Folklore: Play Ground Hand Jives

Subject: RE: Dutch girl
From: Mo the caller
Date: 30 Jun 07 - 12:30 PM

Azizi, you quote the Opies saying that
My boy friend's name is Fatty,
He comes from Senoratti
With turned up toes and a pimple on his nose,
And this is how the story goes:
came to the UK in 1959.

It seems to have some relation to the 2 ball rhyme we said in 1954 (I had just started secondary school in London, age 11)
You start with the letter A and all the names have to begin with that letter
e.g.
My name is Alice
My husbands name is Arthur
We live in Aldershot
And we sell apples

You go through the alphabet while throwing and catching the balls, if you cant think of something or you drop the balls it's the next ones turn, and when they are out you go start again with the verse you were out on.
Our version had rythmn but didn't have to rhyme.

Subject: RE: Hand Jive
From: Mo the caller
Date: 30 Jun 07 - 12:21 PM

Yes they were mostly white I think.
I've looked at your link and it has a link to hand jive and I was reminded of another move, cup L hand under R elbow and shake R fist and v.v.
It was all very rhythmic

Subject: RE: Hand Jive on 'Blockbusters'
From: Mo the caller
Date: 30 Jun 07 - 12:11 PM

The audience of the show was probably late teens, as were the contestants. They were shown at the end of the programme, doing something complicated with their hands, not touching each other, but all doing the same. Sat in rows, in their seats
One move I remember, they had their hands in font of them, palms down, then crossed one above the other once or twice without touching, then the other above. No clapping that I can remember.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Play Ground Hand Jives
From: wysiwyg
Date: 30 Jun 07 - 10:31 AM

Are you saying that people in the audience clapped their own hands and slapped their chest or thighs to the beat-similar to "pattin juba?"* Or did they turn to face a person sitting next to them and alternately clap both of their own hands or one or both hands of the person they were facing? I presume that they stayed in seated. Is this right?


The "Hand Jiving" I recall from school was that the person was seated and the hands were dancing, so to speak-- purposeful and graceful waving of hands being held up in the air at about chest level. Not a patting game, or even necessarily a partnered activity. I keep picturing it as a thing to do while riding around in a car... maybe that was just us, my group.....

Maybe in high school? So that would be late 60's in the north suburban Chicago area. (Not a very diverse area at that time.)

There was a song "Hand Jive," and I'd love to be able to see the group that did it. Were they demonstrating it? Lost now in memory... The chorus: "Hand Jive.... Hand Jive. Hand Jive-- doing that crazy Hand Jive." On the radio. On TV.

~S~

Subject: RE: Folklore: Play Ground Hand Jives
From: Azizi
Date: 30 Jun 07 - 07:55 AM

Oops!

I made a mistake in the example that I wrote of the children's parody of "I Believe I Can Fly".

Here's the real words to that example:

The 2nd example that you posted Natasha is a parody of that record. Here's a very similar one that I collected in 1999 from school age African American boys in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania:

I believe I can fly.

I got chased by the FBI. (or "I'm being chased by the FBI").

It's all because of those collards greens

that I ate with those chicken wings.

I believe I can soar.

See me running through that open door.

I believe I can fly.

I believe I can fly.

I believe I can fly.

-snip-

This song uses the same tune and phrasing as the R. Kelly song.
For instance, the word "door" is elongated to dor-or-or".

Subject: RE: Folklore: Play Ground Hand Jives
From: Azizi
Date: 30 Jun 07 - 07:25 AM

Mo, thanks also for your post in this thread!

When you wrote "I like coffee, I like tea , I like --- in with me.", do the dashes denote a person's name or nickname?

Also, I'm curious about your rememberances of the British television show. Are you saying that people in the audience clapped their own hands and slapped their chest or thighs to the beat-similar to "pattin juba?"* Or did they turn to face a person sitting next to them and alternately clap both of their own hands or one or both hands of the person they were facing? I presume that they stayed in seated. Is this right?

And, I'm assuming that the audience was made up of all or mostly White people-is this true? And were they children or pre-teens or adults?

* See this Wikipedia article about "pattin juba":

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juba_dance

Subject: RE: Folklore: Play Ground Hand Jives
From: Azizi
Date: 30 Jun 07 - 07:05 AM

Here's one variant form of "Pretty Little Dutch Girl" that I collected in 2004 in Pittsburgh, PA. The three African American girls {ages 7 and 8} performed this rhyme as a three person handclap {the three girls stood in a right triangle formation and took turns clapping and slapping each others hands}. The introductory lines "Zing Zing Zing/at the bottom of the sea" were performed differently than the "real" rhyme.{Each of the girls held another's pinky finger and did some swaying left to right motion with it}

Also, note the racial put-down in the ending line:

I AM A LITTLE SECOND GRADE

Zing Zing Zing
at the bottom of the sea.
I am a little __ second grade *
as pretty as can __ be be.
And all the boys around my house
go crazy over __ me me.

