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'Supernatural' animals inhabit our everyday lives, folklore master's student says By
Sarah Mulholland While sitting quietly in a room, all of a sudden two cats jump up and run to the closed door, expecting . . . waiting . . . for something. The human doesn't hear anything and becomes frightened. Lynne McNeill, a Utah State University student, studying folklore, calls it the "creepy cat stare" when her cats, "Oddly Familiar," "Co-dependent," and "Everyday," do this. She has always been a cat lover and has become interested in researching them. McNeill believes that cats can see things we can't. They have an extra keen sense. McNeill finished her thesis, "The Waving Ones: A Study of Cats in Folklore," on March 20. She researched the reason we empower cats on the supernatural plane through stories and beliefs, what impact this has on our lives, and what we can learn about ourselves. She has done many interviews, library research and folklore archive research to gather her information. The first chapter of her thesis has been accepted for publication in a volume about nature in legends. Unicorns, fairies and ghosts are a few imaginary characters with supernatural powers. Cats are also believed to have these powers, yet they are real and most people interact or see them almost every day. Folklore is the study of everyday life that you share with others. It is an unofficial level of culture, containing stories, legends, customs, folk songs and superstitions. It is knowledge that people don't go to school to learn. "Folklore is the study of the expressive aspects of vernacular culture," McNeill said. The Pennsylvania Dutch believe that if you put a cat in a cradle in a newly weds' home, it will bring good luck with conceiving children. Some people believe that if you give the first bite of your food to a cat, you will have financial wealth. McNeill is interested in finding out what these beliefs and legends say about humans. She first became interested in folklore while attending Acalanes High School in Lafayette, Calif., where she wrote a term paper about fairy tales. She became good at telling stories and finds enjoyment in this research. "It says something about people in the present," she said. Cats are believed to be in a state of "liminality." Liminality is a state of being between two categories. For example, engagement is the period between being single and married. You aren't single anymore, and yet you aren't married yet. Some believe that cats are extra powerful, yet they are common in our everyday world. They are nocturnal, yet they will interact with you during the day. They are domestic and at the same time they will hunt in your yard, being closer to their wild ancestors than dogs. Cats are often considered lazy, yet they are alert at all times. They are distant, yet loving. Ghosts and fairies also fit into this category. According to folklore ghosts are dead, but alive. Similarly, folklore says fairies exit, but are unseen. Robin Parent, a lecturer in the English department, has heard McNeill's thesis. Parent received her master's in folklore in 1999 from Utah State. "Eccentric [women], or women that are labeled by the community as crazy, many times have cats and often have many. Therefore being called Crazy Cat Ladies. You rarely find stories of Crazy Cat Men, but rather men killing kittens," Parent said. McNeill has grown up listening to crazy cat stories, such as a woman being eaten by all of her cats. "Women and cats share this mysterious power," she said. Gender issues connect cats with women. Even when a woman may have no cats and is odd, some people may start calling her the "crazy cat woman." Cats and women may be connected because they are both tricky. "Folklore dramatizes an issue that causes us anxiety," McNeill said. Beliefs and stories about cats come from all over the world. "Telling stories about cats is one way we try to reconcile and acknowledge our tenuous control . . . and relationship to the natural world," she said. A cute-looking dog that some people brought back from Mexico showed it to their landlord and found out that what they thought was a dog, was actually a rat. This story illustrates a reason for being xenophobic (the fear of foreigners). Just because something or someone looks cute, doesn't mean it can't be dangerous and not what you expect. Another story is about a guy going into a bar and meeting a nice girl. He takes some drinks, and a few hours later woke up to find himself in a bathtub full of ice. There is a note next to the phone reading "I stole your kidney." Through this story one may learn that a bar isn't a safe place to meet new people, especially when you have too many drinks. If these types of stories stop serving our needs, we stop telling them. Just like some people are unsure about cats, they may be unsure about women. Issues come up as women gain power. Animal hording occurs when too many animals are in one place, which may harm the health of the animals. This happens due to psychological problems. In the past there have been stories of women with too many pigs or beavers. Even though people usually stereotype this behavior to women, men do it too. "The story that resonates with the community is women and cats," she said. McNeill believes that society needs to equalize gender by not having stereotypes. It's interesting that stories about men and animals always display some type of violence. For example, there is a story about a man tying two cats' tales together and the cats end up killing each other. Even though these stories seem to be popular, none of this happens as much as legends say they do. McNeill has noticed human-like qualities in her cats in how they act and react to different things. She once witnessed one of them flushing a toilet and thought she was dreaming. Cats communicate with other cats through quiet sounds, fur, and eye contact. The sounds cats make to humans are different than what they would use to communicate with their own species. By listening to humans speaking and communicating, cats have learned that in order to get attention, they must make noise. "Cats have been immortalized for thousands of years by humans for different reasons. I believe that cats have the ability to be perplexing to humans due to their relative lack of expression in contrast to dogs. This causes an enigma of sorts for humans. Many times this lack of expression is comforting to women who seek calm companions," Parent said. Even though cats can be found as a typical house pet, they can also be observed using their mysterious powers. Humans can learn about themselves through these different beliefs and legends, to understand why they act and believe the way they do.
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