BACK ISSUE
That Time We Gave You Five
Now that the world is opening and closing...and opening, we’ve been thinking a lot about touch. This week, Tracy and Josh explore all the ways we greet each other – high fives! low fives! secret handshakes! – and what they say about us. They also get into a battle over whose hometown invented the high five. 🍿 And Barry White Jr. – no, not the crooner, but the teacher who went viral for memorizing individualized handshakes for 80+ students – joins us to help us understand the power a greeting can have.
Episode Transcription
[00:00]
Child: Slide, slide, slippery slide. If you say the number five, you will be disqualified.
[clapping]
Kids in Unison: One! Two! Three! Four! Six! Seven! Eight! Nine! Ten! Eleven! Twelve! Thirteen! Fourteen! Sixteen! Seventeen! [music starts building]
Eighteen! Nineteen! Twenty! Twenty-one! Twenty-two! Twenty-three! Twenty-four! Twenty-five! [Music gets louder and plays under]
Addison Grace Sutton: Hi, my name is Addison Grace Sutton and I’m ten years old.
Ava Stevens: Hi, my name is Ava Stevens and I am ten years old.
Together: And we are best friends.
Addison: So the inspiration behind our handshake was that when I met Ava, I just knew that she was gonna be my best friend from the start. So, we decided to make a handshake. We went through so much time trying to figure out the name, which we’re still working on. And figuring out the moves, that was pretty much how the handshake started.
Ava: I think my handshake would say, “Hey Addison, boo!”
Addison: Our handshake would say “Hey Ava girl, let’s play a game.’
Addison: We have a secret handshake between us because we are best friends and we’ve been best friends for two years, almost three.
Ava: I think when we hug in our handshake it means that we love each other and that we will stay best friends forever.
Together: (while doing handshake) We are best friends! Woo-hoooo!
Addison: When we’re touching hands, it’s like an inseparable bond. It cannot break.
[break repeats and fades into intro music]
[01:49]
[CLIP] Voice: Beyonce? You look like Luther Vandross.
[CLIP] Voice: Ho, but make it fashion.
[CLIP] Voice: But you ain't heard that from me.
[CLIP] Voice: Fierce
[CLIP] Voice: Call ‘em
[CLIP] Voice: You see, when you do clownery--
[CLIP] Voice: ‘Cuz we won’t stop.
[CLIP] Voice: Can’t get no sleep ‘cuz of y’all--
[CLIP] Voice: the clown comes back to bite.
[CLIP] Voice: Y’all not gonna get no sleep cause of me.
[CLIP] Voice: It's Britney, bitch.
[CLIP] Voice: [Voices overlapping] We were rooting for you, Tiffany. We were all rooting for you… [overlapping voices crescendo]
[CLIP] Voice: Who said that?
[Intro music starts]
[02:18]
Josh: Welcome to Back Issue.
Tracy: A weekly podcast that revisits formative moments in pop culture that we still think about.
Josh: This week, Tracy, give me five.
Tracy: No, because you are not good at paying me back.
Josh: I was just saying, give me some skin.
Tracy: Oh, like on the black hand side. I see, I get you. Okay.
[Music fades into media clips]
[CLIP] News Reporter: A fist bump, a pound, a terrorist fist jab?
[CLIP] Voice 1: (From Fresh Prince) Hey what’s up, Jay?
[CLIP] Voice 2: (From Migos Carpool Karaoke) Dabbing is swagging. Dapping is really swagging, you know what I’m saying? Dapping is like, look at my dap, look at my swag.
Tracy: Each week, we'll go back into the past and revisit unforgettable moments that we think we all remember.
Josh: And learn what they can teach us about where we are now.
Tracy: I am pandemic survivor, Tracy Clayton.
Josh: And I'm Cab Calloway's roadie, Josh Gwynn.
[laughter, music fades, echo effect]
Tracy: I’m with that.
[03:12]
Josh: Hey, Tracy Trace.
Tracy: Hi friend.
Josh: I feel like I haven't seen you in a month of Sundays.
Tracy: You literally have not with the pandemic, and quarantine, and you living across the country.
Josh: I know.
Tracy: I know, but it’s really good to be back in our little den of happiness. Don’t you think?
Josh: I feel like all I want to sing is, I'm black, ya'll, and I'm back, ya'll, and I'm black, and I'm black, and I'm back, y'all." [music starts playing] But, we've been through so much in this last year.
Tracy: Oh, have we? I hadn't noticed. I hadn't noticed a single thing.
Josh: Can you imagine that we started the show in the middle of a Panasonic?
Tracy: That's weird. What if we all get together, at last, and I'm not as amazing as I am through zoom?