My boyfriend's name is __ Yellow.
He comes from Ala__bama
with 25 toes
and a pickle on his nose
and this is how the story goes.
One day I was ah __ walkin
I saw my boyfriend __ talking
to a very pretty girl
with cherry pie curls And this is what she said
"I L-O-V-E __ love you."
"I K-I-S-S __ kiss you."
"I A-D-O-R-E __ adore you"
So S-T-O-P. STOP!
1-2-3-4
Get your black hands off of me!

-snip-
The "___" indicates one beat before recitation begins again.

The "second grade" {meaning "second grader"} was used to denote what year most of the girls were. In response to my question about this line, I learned that the girls change that line to reflect which grade they are in. This performance of this rhyme was done in Oct 2004. The rhyme actually started with the girls saying "I am a first grade". But they started over again because they remembered that {two of them} were now in the 2nd grade.

On the lines "get your black hands off of me" the girls try to be the first ones to quickly snatch their hands away from the other players.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Play Ground Hand Jives
From: Azizi
Date: 30 Jun 07 - 06:50 AM

Eugene, is this the "pretty Dutch girl" rhyme that you can't remember?

I AM A PRETTY LITTLE DUTCH GIRL

I am a pretty little Dutch girl.
As pretty as can be, be, be
And all the boys in the baseball team
Go crazy over me, me, me

My boy friend's name is Fatty,
He comes from Senoratti
With turned up toes and a pimple on his nose,
And this is how the story goes:

My mother sent me to the shop,
And told me not to stay, stay, stay
I met my boyfriend on the way
And stayed till Christmas Day, Day, Day .

First he gave me peaches,
Then he gave me pears
Then he gave me 25 cents
To kiss him on the stairs, stairs, stairs.
I gave him back his peaches,
I gave him back his pears,
I gave him back his 25 cents
And kicked him down the stairs, stairs, stairs.

One day when I was walking,
I saw my true love talking,
To a pretty little girl
With a strawberry curl,
And this is what he said:
I will T-A-K-E take you
to the P-A-R-K park,
I will K-I-S-S kiss you
In the D—R-K,
I will L-O-V-E love you
All the T-M-E time,
And the wedding bells will chime

"This light-hearted love story would be recognized as American even if the earliest recording did not come from New York. It appears to have arrived in Britain in 1959, when it was first noted, and it spread through the country like wildfire. A girl fround Twickenham taught it to the children of her new school in Wilmslow. A girl from
London SE8 taught it to the children in her new school in Worchester. A girl brought it back to her school in Spennymoor from the children's ward of Durham County Hospital where 'every was playing it". …But oral tradition, under pressure could not preserve the unfamiliar words, which diversified charmingly. The boy friend Fatty, originally from Cincinatti, is now from "Sixolatti, "Switzerlatti", "Madagassi", ot 'an Irish Naafi",; or his identiy iow "Tony from the land of Palony', or 'Shallow from Portomallow', or 'Martin from the Isle of Tartan', or "Sailor from Venezueloa' {it seems that rhyming a boy's name with a home town is part of the game}; or he has 'a red, red nose and cherries on his toes", or 'a pickle on his nose and ten black toes, 'or bubble gum feet that smell so sweet".

The text given here is an assemblage of all the possible component parts of the story which stem from different places. Children most often combine the first, second, and fifth parts , or the first, third, and fourth, In the very many versions collected almost every combination has been found, except all five parts in one version."

{text & example found in Iona and Peter Opies, "The Singing Game" p.452}

Subject: RE: Folklore: Play Ground Hand Jives
From: Azizi
Date: 30 Jun 07 - 06:43 AM

EuGene, thanks for those examples! Thanks also for including demographical information.

I've never seen or heard that version of "I love coffee/I love tea". I'm interested in the way that the example starts out with an introductory verse before moving to the "I love coffee/I love tea" lines. I've noticed that a number of African American handclap rhymes start with short introductory phrases. Two examples are-"Shame Shame Shame"; "Zing Zing Zing and ah one two three".

