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Starter

1. Do you have one or more lucky charms?

□ yes □ no

2. If so, which ones?

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3. Why do you have lucky charms? Tick a number to indicate how important each reason is (1 = not at all important; 10 = very important)

because... 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

... my friends also have them... they look good... they bring luck... they stress my individuality

4. Summarize the results for the whole class. First make a table to visualize the answers to question (1) and (2).

lucky charm number of pupils

1.

2.

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None

5. Then calculate the average for each of the reasons given in question (3).

Anke Uhlenwinkel – University of Potsdam/Germany

Lucky charms

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Map Work – Patterns and Trends

6. Look at the maps below and compare the answers of your class to the average of your country.

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7. Geographers love to find patterns in maps. One bright student came up with the following idea for the first map (Do you have a lucky charm?):

Try to describe what he did.

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8. Do you think, this is a helpful pattern? Give reasons.

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9. Other patterns that could be helpful are e. g. religion or the wealth of a country.

Religions in Europe

(source: http://commons.wikipedia.rg/wiki/Image:Europe_religion_map_de.png?uselang=de)

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GDP per head in Europe (in percentage of European average)

(source: http://de.academic.ru/dic.nsf/dewiki/415411)

Try one of the patterns and test whether they are helpful. You can use the writing frame, if you like.

I think, you can find a pattern related to ...

A good example are ...

An example hard to explain by this pattern could be ...

But if you take into consideration that ...

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On the other hand ...

Overall, I would say ...

10.Discuss your results in class. Did you, as a group, find a meaningful pattern so far?

□ yes □ no

11.The graph below relates the data from the first and the second map to each other.

Can you find a pattern or trend in these data? Which countries are more exceptional than the others? Why?

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Map Work - Explanations

12.Some scientist think, that the more modern (or post-modern) a society gets, the more people have and / or believe in lucky charms. Looking at the graph in question (12) and at the data below, can you support this conclusion?

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Country Code GDP per capita 2008 (in Euro)

HDI 2007(rank)

Czeck Republic CZ 14.200 36

France FR 30.400 8

Germany DE 30.300 22

Greece GR 21.600 25

Netherlands NL 36.200 6

Poland PL 9.500 41

Portugal PT 15.600 34

Romania RO 6.400 63

Slovakia SK 12.000 42

Spain ES 24.000 15

Turkey TR 11.170* 79

United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland UK 29.700 21

* in US-$(Sources: http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mitgliedsstaaten_der_Europäichen_Union; HTTP://.de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Türkei; www.euractiv.de/fileadmin/images/UN_RankingEU_2007_Vgl.pdf)

The Human Development Index (HDI) is an index used to rank countries by level of "human development", which usually also implies whether a country is developed, developing, or underdeveloped.HDI combines three dimensions: Life expectancy at birth, as an index of population health and longevity Knowledge and education, as measured by the adult literacy rate and the combined

primary, secondary, and tertiary gross enrollment ratio.

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Standard of living, as measured by the gross domestic product per capita at purchasing power parity.

(source (slightly altered): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_Development_Index)

13.Let’s try out other explanations as well. In the following pictures you find different lucky charms.

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Compare them to the lucky charms, that were mentioned in your class. Which are similar? Which are different?

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14.What can you conclude from the lucky charms shown in the pictures?

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15.Now let’s make some purposeful use of Wikipedia! Below you find the (translated) entries for “lucky charms” in different languages.

GermanA lucky charm - as opposed to the more abstract symbol of luck – is a concrete object (stone or jewellery), a plant or parts of it, a person or an animal, of which superstitious people think, that they have the power to make you lucky. A lucky charm is often comparable to an amulet or a talisman and is supposed to help people being lucky, wealthy, healthy and have a long life. It is also said to keep evil spirits away. Usually

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living things or objects are considered a lucky charm, because of their history or stories told about them; also somebody conveying good news is considered a “Glücks-Bringer” – a bearer of luck or a lucky charm.

EnglishLucky Charms is a brand of cereal produced by the General Mills food company of Golden Valley, Minnesota, United States. It first appeared in stores in 1964. The cereal consists of two main components: toasted oat-based pieces and multi-colored marshmallow bits (marbits) in various shapes, the latter making up over 25 percent of the cereal's volume. The label features a leprechaun mascot, Lucky, animated in commercials.

