Collection Information: Alizay was collected on May
18th, 2014 in Hanover, New Hampshire. It belongs to a sub-genre of
nursery rhymes called wake up songs.
Informant Data: I am my own informant for this collection piece. I am 20 years old and have lived my whole life on Cape Cod, Massachusetts. While my father is English, German, and a bit Swedish, my mother is Irish, German, and Creole/Cajun. I study Earth Sciences at Dartmouth College.
Context: This wake-up song is from my childhood, and my mother would sing it to me almost every morning to get my brother and me up for school. Cajun people are the African American descendants of slaves in Southern Louisiana, from when it was under French control, and as such they speak a unique dialect of French called Creole. This piece of folklore contains some Creole words, which are translated. It has been passed down from father to son and daughter for generations in my family to my mother, and from there, to myself. Presumably this originates from a time where they had to work in the fields.
Text:
“Alizay, Alizay, Alizay
You can't stay in the bed all the day
Get out of bed, Alizay
It's time to pick the meliton
Alizay, Alizay, you big cochon.”
Translation:
A meliton is a chayote (vegetable) and a cochon is a pig.
Meaning and Interpretation: This wake-up song, while short, does hold a lot of meaning, and has several important factors worth considering. Alizay is a region of France, but here it is used as a nickname for the child being addressed. The connection to French is due to the fact that, as said earlier, Creole is a dialect of French. Significant functions within the wake-up function are the referencing of the bed and wake-up times, chores to do the next day, and poking fun at the child for being as lazy as a pig. Additionally the meaning extends further in that it is carrying on a part of family history that otherwise is not mentioned very often.
Collector’s Information: Ben Wood, Dartmouth College ’16, Russian 13, Professor Mikhail Gronas, Spring 2014