I'm wondering if this billygoat chasing rhyme or the line "and this is what he said to me" is used to introduce other children's rhymes that you {or others} remember or do you remember it just from this rhyme?

**
I have seen lines in some children's rhymes about grandma hitting someone or being hit herself with a hickory stick. For example there's this verse:

"Grandma, grandma sick in bed
called the doctor and the doctor said.
Get up grandma, you aint sick
All you need is a hickory stick.

This is from Talley's "Negro Folk Rhymes" and I've seen it published elsewhere, though Talley may be the oldest printed source there is.

Children chant this verse nowadays by rote memory without thinking about its lyrics or the historical information it contains. However, I believe that this 19th century or older verse shows how slave masters treated older enslaved people who were ill {and, by extension, any enslaved person who was ill}. Their illnesses would be discounted and if the sick person didn't get up from bed, they'd be beaten by a hickory stick.

Here's a widely used example of this verse which I found in a number of versions of "I Love Coffee/I Love Tea" in Pittsburgh, PA area -though in theat area children {at least African American children who I've known and interacted with} call that handclap rhyme "Down Down Baby":

Mama, Mama I feel sick
Send for the doctor quick quick quick
Doctor, Doctor, will I die?
Close your eyes and count to five.
1-2-3-4-5
I'm alive!

-snip-

Sometimes-for some reason a child {usually a girl ages 5-12 years} would add after the "I'm alive" line "and on channel five".

I've found this verse-with & without the channel five part-on various Internet sites. I've also seen the ending "1-2-3-4-5. Too late, I died."

Subject: RE: Folklore: Play Ground Hand Jives
From: Azizi
Date: 30 Jun 07 - 06:27 AM

Gargoyle,

I've learned not to be surprised by anything you say.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Play Ground Hand Jives
From: Mo the caller
Date: 30 Jun 07 - 02:26 AM

In London in the late 40s / early 50s we played 'skipping' with the the rhymne
I like coffee, I like tea , I like --- in with me.
I don't like coffee, I don't like tea, I don't like --- in with me.

At the time it was an all white school, there had not been much imigration then. I didn't skip much, I assume that the first player called the second in, and then jumped out herself, but am not sure.

The Hand Jive that I remember didn't involve clapping, it was a rhythmic hand movement popular in the 80s or 90s. We used to watch a TV programme called 'Blockbusters' were pairs of students competed to answer questions (with the initial letters of the answer given, the answer giving a block in a noughts and crosses type grid). At the end of the programme they showed a shot of the students in the audience doing a hand-jive in unison to the signature tune.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Play Ground Hand Jives
From: EuGene
Date: 30 Jun 07 - 12:03 AM

I grew up for part of my early years in the remote Ozarks area of North Arkansas where there were no African Americans. Yet in the 1950's and early 1960's a variation of that "I like coffee, I like tea" song was a common jump rope ditty in our area that went like this:

"I went down to Granpa's farm,
Billy goat chased me 'round the barn.
Chased me up an apple tree;
This is what he said to me:

I like coffee, I like tea,
I like pretty girls, they like me.
Hurry! Hurry! Kiss me quick,
Here comes Granny with a stick!"
(clap!) (Clap!)

This ditty ended with two loud hand claps. It was sung to that tune about "Down at Papa Joe's" . . . I don't know the name that song, but as kids we could always start with a black Eb key on a piano and easily pick it out using mostly the black keys.

Another jump rope ditty that I vaguely recall the beginning to:

"Oh, I'm a pretty little Dutch girl,
As pretty as pretty can be.
. . . . . "

The above ditty was sung to a tune just like the tune that played at the end of some cartoons, just before Porky Pig stuttered "Th..Th..Th..That's all, folks!"

I had seven younger sisters, did a lot of jump rope twirling (that's what we called it), and I used to hear lots of those little ditties when the girls were jumping rope, but I just can't remember any others right now.

By the way, I did some jump rope, but that wasn't my forte . . . however, I could beat most of 'em at jacks (my larger hand help me beat 'em on "fourzies" and above) and hop scotch.

Eu

Subject: RE: Folklore: Play Ground Hand Jives
From: GUEST,.gargoyle
Date: 29 Jun 07 - 11:24 PM

ANZISI

Don't get me wrong girl, you are a breath of fresh morning dew in the stale fetid smoke of a UK infested pub.

Keep up your contributions....they ARE VALUABLE to keeping this place AMIERICAN.