Josh: That's what I've been so afraid of. It's like, you start fantasizing about what it's going to be like when you're finally all together. And you're able to share physical space and how amazing that's going to be. But then you're like, usually when I have dreams about what things are going to be like, they're never that good. [laughs]
Tracy: It's like every New Year's Eve. Every New Year's Eve you're like, "I'm going to go out. I'm going to paint the town red." And then at the end of the night, you're just sitting on the curb crying with your heels in your hand.
Josh: My version of that is any costume party ever.
Tracy: [laughs]
Josh: I'm always like, "Yo, I'm going to have this dope idea. I'm basically about to be Heidi Klum up in this bitch."
Tracy: And then nobody knows who you are after you spent so much time on your costume.
[Music fades]
Tracy: Yeah. It's definitely going to be awkward. Which is weird to think because we've literally spent our entire lives, so for me that's almost *ahem* amount of years, going outside and feeling fine about it. But now it's gonna be weird. Everybody just like, "yeah, we're back to normal." And I'm like, "Normal is dead."
Josh: Right, right.
Tracy: We're literally constructing a new way of being in the world, which is kind of overwhelming.
Josh: I feel like I'm wading through two different thoughts, like I have Tia Tamara on each side of my shoulder and they're telling me two different things.
Tracy: [singing] Sister sister!
Together: [singing]
[CLIP] Sister Sister Theme
Josh: So the two thoughts, right?
Tracy: Mmhm
Josh: First thought -
[CLIP] Sister Sister Theme continued
Josh: - folks are amped and they're ready to go. And the CDC is like, "Girls y'all don't have to wear your masks anymore." And you know who I feel like?
Tracy: Who?
Josh: Valentina from RuPaul's Drag Race, when she had that mask on during the lipsync.
[CLIP] Voice 1: Take that thing off of your mouth.
Voice 2: I'd like to keep it on, please.
Tracy: I'm about to be Valentina for the next two to three years, at least.
Josh: I feel like everyone's in a race to go back to...
Tracy: Before.
Josh: [laughs] A place that's not good.
Tracy: Yeah.
Josh: Like, what are we rushing to get back to? Let's use this as an opportunity to re-imagine the second thought that Tia and Tamera are telling me on my shoulders.
[CLIP] Sister Sister Theme continued
Josh: You know when you run into someone that you know at Target and you're not ready to run into someone that you know at Target? I feel like it's going to be that experience, but all the time.
Tracy: Oh, geez.
Josh: Do we hug? Do we dap up? The space between us has never seemed so close, but yet so far.
Tracy: Right. Oh man, I'm starting to freak out over this. I'd never really thought about it. When I see somebody in public, if I'm having a bad day, but it's the first time I'm seeing you out in the real world, I'm supposed to have a certain level of excitement, right?
Josh: Right.
Tracy: What if I'm just not that excited on this day? Then you feel like, she hasn't seen me in eight months and she totally didn't care. She hates me. And now I don't even hate you. Ugh, I'm stressed out, Jesus.
Josh: I’m stressed out, too. So I think we should use today’s episode to really get into all the ways that we greet each other, that we interact with each other. If anything, just for practice because it’s about to be a mess.
Tracy: Seriously! Really, I think that’s fair and it’s smart. Because I don’t think we’re prepared for how awkward it’s gonna be when we’re out in the world and we’re like, “oh wait, we can touch each other again? How does one do this?”
Josh: How is this supposed to be done? So I think we should try to consider all the different ways we interact with our hands, from all different angles: handshakes, high fives, personalized handshakes. And we should also think about it in different contexts. And so, I have a surprise for you, Trace.
Tracy: Ooo, what is it what is it?
Josh: I sat down with Barry White Jr.
Tracy: WHAT?
Josh: Hold up, NOT THAT BARRY WHITE. [laughs]
Tracy: Aww, I had so many questions for you.
Josh: I actually asked him that and he was like - I GET THAT ALL THE TIME. But this Barry White Jr: he’s a teacher, and he went viral for memorizing an individual handshake with 80+ students.
Tracy: I saw that video!
Josh: Yea, me too. And that’s why I think we should talk to him a little bit later. I remember last season we did an entire episode on how much we missed gathering, remember? We talked about Second Lines, and the Kentucky Derby. And you can listen to it wherever you listen to THIS show [ding] but reality is starting to hit me. Like, maybe missing it is enough? Maybe it’s not gonna be how I remember it being.
Josh: So, if we take it all the way back to the beginning. When you think of greeting someone, what’s the first thing you think of?
Tracy: Oh my gosh. Panic.
Josh: [laughs]
Tracy: Because first I'm like, "Is this actually who I think it is? Because I can't see that well." Then I'm like, "Have I met this person in real life before?" Because you know I love to reintroduce myself to somebody that I've already met. And then if I'm like, "okay, I know this person," some form of touching has to happen. Is it a hug? Is it a handshake? And then this time I got to think about, is there COVID on your hands? It's a lot.
