Cajun and Creole Folktales

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Cajun and Creole Folktales

• The French Oral Tradition of
• South Louisiana

Dr. S. Kay Gandy Western Kentucky University
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Creole

• Distinguish that which was native to colonies
  from that which was imported
• Distinguish descendants of Europeans born in
  colony from immigrants
• Distinguish French-speaking black people from
  English-speaking African Americans
• French Creole referred to white, upper class,
  non-Cajuns

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Cajun

• Americanized for of term Cadien (pronounced
  Cajin)
• Referred to Acadians deported from Nova Scotia
• Cultural and linguistic blend with Creoles,
  Spaniards, Germans, Scotch and Irish

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Excluded Minority

• 1900s law banned speaking of Cajun French in
  schools
• No written literature by Cajunsoral storytelling
  tradition
• 1968 Council for Development of French in
  Louisiana (CODOFIL)
• Preserve and utilize French language and culture
  by offering subject in schools

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Results of CODOFIL

• Elevation of ethnic consciousness
• Popular to associate with Cajun or Creole
  cultures
• Zydeco
• Food
• Tales

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Folktales

• Portray the kinship, language, religion, customs
  and heritage of culture
• Always been symbolic of the culture of a people,
  typically becoming part of the oral tradition
• Fits well with National Standards for Social
  Studies Teachers Culture and Cultural Diversity
  People, Places, and Environments and Individual
  Development and Identity

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Categories of Tales

• Based on vestiges (trace of something gone)
• Animal talesfollies of animals
• Magic talesold world romance
• Based on popular tradition
• Jokes
• Tall tales
• Based on historical experience
• Legends
• Historical tales

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Animal Tales

• Animals speak, cry, laugh, and reason like humans
• Cleverness (rabbit, fox, turtle)
• Ignorance (wolf, bear, hyena)
• Malice (spider, monkey)
• Based on French and African traditions
• Frequently framed by comments and judgments

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Animal Tales
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Magic Tales

• Typically long, oral narratives
• Complex plots, amazing skill, quest for treasure,
  and heroes/heroines who succeed in the end
• Formal vocabulary

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Marie Jolie
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Jokes

• Most popular oral genre
• Funny, but serious
• Define a culture from the inside
• Often told in English

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• Boudreaux and Thibodeaux had bought their own
  airline. On their first flight from Lafayette to
  Jamaica, they ran into motor trouble. Thibodeaux
  came on the speaker and said, "We are going to
  have to make an emergency crash landing. We are
  over the ocean so all of you that can swim please
  move to the left side of the plane, and all of
  you that can't swim, please move to the right
  side. As soon as the plane hits the water I want
  all of the people on the left to swim for shore.
  All of you on the right, well, Captain Boudreaux
  and I would like to thank you for flying Cajun
  Airlines
• (from http//www.carencrohighschool.org/LA_Studies
  /Humor/boudthib.htm)

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Cajuns as Illiterates

• Cajun boy who went to LSU and came home for
  Christmas. The proud father gathered 100 people
  to welcome the boy home and demanded that the boy
  share something he learned at L.U.S. The boy
  shared what he learned in algebra
• "Look, boy, I done spen' my las' money wi'at I
  got on you fo' you to got some educate, an' here
  you come tole me you can't said somet'in' in
  algebra. You better said somet'in', or you won't
  be able to go back to school no time. I'm gonna
  beat yo' head from you." De son say, "Hokay,
  pa-pa. Pi R Square." His pa-pa look at him an'
  say, "Now if dat ain't a damn fool. Averybody
  know pie are roun'--cornbread are square" (Wilson
  Jacobs, 1974, 102).

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Tall Tales

• Common in prairies to the west
• Based on familiar activities
• Highly public and often told to strangers (test
  gullibility)

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The Bent Shotgun

• There's a man who had gone duck hunting. And it
  was a round pond and the ducks had lighted all
  around next to the bank. He wanted to kill all
  the ducks. He didn't know what to do. So he bent
  the barrel of his shotgun according to the lines
  of the pond, and the pellets went all around and
  killed the ducks (Ancelet, 1994, 124).

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Loup Garou
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Legendary Tales

• Based on belief, often told as true
• Explore boundaries between everyday and
  supernatural
• Buried treasure or mysterious events

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The Man Who Asked for Rain

• The story teller uses the story to present a
  moral against pride and greed. The fact that this
  man seeks not only to succeed himself, but to see
  his neighbors fail recalls the line often
  attributed to Attila the Hun It is not enough
  that I win others must lose.
• Ancelet, B.J. (1994). Cajun and Creole folktales,
  Jackson University Press of Mississippi, p. 151.

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Historical Tales

• Embellished truth
• Exaggerated attributes of hero
• Occurrence of events in groups of three
• Entertainment as important as transmission of
  facts

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Little Pierre
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For the Classroom

• Sketch migration path of Cajuns from Acadia to
  Louisiana and follow the settlement patterns
• How did the neighbors in surrounding areas
  influence the Cajun culture and how did the Cajun
  culture influence others?
• Examine Tall Tales that have developed in other
  areas of the U.S., such as, Pecos Bill and Paul
  Bunyan and compare to Cajun tales

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For the Classroom

• Taste Cajun cuisine and note the ingredients that
  came from other cultures (African vegetable
  okra, Choctaw spice file powder, French base
  of roux, German Andouille, Spanish
  jambalaya).
• Examine influence of Creoles in New Orleans
  through architect

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Conclusion

• Direct relationship between culture and folktales
• Create cultural awareness and understanding
• Reflect everyday life of a people
• Binds the listener and the storyteller

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Resources and Materials

• Ancelet, B.J. (1994). Cajun and Creole folktales,
  Jackson University Press of Mississippi.
• Reneaux, J.J. (1992). Cajun folktales, Little
  Rock August House Publishers, Inc.
• Reneaux, J.J. (1994). Haunted bayou and other
  Cajun ghost stories, Little Rock August House
  Publishers, Inc.
• Breaux, T.J. (1999). Cajun stories my granpa tole
  me, Gretna Pelican Publishing Company.
• Thomassie, T. (1995). Feliciana Feydra Le Roux,
  Boston Little, Brown, and Company.
• Thomassie, T. (1998). Feliciana meets dLoup
  Garou, Boston Little, Brown, and Company.
• Reneaux, J.J. (1995). Why alligator hates dog,
  Little Rock August House LittleFolk.
• Soper, C. (1997). Cajun folktales, Gretna
  Pelican Publishing Company.
• San Souci, R.D. (2003). Little Pierre A Cajun
  story from Louisiana, Orlando Harcourt, Inc.