Sincerely,
Gargoyle

Subject: RE: Folklore: Play Ground Hand Jives
From: GUEST,.gargoyle
Date: 29 Jun 07 - 11:20 PM

Now WHY????? would a NATASHA WOODS (never before posting) make a complicated procedure....first-time posting.....

be replied by AZIZI

our bestest Nigress Emeritis?????

Huummmmmmmm.......

Give one cause to wonder........

Sincerely,
Gargoyle

do, dew, due, wonder

Subject: RE: Folklore: Play Ground Hand Jives
From: Azizi
Date: 29 Jun 07 - 08:35 PM

Hey, Natasha!

I've collected versions of the handclap rhyme "I Don't Want To Go To Mexico" from African American children {mostly school age girls ages 6-12 years} though school age boys also know it. Up to about age 8 years boys wouldn't mind showing me how to do the handclap routine that "goes with" for this "song". But after that age, most boys say that these songs and handclaps {the performance activity} are for girls*.

I've also collected examples of this rhyme from various Internet sites-including my own website Cocojams. See this page of that website for more examples and commentary:

http://www.cocojams.com/handclap_rhymes_example_0104.htm

* I found that {elementary] school age boys will, however, join in {but not usually start} competitive handclaps like "Strolla Ola Ola"{"Stella Ella Ola" and other such names}.

See this Mudcat thread about that rhyme thread.cfm?threadid=77066 "Kids chant Stella Ola Ola / Stella Ella Ola"

Subject: RE: Folklore: Play Ground Hand Jives
From: Azizi
Date: 29 Jun 07 - 08:21 PM

Natasha, sorry for jumping into this discussion without first apologizing.

I'm sorry that I'm just responding to your May 30, 2007 post. And I'm sorry no one else did. But I'm here now. Hopefully, other people will join in this thread. Natasha, I hope you will check out this thread and give me and other folks a holla back.

Btw, Natasha I find it interesting that you use the term "handjives" for handclaps.

I'm from the Eastern part of the USA {New Jersey} and have lived in the near-Midwest {Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania} for longer than I lived in the East. And I have never heard these rhymes or their performance activity called handjives by any Black people. However I have heard of the song Willie And The Hand Jive . So I guess there was a time when some folks called them or the routines done to the chants "hand jive".

The African American children I interact with in Pittsburgh call them "songs". Or they say that they are doing "handclaps". I've never heard them say they are "playing handclaps". Being much older than these children, I call them rhymes, though I also called them "songs" when I was growing up.

**

Natasha, with regard to the second example that you posted, this used to be the bomb in Pittsburgh {meaning it was way hot! meaning it was real popular. This was waay back in the day-in 1998 or thereabouts -when you could hear R. Kelly singing his hit song I Believe I Can Fly on just about any urban R&B/Hip Hop radio station at any time.

The 2nd example that you posted Natasha is a parody of that record. Here's a very similar one that I collected in 1999 from school age African American boys in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania:

I believe I can fly.

I got chased by the FBI. (or "I'm being chased by the FBI").

It's all because of those collards greens

that I ate with those chicken wings.

I believe I can fly.

See me running through that open door.

I believe I can fly.

I believe I can fly.

-snip-

Your guess is as good as mine where this version came from.
I wouldn't be surprised if it was part of a comedy routine that was shown on one of those BET comedy shows {"BET"="Black Entertainment Television"}. But that's just a guess.

I really don't have a clue how this song became sooo popular and how it spread-well-wherever it spread.

I should mention that in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania the children's version of "I Believe I Can Fly" was a song. Nobody ever did handclap routines or steppin or any other kind of movement to it. Boys as well as girls sung this song with lots of enthusiasm. I said "sung" instead of "sing" because I've found that few if any Black school age kids know this song now...

Natasha, I'd love to know if you remember this song from now-or from "then". And I'd love to know when "then" was for you... Also, what is your race? I ask that question because I'm curious if this song is or was known by people who aren't African Americans.

Some people don't like to bring up race. But in the context of documenting what rhymes are {and were} known and how they are {and were} performed, it is alright {and I think it's important} to ask questions about race so that information about these rhymes can be documented as fully as possible.

In any event, best wishes, Natasha and thanks for posting your examples.

Azizi

Subject: RE: Folklore: Play Ground Hand Jives
From: Azizi
Date: 29 Jun 07 - 07:44 PM

There is no tellin why some children's rhymes change the way they do.

Take the first example posted by GUEST,Natasha Woods. The "I like coffee, I like tea" verse dates back at least as far as the 1920s. This line is included in an example entitled "Vinie" that is found in Thomas W. Talley's 1922 collection "Negro Folk Rhymes". In that   book that verse is given as

"I loves coffee, an' I loves tea.
I axes you, Vinie, does you love me?"