Turkish (found under the entry “uğur” / “luck”)"Luck" is the name given to an object or an event that is believed to affect a person's life positively, but is out of that person's control. Some objects are believed to be loaded with this positive effect more than others. These lucky charms can be different from country to country, belief to belief. Four leaved shamrocks, horseshoes and rabbit legs can be counted as the best known lucky charms worldwide. Differing according to cultural and religious points of view, luck can be seen to mean anything between superstition and destiny.

Slovak (there are two relevant entries here: talisman (1) and amulet (2) )(1)Talisman (from Greek "telesma" = ritual, originally from the word "telos" = result) is an object, which is meant to bring luck or some other (magic) benefits to its owner. In magic it is used for many different rituals. With its shape, material and construction it is similar to another magic object - the amulet.(2)Amulet is an object, which is believed to have the magic power to protect its owner against diseases, unluckiness or bad magical powers. It was being attached to animals' harnesses as well.According to the epoch and habits in a certain locality, they were claws and teeth of predatory animals, stones, glass beads, small mirrors, diamonds and gemstones, but also jewels carved from gemstones, inserted into seals, rings, small planks or emblems. Sometimes also prayers and spells were inserted. The jewels could be shaped like animals, fruits, the sun or the moon (or half moon). Similarly to the amulett also another object was being used - the talisman.History - In antiquity it was common to carry talismans and amulets in the entire Near East. Hebrews were rejecting this custom, though. Former amulets are nowadays carried mostly like fashion jewellery, for instance earrings, rings etc.

Dutch (here the term does not have its own entry, but is found under alvetism (1) and myrtle (2) )(1)Nature as lucky charmA lot of trees and animals were seen as lucky charms, for example the heron. Not only for aleviets do herons have a special symbolic value, but also for other people. Since antiquity the heron has had a special magic. (2)

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During the Sukkot, the Feast of Tabernacles of the Jews, three myrtle branches, that were plucked on the first day of the feast, together with other branches and a fragrant fruit were used for ‘waving the lulav’, a custom that goes back to the third book of Mose (Wajikra or Leviticus) 23:40-41. The fragrant, but tasteless myrtle branches or “hadassiem” symbolize the jews, who do not study the Torah, but nevertheless apply it. The myrtle is also thought to be a lucky charm in relation to marriages and fertility.

French (here term does not have its own entry, but it can be found in the article on “superstition”)The term superstition may have different meanings:

... It describes the belief that certain actions will always have either positive or

negative consequences, that certain objects, animals or persons inherently carry the property of being able to make people lucky or to bring them bad luck and that certain phenomena are automatically suspicious and disasterous signs. Usually the superstitous person cannot explain, why these things or actions have these properties, or the reasons offered are considered irrational by modern sciences. There are sometimes attributions of anthropocentric significance and to intentions in coincidental events or objects; that is why one also speaks of magic thinking. Superstitions are often cultural phenoma, that is, they are shared to a certain degree by the social environment a superstitious person lives in and they differ from one culture to the other. Nevertheless there are also purely individual superstitions.

Czeck (there are two relevant entries here: talisman (1) and amulet (2) )(1)Talisman comes originally from the Arabian word "talasm" = ritual, more originally from the word "telos" = result. A talisman is an object meant to bring luck or to protect its owner. It is used for many rituals in magic. A talisman is mostly an artificially made object that yields luck. It is one of the most effective tools to protect against magic. The most effective talisman must be made by the person who wants to use it.(2)An amulet is an object, which should protect its owner with its magic power. The word is derived from Latin "amuletum", which means an object that protects, or a medical tool. According to some other opinions this word comes from either the Etruscan or Arabic language.Usage of amulets is based on the faith in the protective power of a certain object (for example a plant, a stone or magic signs). Amulets only work when a person carries them all the time. It differs from similar objects like the talisman in that it is supposed to protect its owner against evil forces, while a talisman should attract good impacts.Amulets are carried on the body (like a jewel) or on clothes. According to esoteric experiences, it must be magically blessed after it was made. Also during its production it is necessary to consider the astrological correspondence to the future owner.Amulets in Christianity – In Christianity amulets were spread mostly as small crosses carried on a chain around the neck, pictures of saints and cases with relics or other blessed objects. In the middle ages in Europe, Agnus Dei (the Lamb of God) was considered a very strong amulet. It was a medal made from the wax of sacrificial candles from Sistine Chapel in Jerusalem by Cistercian monks. There was an

