offerings in their memory. Elements inherited from the Aztecs include using sempaxochtl – marigold – petals to guide the dead from the entrance of the house to the home altar where different types of bread – pan de muertos – sugar skulls - calaveras - and other objects compose the ritual enriched by songs, dance, and shared memories.
Desole
Cloth embroidered by Somali Bantu women and used as bedspreads Dichos
Spanish for “sayings” that contain folk wisdom
Dynamism
A worldview that changes and/or the extent to which the bearers of the materials or the context in which they operate have worked upon these materials in such a way as to change them. It is reflect in all elements that function to alter features, contents, meanings, styles, performance and usage as a particular traditional event takes place repeatedly through time and space.
Ethnographer
One who conducts ethnographic research.
Ethnography
Descriptive anthropology, or the study, recording, documentation, description of any area of culture by doing fieldwork.
Expressive culture
The variety of creative and symbolic forms such as the customs, beliefs, technical skills, language, rituals, vernacular architecture, music, songs, games, dance, rituals, celebrations, and crafts. In general, cultural expressions are learned orally, by imitation, and are preserved and passed on informally, through practice.
Fable (En) or Fábula (SP)
Tales of specific moral content. Usually told by animals that have certain well known characteristics – a wise owl, an astute fox, a laborious ant, a trickster coyote, or a lazy cicada – fables are used to teach a lesson, illustrate a point. They often end with a proverb.
Fieldwork/ Investigación de Campo
Fieldwork or investigación de campo is an academic endeavor that requires first hand observation – to record or document sights or statements in a particular place, whether in a rural community or an urban center, in a fish market or in grandma’s living room. Fieldwork documentation is used to provide information about living cultures for future researchers, and to create public programs in communities.
Foodways
The ways one plants, harvests, prepares, and presents food at the table. It includes the recipes we were given by friends and family and mealtime traditions.
Folklore
Songs, stories, dances, jokes, establishes world view
Folklife
The traditional songs we sing, listen and dance to - Fairy tales, stories, ghost tales and personal histories - Riddles, proverbs, figures of speech, jokes and special ways of speaking - Our childhood games and rhymes - The way we celebrate life – from birthing our babies to honoring our dead - The entire range of our personal and collective beliefs – religious, medical, magical, and social - Our handed-down recipes and everyday mealtime traditions - The way we decorate our world - The crafts we create by hand – crocheted afghans, wooden spoons, cane bottoms on chairs - Patterns and traditions of work – from factory to office cubicle The many creative ways we express ourselves as members of our family, our community, our geographical region, our ethnic group, our religious congregation, or our occupational group - Folklife is part of everyone's life. It is as constant as a ballad, as changeable as fashion trends. It is as intimate as a lullaby, and as public as a parade. - In the end ... we are all folk. (American Folklife Center)
Folk Group
A group of people who share some identity and cultural expressions, a community. (Louisiana Voices)
Folklorist
Is the professional social anthropologist specialized in the study of folk traditions
Folk or Cultural traditions
Expressive culture shared in families, occupational, ethnic, religious, or regional groups in the United States and in other countries.
Folk Genre
Categories or types of traditions; ways of saying or doing that are recognizable within a culture as distinct from other ways. The general categories are oral traditions, music, dance, material culture, beliefs, customs, and body communications. (Louisiana Voices)
Foodways
The ways one plants, harvests, prepares, and presents food at the table. It includes the recipes we were given by friends and family and mealtime traditions.
Frontera
Border lands
Guitarrón
An oversized, back-bowed instrument is basically a bass guitar part of the harmony and rhythm in Mariachi bands.
Guwaya
Kizigua word that means “cover,”figuring into the names of several items
Guwayamesa
Kizigua word for embroidered tablecolth
Guwawyamnango
Kizigua word for embroidered door coverings. Also called Karibu cloth. Kari means welcome, in English
Heisenberg Principle
The very presence of an observer is bound to have some effect on the phenomenon under scrutiny.
Hispanic
Identifier for Spanish speaking peoples in the Americas.
Jaripeo
A seventeen century Spanish form of bull riding widely practiced in central western Mexico as a result of colonization. In the past, it involved riding the bull to death. Later, it evolved from fighting to riding the bull until it quit buckling. In today’s charreada, the Jineteo de Toro is a replacement form where the rider tries to remain riding as long as possible.
Jeepepero
Kizigua word for hand-held fans made from From wood and plastic stripping woven together with colored yarns in decorative patterns. Handles are cloth-covered. When not in use, they are hung on the walls as decorations in Somali Bantu homes.
