Invented tradition

On a much smaller scale we do this in our family. We take weird, wonderful, or strange occurrences and formalize them to family traditions - pretending we’ve always done them and they are sacred. It’s wonderful part of our family culture.

One example - we had a cookie decorating party a decade ago and found once we had a house full of friends that we no cookie cutters at all! I ran to the CVS on the corner and for some reason the only cookie cutters they had were leftover Halloween ghosts… we’ve made Christmas ghost cookies every year since. We wouldn’t dare make trees or wreaths or Santas… our kids think this tradition is passed down for years, with varying insane stories as to why. It’s a huge part of Christmas fun to get out our ghost cutters!

Tradition is the glue of culture.

I love finding examples of this in food too - for example hot dogs sold out of push carts in New York date back to the 1860s whereas ciabatta dates back to 1982.

Love celebrating my long family history of Festivus. Lore tells of my great-grand poppy, Jedidiah, and his feats of strength. He won his first Festivus at 8 and didn’t lose again until he was 93.

Approximately all traditional European recipes are like this - Italians may have meltdowns if you try to change anything about their food (or have a cappuccino after 11am), but that food was still invented around 1960 by Italian-Americans and then brought back.

Which is why it all has New World plants in it.

An important propaganda function in forming group unity.

In the case of national unity, it seems to have been most effectively implemented by various Chinese dynasties (in fits and starts, of course) and France under Louis XIII and Louis XIV. Famously it was seriously pursued, but luckily not especially effectively, by the Nazi regime.

The case that amuses me most is famous to English speakers, is of course cited in the Wikipedia article: the emergence of a blended "British" culture in the reign of Victoria: Tartans being the most famous, but also national anthems, brides in white, today's formal fashion (suits, military dress uniforms, and the like) and so on. What amuses me most is the ad-hoc nature (so consistent with how the british developed an empire) and especially how widely it spread: North Korean military uniforms look like 19th century upper class dress and Japanese weddings remind one of Victoria's.

After reading through the article, I was wondering if something like the Coca Cola depiction of Santa is an example of this? Or Elf on a Shelf?

"Look to the mint of your seven/eaten shits", a daily nonsense phrase used in disapproving exclamation of an unlikely event.

No one knows where it comes from, and people with similar backgrounds as me raise a curious eyebrow when its said, but its origin reaches at least as far back as my great-grandmother's generation.