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inscription saying "Ecce Agnus dei, qui tollit peccata mundi" (Behold, Lamb of God, you who take away the sins of the world). This amulet was meant to protect against evil spirits, the plague and other diseases etc.

SpanishThe term amulet (from Latin amuletum, first used in “Naturalis Historiæ” by Plinius the elder in the sense of “an object that protects a person in the face of a problem”) has certain relations to the term talisman (from Arab tilasm and Greek telesma or “telein” which means “introducing somebody to the mysterious”). It consists of a portable object to which superstitious people attribute certain supernatural virtues: to make people lucky and / or to protect them. Amulets can be: gems or stones, statues, coins, paintings, jewellery, rings, plants, animals.... including prayers, like the “vade retro santa” used in certain situations to ward off the devil or bad luck.Amulets are some of the oldest objects of human kind, since human beings saw in them a way to escape the bad things, that they were suffering from, no matter whether they were physical, moral or spiritual. The first amulets were natural objects like stones, carved wood or minerals, which were appreciated for their form, colour or rareness. Later peole wanted to possess objects of everyday use that had been the property of a special person or had been playing a part in succeeding in something. People kept these objects because they thought, they had a certain power. Today there exists a large number of different amulets, commercial and personal and also each person values these objects in a subjective way, ascribing different importances to them. A person, who is wearing an amulet because of his belief and trust in it, may not want to reveal this fact to other people and therefore not share his feelings.

PortugueseAn amulet is an object to which an individual ascribes the power of making him lucky or protecting him. It is closely linked to popular belief. A lot of people have an amulet to guarantee success or to ward off certain situations. Normally it is given as a present by a person of great importance to the recipient. Objects, normally originating from animals or minerals, to which superstitious people attribute virtues that ward off bad spirits and bad luck, protecting their owner. Their characteristics vary from people to people and from culture to culture. They are normally worn on some part of the body, like the neck, the arm or around the ancle, but they can also be hanging from the clothes. Fists, crosses of David, knells, keys, elephants with their trunks up or down, clover, “thirteens”, horseshoes, hunchbacks, quarters of the moon, pigs, feet and horns of animals, Buddhas, eyes and an infinite number of similar objects are some examples of amulets.

Choose three or four of the entries and compare them with the help of the following table. What similarities and differences can you find?

Name of language

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Which lucky charms are mentioned?

What are they good for?

In what context are lucky charms used?

What is thought of people, who have lucky charms?

16.What do the findings in question (15) imply for the answers people in different European countries may give to the questions, whether they have lucky charms and whether they believe in them?

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17.Now choose three or four countries in which the languages of the entries you chose in question (15) are spoken. Try to explain the results shown in the maps in question (3) for these countries.

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18. What makes collecting and explaning data on people’s views on and attitudes towards lucky charms a difficult task for scientists?

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Evaluation questions

1. What did you learn about lucky charms?

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2. What did you learn about finding patterns?

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3. What do you have to take into account when explaining patterns, especially when the objects are people’s views?

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4. What aspects of the assignment did you like?

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5. What aspects of the assignment did you dislike?

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_________________________________________________________________________Teacher Information

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This lesson is aimed at older teenagers (15-16 years old). The activities would not need to be amended, but the teacher may want to decide whether to do the tasks in a written or oral form.

The length of the lesson will depend on the class and expectations. Two to three lessons should be sufficient.

The lesson could be taught within Citizenship, Geography (GL, Welt-Umwetkunde) or LER.

Relating to students

The first six questions are designed to give pupils an opportunity to reflect on their experience and knowledge in relation to the topic. It will help pupils to be more conscious about what they are learning and it helps the teacher to see what he or she can build on. Also both will be able to better evaluate development and learning at the end of the assignment.