["Negro Folk Rhymes", Kennikat Press edition, 1968 p. 130]

-snip-

By the 1950s, this verse was chanted while jumping rope. The standard words to the rhyme were:
I like {or "love"} coffee
I like tea
I like {insert a boy's name}
and he likes me

{or "I like the boys/and the boys like me"}

Another form of this rhyme was:
I like {love} coffee
I like tea
I want {a boy or a girl's name}
to jump in with me {meaning to jump in the rope along with the another person}

But at some point, this verse became a handclap/imitative movement rhyme. The most widely printed version of this form of this rhyme is "Shimmy Shimmy Coco Pa" {or puff, or pop or some similar sounding name. Guest Natasha Woods' example-excluding that 2nd verse-is the "standard" version of this rhyme.

However, for some reason or reasons, by the late 1980s, racial confrontational lines had become a standard part of many examples of this rhyme.

Natasha Woods gives this standardized racial confrontational verse as her 2nd verse. These words are found-in the same way-in examples that I've collected as a result of direct interactions with African American school age girls, female teens, and adult women, AND from examples posted on various Internet websites [including Mudcat]. The only slight differences is that the person speaking [a Black girl?] either says " I like a black boy" or "I like a colored boy" or "I like a color boy". "Color boy" here is probably a result of folk etymology since the referent "colored" is not used any more, and probably is not a term that children know.

One example that I collected from the Internet has the speaker {presumably a girl saying "step back white girl/you don't shine/ I'mma get a Black boy to beat your behind". However, this change in gender may be due to folk etymology. I've also collected an example that says "I love a pretty boy and he loves me" and then continues with the other "fixed" wording. I believe that there are probably more folk process changes like that. But where did this confrontational racial referent verse come from and why?

I believe that the "I Love Coffee. I Love Tea" rhyme has its roots in African American communities. I also believe that the racial confronational verse is also of African American origin. What is interesting to me is that this children's rhyme is among the few African American "contemporary" rhymes that I have collected that almost always mention race.

It's my position that this addition to this originally non-confrontative rhyme is the result of and reflect racial tensions that occurred because of school integrations {and perhaps less likely, the integration of neighborhoods, and other social orbanizations that children of different races may frequent}.

And with regard to the lines "step back white boy/you don't shine", it's my position that "shine" is related to "glowing brightly". Therefore, in the context of this rhyme it means that the boy in question is not "all that" or "is no big deal" [substitute the latest putdown slang lingo]. I definitely don't think that 'shine" here is the same as "Shine", the colloquial and sometimes perjorative referent for Black people.

So, Guest Natasha Woods, that's my sense of what's up with this rhyme. I'd love to hear from other folks as to what they think is up with it.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Play Ground Hand Jives
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 31 May 07 - 12:41 PM

refresh.

Azizi out there somewhere?

Subject: Folklore: Play Ground Hand Jives
From: GUEST,Natasha Woods
Date: 30 May 07 - 03:59 PM

Hand Jives I've learned as a kid living in VA. Please Post some that you know!!!

Down Down Baby


Down down baby, down by the rollercoaster
Sweet sweet baby, mama never let you go
Shimmy shimmy coca pop, shimmy shimmy pow!

I like coffee, I like tea,
I like a color boy and he likes me
So step back white boy, you don't shine
I'll get the color boy to beat yo' behind

Let get the rhythm of the hands (clap, clap)
We've got the rhythm of the hands (clap, clap)

Let's get the rhythm of the feet (stomp,stomp)
We've got the rhythm of the feet (stomp, stomp

Lets get the rhythm of the head DING-DONG
(move head side to side)
We've got the rhythm of the head DING-DONG (move head side to side)

Let's get the rhythm of the HOT-DOG
(move body around)
We've got the of the HOT-DOG
(move body around)

Put all together and and what do you get....

clap, clap, stomp, stomp, ding-dong, hot-dog

Say them all backwards and what do you get....

hot-dog, ding-dong, stomp, stomp, clap, clap!



(To the tune of I Believe I Can Fly)

I believe I can fly
I got shot by the F.B.I
All I wanted was some chicken wings
and a little bit of collad greens
I believe I can soar
I got a beaten at the geocery store




I don't wanna go to mexico


I don't wann go to mexico no more more more
There's a big fat police man at the door door door
He'll grab you by the collar, ask you for a dollar
I don't wanna go to mexico no more more more
So shut the door!