Latino
The people from Latin America (Colombia, Cuba, Mexico, Brazil, Argentina, etc.) and Europe (Portugal, Spain, Italy, France) and their expressive cultura. Legend A tale or story that typically recounts great achievements that often reaches heroic proportions. Such tales may be passed down for generations, or describe contemporary events. They may be completely accurate, factually based yet exaggerated, or entirely fictional¬. These varied approaches all illustrate different aspects of the folkloric process. The heroes or main characters of such tales are also known as legends.(Louisiana Voices)
Lienzo Charro
A 13-yard lane that opens into a circle 44-yard diameter where equestrian competitions - Charreadas - happen.
Lullabies
Unaccompanied songs sung to comfort babies or lull them to sleep. Virtually all cultural groups have lullabies, which are often passed on quite unconsciously from one generation of parents to another. Lullaby lyrics are often nonsensical and repetitive. The melodies are simple and smooth to produce the desired effect of getting a fussy baby to sleep. (Louisiana Voices)
Mariachi
Traditionally, Mariachi is a 13 piece musical ensemble and its repertory. The "son" is Mariachi’s true folk root.
Matambi
Cloth and crocheted ceiling coverings
Material Culture
A broad genre of folklore including a vast array of traditional artifacts or objects from fence types to quilts, instruments to foodways. (Louisiana Voices)
Menudo
Traditional Mexican soup, widely used in Mexico and in the US Southwest, made from white hominy with beef tripe, red chili, and other spices. It is usually served with chopped onions, cilantro and fresh lime juice.
Mexican American
A United States citizen born in Mexico or in the US from a Mexican family.
Mexicanos
Spanish for Mexican people.
Mestizos
Mexicans of mixed ethnic origin
Muleteer
Mule packer, arriero, in Spanish.
Myth
Sacred in nature, myths are stories that answer questions, as they explain the cultural aspects of peoples’ values, belief systems, and somehow bring an order to their experiences.
Narco Corridos
Ballads narrating events and people related to narcotic traffic and/or to traficants on the US/Mexico border.
Occupational culture
The knowledge, customs, traditions, oral narrative, music, and lore of occupational folk groups. (Louisiana Voices). Also, the cultural practices found in particular work groups; i.e. cowboys, loggers, fishermen, filmmakers, physicians, teachers, students, etc.
Papel Picado
Cut out paper decorations, often featuring patriotic symbols from Mexican history and patriotic colors, used for celebrations and home decoration.
Parfleche
Box or envelope-shaped container made out of rawhide and used by the Nez Perce and other Native peoples to carry dried meets and other belongings on horseback.
Proxemics
How things are arranged
Popular Culture
Culture and knowledge passed on through mass media, magazines, television, radio, Internet
Quinceañeras
Fifteen year old girls and the celebration of their 15th birthday in Mexican and other Latino cultures. As such it is a rite of passage observed by traditional families.
Rancho
Farm or ranch, also a small tract of agricultural land.
Riata
Lariat or lasso used by cowboys and buckaroos to select animals in a herd. It is also used as a form of cultural performance in connection with certain folk dances or as a demonstration of equestrian skill during rodeos and charreadas.
Silent language
A form of effective communication that relies on body language, eye contact, hand and other gestures.
Sign language
A form of visual, non-verbal communication that uses sign patterns to convey meaning. Manual communication relies on a combination of facial expressions, hand shapes, movements, and orientation of the hands, arms, and ultimately the whole body. Sign languages – there are many of them – are at the core of deaf cultures. As with any other group, there are different ethnic deaf groups everywhere in every country. They have local cultures which have their own expressive ways to communicate, including different visual vocabularies and sign languages.
Skidroad
Roadbed made up of logs placed side by side crosswise to the direction of traffic
Tale
Story
Tejano
Individual from Texas, musical genre originated in the Texas-Mexico border, the songs and performing groups with German influences associated with the area.
Trajes de Charro
Attire adorned with silver and embroidery that characterizes male and female charros.
Typical
Attribute of a site, person, or object.
Tommy knockers
Miners who have been trapped in cave-ins and pound on the rocks for rescue. It is believed that the ghosts of these miners go on knocking in the mine shafts long after the victims have died.(Urban dictionary)
Uchindu tree
Source of fiber from which the Somali Bantu people weave mats.
Vaqueros
Cowboys or buckaroos
Vernacular
Domestic, what belongs to the country, local, native.
Vihuela
Small, bowed back, five-string instruments played with picks that integrate the family of Mariachi rhythm instruments, Vihuelas play the harmony in the ensemble.
Wabitemba
Somali Bantu wall covering embroidered and trimmed with crochet
Weaver
Someone who weaves fibers – cotton, leather, sisal, silk, palm fronds, wool, or fibers of another nature – into fabric, rugs, mats, and baskets.
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