Describing patterns

Tasks 7 to 11 focus on describing possible patterns in the distribution of beliefs in lucky charms. The first pattern offered is purely fictional, of course. It’s function is to make pupils aware of what patterns are, but also of the fact, that there are patterns that make less sense than others.

In the next section, pupils are given two maps, one on religions in Europe and the other on wealth in Europe, which might serve as a structural background for identifying patterns. But testing the usefulnes of these maps pupils will find, that the patterns behind the beliefs in lucky charms are much more complicated and cannot be reduced to just one explanatory factor.

The diagramm serves to show, that it is not impossible to find patterns, especially when things are closely linked like the possession of a lucky charm and the belief in lucky charms. But even here there are exceptions to the rule, that have to be explained seperately.

Explaining patterns

The next section aims at explanations. The problem here is, on the hand, that explanations are usually disputed even between scientists and on the other hand, that with a more exotic topic like “lucky charms” you can often only refer back to more general explanations, in this case on religion.

One explanation for a decrease of traditional religion and an increase of alternative forms of religion is the following:

“An important explanation for the decreasing influence of religion in the lives of people can be found in the modernisation theory. With modernisation a large number of fundamental social changes is meant, which appear simultaneously in economic, technological, political, social and cultural areas. Prosperity increased and welfare states were built. With the development of welfare states, the security for people increased as well. Where in former

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days religion provided certainty to people, now the welfare states offer this certainty and therefore the belief became, so to speak, superfluous.”

“Secularization can be considered as individualisation in the field of religion. The secularisation thesis states that the decreasing influence of religion can be ascribed to the modernisation process. However, a distinction should be made between the different levels on which secularisation takes place. One can distinguish three dimensions of secularisation, which operate at different levels of society: the societal, the organizational, and the individual. At individual level secularisation means the decline of traditional religiosity, this means a decline in believing the traditional dogma: personal god, hell, heaven etc, although other forms of religiosity can be increased. Think for example of transcendental religiosity: there exists something higher, which does not have to be necessarily a God. In other words, the belief has been adapted. At the level of institutions (church) secularisation means the decline of church pace and declining number in church membership (...). Finally, there is secularisation at society level. On societal level, the decreasing value of churches and religion in society are meant. Religion, and particularly the churches and its leaders, no longer dominate the lives of people.”

According to this thesis, the use of lucky charms should be more widely spread in richer societies, where people no longer stick to traditional beliefs. But looking at the data the picture is not as clear as suggested in this thesis. This can have different reasons. One reason could be, that some of the analysed societies don’t even have a secularised religious background any more, that is, that people in these countries may have come to not believing in anything at all. And there is evidence that people in such societies are also free from any para-religious beliefs or costums.

Therefore it seems appropriate to look a little bit deeper into the issue. The first thing one will find is, that the term “lucky charm” can embrace a number of very different objects, depending on the people you ask, either between countries or even within countries. But apart from that, also the concepts associated with lucky charms are quite different. One extremely helpful source to find out about this is Wikipedia. It is not a scientifically reliable source, especially when it comes to more everyday topics like lucky charms, but it can serve as a mirror of what people in one language community think. This last point is important when interpreting the source: it is not about countries, but about language, even though in some cases that may be almost the same. In relation to lucky charms, the first problem you encounter is translating the word into the different languages, because what is a more specific term in one language may be the general term in other languages. Also in some countries you find entries entitled “lucky charms” (or a more or less suitable equivalent to it) and in others you will only find hints under different headings. But this alone gives you some impression of how different the conceptions are that people have of lucky charms in different European countries.

This does not only pose a problem when trying to explain the data, but even data collection can become somewhat tricky when you do not know whether the participant has the same conception of a term as the scientist, who made up the question. This is a very unlikely often even when talking to people from your own country. But this is also what makes the world so very interesting.

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Acknowlegdements

I would like to thank Michal Ivaška and Elif Zeynep Azar for help with the Slovak, Czeck and Turkish Wikipedia versions. I mailed both of them on an early Saturday afternoon and I had the answers back before dinner. I never expected such a quick reply, but I’m grateful for it.

