Halloweenの昔と今

【Halloween聖人の日の前夜】ハロウィーンパーティー、本当に深い話で盛り上がりましたね！人間の本能は昔から変わらず、今のハロウィーンの姿になったことも面白い話でしたね。

私は猫が好きなので、猫として参加させていただきましたが、コスチュームを着るのも昔の人の自然界への不安や恐れがあったことから始まっているんですね。

英語と日本語での意見交換や歴史への理解もとても有意義でした。言葉は考えを伝えるための道具で、このようにパーティーを通して、イギリス、アイルランド、アメリカの歴史を学ぶことができました。日本でのハローウィーンパーティーがかなりかけ離れているというのも面白いですね。日本語を勉強している私の生徒が英語で説明をまとめてくれたので、下に共有させていただきます。人間の本質が感じられます。

イギリスは11月1日から一気に街中がハロウィーンのオレンジと黒から、クリスマスの装飾に変わります。

そして、英語勉強会も11月からいよいよ効果的な英語の学び方を中心に活動していきたいと思います。私が日本にいながらゼロから英会話講師になるまでの学び方を話してほしいというリクエストもあるので、そのようなセッションも設けたいと思います。日本語教育の経験や第二言語習得理論なんども交えて今後ブログとしても投稿していこうと思っております。グローバル市民として、グローバル・コミュニケーションに向けて、皆さんでサポートし合っていきましょう！

「マットさんがまとめてくれたハロウィーンの起源と今」

Many years ago, the people who lived in the United Kingdom and Ireland, called Pagans, celebrated a festival called Samhain(“sow-in”). Because the days became darker and colder at this time of year, people saw this as a sign that the year was ending and a new year was beginning.

Samhain was a festival to celebrate the new year, which started on the date we now know as 1st November. On the last day of each year (31^st October), the people believed that the ghosts of the dead returned to earth for one day.

In the evening of 31st October, many people did not leave their houses because they were afraid of seeing ghosts. Instead they left food outside their houses - can you guess why? (for the ghosts to take and in the hope that the ghosts would leave them alone) If anyone needed to go out, they would wear a ghost costume so that any ghosts they met outside would be afraid of them.

These traditions continued for many years. Christianity became more and more popular in the UK. In medieval times, 1st November was a day for Christians to remember saints (important holy people in the Christian faith).

The day was known as All Hallows, and the night before was therefore called All Hallows Eve. There were now two very different festivals over these two days - the first was a Pagan festival to celebrate the end of the year when people believed that ghosts from the dead and the second was a Christian festival to remember saints and holy people in the church.

So how did the name Halloween develop? Do you have any ideas? Gradually the name of the evening before All Hallows changed. Firstly it was known as All Hallows Eve - Hallow means holy person or saint and Eve means evening - but this name was too long for people to say! In Scotland, the word for evening was even , so in some parts of the country the evening was called All Hallows Even . Then it was shortened to Hallows Even and finally Halloween - meaning literally Saints Evening . Which is easier for you to pronounce - All Hallows Even or Halloween?

When people from Europe first started exploring America, they took their Halloween customs with them. The settlers wore ghost costumes and left food outside their houses for ghosts at Halloween. Many people were poor and hungry at this time and they started to take the ghosts’ food in order to feed themselves and their families. 

Over time it became more common for people to do this and if the owner of a house didn’t leave food outside at Halloween, the poor might knock at the door and beg for some food. Can you guess which Halloween custom this became? That’s right, Trick or Treating.

 As time passed in America, Halloween became a big commercial event. Most people no longer believed in ghosts but they still enjoyed dressing up in costumes on Halloween and offering food to visitors. The visitors who came asking for food were now children living in the local area. Shops started to sell fancy Halloween costumes and different types of sweets for the trick or treaters.

But what does Trick or Treat mean? Does anyone have any ideas? A treat is a nice thing; a trick is a bad thing. At the beginning of the 20th century, if visitors to a house asked the owner “trick or treat” and the owner chose “treat”, they had to give something nice to the visitors to their house. If the owner chose “trick”, the visitors would do ghostly things to scare them such as banging on walls or rattling windows.

These new commercial ideas gradually came back to the UK through the influence of American culture. Now in the UK we also celebrate Halloween as people do in America, although on a much smaller scale!

In America, it is very popular to use pumpkins as decorations and as food. In October pumpkins are ready to eat and easily available so many people make Halloween lanterns from them, bake pumpkin pie and roast pumpkin seeds to eat. Has anyone tried pumpkin pie or roasted pumpkin seeds before? Pumpkins have only recently become a popular food in the UK, so instead we use apples for our Halloween food and games because apples are very easy to find in autumn in the UK!

マットさんはもう13年近く私の日本語のレッスンを受けているロンドン出身の英語教師です。もしマットさんの英語レッスンに興味がありましたら、こちらより詳細がご覧になれます。

Audio Song: A Waltz In Port Righ

Composer: WombatNoisesAudio

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