Folk Illusions by K. Brandon Barker Claiborne Rice

Author:K. Brandon Barker, Claiborne Rice [K. Brandon Barker, Claiborne Rice]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Social Science, Folklore & Mythology, Games & Activities, Optical Illusions, Psychology, Developmental, Child, Science, Life Sciences, Neuroscience, Children's Studies, Anthropology, Cultural & Social
ISBN: 9780253041111
Google: heJVEAAAQBAJ
Publisher: Indiana University Press
Published: 2019-04-22T05:27:12+00:00

“Because, every time you do this!” [mimes stacking hands]

“You didn’t expect it the first time, but you expect it the second time!”

“We don’t know. It just works, we figured it out.”

“Joining hands [mimes stacking hands], gives each other strengths!”

“Like if you put a doughnut [a weight] on a [baseball] bat, it gives you more, it makes it lighter pretty much.”

The boys’ justifications gesture toward scientifically grounded explanations like weight distribution and increased muscular performance following resistance exercises. Indeed, these nearly scientific explanations for the higher second lift seem to be a key traditional element of the variant. In 2014, a twenty-seven-year-old male who grew up in Venezuela explained to us that the hand-stacking elements actually “cut the center of gravity.” As off-base as some of these theories might seem (how can a center of gravity be cut?), it is important not to think of the explanations of the seventh graders as incorrect theories (scientific or otherwise), because relegating the youth’s theories to the world of the confirmable would miss key insights.

We learn strategic elements of youthful theory-creation, for example, by comparing Combine Our Strengths lifts to those of more ritualesque traditions like Light as a Feather, which we introduced in chapter 2. Remember that the necessary contexts for the creation of Light as a Feather’s lift are similarly distributed because the participation of the many lifters is necessary to achieve the illusion’s success. For levitation to occur, the group must assume their performance positions so that they properly distribute the actor’s weight. Do they assume this position without recognizing the physical principles underlying weight distribution? Consciously, the children are certainly focused on the macabre, spiritual aspects of the performance and the social flow of the moment. These supernatural, séance-like elements constitute the cultural frame that the illusion relies upon. Among all this—that is, the material and physiological contexts of the lift and the top-down, cultural frame of supernatural presence—some youths report that the actor supernaturally levitates. Like the scientists who believe the golfers’ reports that the “practice” golf balls are heavier than the “real” golf balls, we take the children’s reports of levitation as genuine descriptions of the phenomenological experience.

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