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Solutions

Tasks 1-6

Individual answers

Task 7

The student has obviously choosen the pattern of time zones to find a pattern in the map. But he has not stuck to the actual time zones.

Task 8

It makes little sense, because, first of all, it is not a very obvious pattern, but one that took some effort to be constructed. This becomes particularly clear, where there are several zones with the same characteristics. But even if it was a convincing pattern, there would still remain the question of its explanatory value.

Task 9

It turns out, that it’s not as easy as expected. Malta is the country where people least believe in lucky charms. Economically rather similar countries like the Netherlands or Great Britain and Germany are showing great differences in their beliefs in lucky charms, while Germany and Slovakia or the Netherlands and Portugal have similar attitudes.

Task 10

The answer should clearly be “no”.

Task 11

There seems to be a certain relation between people believing in lucky charms and then also having them. Notable exceptions are the three countries on top (Bulgaria, Poland and Romania), where people strongly believe in lucky charms, but do not necessarily have them, and the three countries to the right (Czeck Republic, Greece and Croatia), where people have lucky charms, but don’t really believe in them. These are also the only countries that appear in very dark colours in the respective maps. – And, by the way, they are probably the countries that are most challenging when it comes to explanations.

Task 12

I think, you can find a pattern related to ...

Religion

A good example are ...

Portugal and Spain, which are both Catholic countries and where only a few people say they have lucky charms or believe in them.

An example hard to explain by this pattern could be ...

the Czeck Republic and Croatia, that are also Catholic, but where a lot of people say, that they have lucky charms.

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But if you take into consideration that ...

in these two countries people also say, that they do not strongly believe in these lucky charms, then the pattern might work after all.

On the other hand ...

you have a Catholic country like Poland, where as few people as in Spain or Portugal say that they have lucky charms, but still a lot more people seem to believe in them.

Overall, I would say ...

that religion may be an important pattern, but it is certainly not the only one, as there are a number of countries that do not fit into this pattern.

Task 13

Individual answer

Task 14

The term lucky charms can mean the same to different people, but it can also mean quite different things to them.

Task 15

Name of language English German Slovak Spanish

Which lucky charms are mentioned?

Cereals

jewellery, stones,plants,persons,animals

claws and teeth of predatory animals, stones, glass beads, small mirrors, diamonds and gemstones, jewellery in the form of animals, fruits, the sun or the moon

gems or stones, statues, coins, paintings, jewellery, rings, plants, animals, prayers

What are they good for? Eating

luck,wealth,health,long life,also: against evil spirits

luck (talisman)protection against unluckiness, disease, bad spirits (amulet)

luck,protection

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In what context are lucky charms used?

Breakfast ??? magic,fashion

history,commercial object,individual object

What is thought of people, who have lucky charms?

??? they are superstitious ???

they will not want to reveal that they believe in lucky charms

Task 16

According to their respective cultural backgrounds people may understand, interprete and therefore answer the questions quite differently.

Task 17

One can for example assume that Spain has such low values not because people do not believe in or do not have lucky charms, but because they are afraid to admit they have them or believe in them.

The high percentage of Czecks saying they have lucky charms may be due to the fact, that they see amulets as part of Christian religion and not only as artefacts for superstitious people.

Etc.

Task 18

The main problem, especially with cross-cultural research is, to make sure, that the people you ask understand the question in the same way, that the scientist intended it. This is a real challenge.

When explaining data thus obtained you will have to take into account the different perceptions of people in different countries, but also of different people inside the same country. This almost directly leads to the challenge of explaining place and diversity. To do this for 27 or more countries at the same time implies a profound knowledge of all of these countries.

References

Buchstab, Günter; Uertz (Hrsg.) (2008): Was eint Europa? Christentum und kulturelle Identität. – Freiburg, Basel, Wien

Foerster, Heinz von (1999): Sicht und Einsicht. Versuche einer operativen Erkenntnistheorie. - Heidelberg

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Schirner, Markus (2004): Talismane und Amulette. - Darmstadt

Anke Uhlenwinkel – University of Potsdam/Germany