Josh: And I think this all really starts with the handshake…..which I am not a fan of, I have to tell you.
Tracy: Oh, tell me about this, as I put on my therapist glasses.
[Music starts, then fades]
[08:45]
Josh: So, according to history.com, the handshake has a lot of different origin stories, but the one that's most agreed upon is that it was a way to show someone that you didn't have any weapons in your hand. And therefore, you meant no ill will.
Tracy: Right. Nothing up my sleeve, nothing behind my back.
Josh: Nothing up my sleeve, not hiding nothing.
Tracy: Nothing but these hands.
Josh: You fight with these. [laughter] Rest in peace Pops.
Tracy: Pops. RIP.
Josh: So I love that, but that's not what a handshake is to me today.
[CLIP] Voice 1: Bill, what's got you so on edge?
Voice 2: I'm just so nervous to meet all these new people today. I'm afraid I'm going to shake their hands and they won't like me.
Tracy: Um… what century did you find that from?
Josh: [laughs] So it's from this website called The Art of Manliness.
[CLIP] Voice 1: Bill, over your lifetime and career, you will shake many a hand at social and professional gatherings. And during that brief moment of physical contact, people are going to form opinions of you.
Tracy: Ew.
Josh: I know, it's gross.
Tracy: Why?
[CLIP] Voice 1: Your handshake could give them the impression that you're a warm, kind person, or a cold and aloof one.
Josh: Okay. So it's a website for a certain subset of men.
Tracy: Yeah, I know who we talking about. [laughs]
Josh: Okay. Who will go on this website in order to learn how to be more manly? I don't know, child. It sounds like it's from the fifties, but it's actually from 2013 and I don't know which one was more embarrassing. Are you not embarrassed? And it kind of sums up the gender dynamics I've always felt were so annoying within handshakes. And honestly, kind of dangerous.
[CLIP] Voice 1: As you take the other person's hand, make sure to grasp it fully. Be sure your handshake grip is firm, not a dead fish grip, like a pansy.
[Clip fades and music builds up, then down]
Tracy: I hear stuff like this and I'm just like, being quote unquote manly just sounds so tiring. Like everything means something. If you don't shake hands good, then somebody is going to kill your whole family because you're weak.
Josh: It's exhausting. I remember being told as a kid, when you shake someone's hand, look them in the eye. It should be firm or they'll think less of you. But what if I want to opt out?
Tracy: Yeah.
Josh: It's such a random power struggle that we don't need to engage in.
Tracy: Right. But then it gets weird because I dislike handshakes for the reason that you said, but I also like them for the reason that you said?
Josh: Ooooh, tell me. Tell me.
Tracy: So I feel like I probably first got the “this is how you do a power handshake”move when I was younger and starting to go out on job interviews and shit. And you got to convince Mr. Paper Pusher, or whatever, that you're a good worker because you did a good handshake, right? But I always loved the opportunity to give a quote unquote good handshake, just to throw a man off. Because they're always just like, "Oh, whoa, oh, whoa. That's a mighty handshake there." And I'm just like, " Yeah, watch your fucking back, bro."
Josh: It's definitely more subversive that way, right? Because you're subverting a gender stereotype or gender norm-
Tracy: Yeah
Josh: - of what people would expect from you.
Tracy: Right. Exactly. Now personally, if gender roles and norms didn't exist, my preferred method of handshake would be the Mariah Carey, just let me present you with the tips of my four fingers.
Josh: Yesss, I love it.
Tracy: Hello darling.
Josh: I love it.
Tracy: Yes.
[Music break, then fades]
[12:08]
Josh: I think we have to talk about the low-five next.
Tracy: Oooh, ok! I feel like you don’t get a lot of people talking about the low-five. Do people still low-five?
Josh: I hope so, cuz the low-five was cool as hell. I think the low-five was just like, jazzy.
Tracy: [laughs] I can see that, I can see that.
Josh: Do you wanna know where it comes from, Trace?
Tracy: Of course! I wanna know where everything comes from. Cuz I don’t trust nothing. I wanna make sure the origins of everything I invest in are good.
Josh: That makes sense
[Music starts, then fades down]
Josh: So we know that it's been around since at least the twenties and thirties.
Tracy: Okay.
Josh: How do we know that? Two ways. Black folks told us, like Cab Calloway, right? So he released several jive dictionaries as a way of documenting language as it was growing, and changing, and blackifying in Harlem, New York. And it was called Mr. Hepster's Dictionary.
[CLIP] Cab Calloway singing
Tracy: Amazing.
Josh: And in 1938 when he released it, it became the official jive reference guide for the New York Public Library. It actually says, give me some skin, which means shake hands.
Tracy: Huh. I Just love this so much. Shout out to Cab Calloway.
Josh: Shout out to Cab Calloway. But there's another way that we know that low fives are a black thing.
Tracy: How?
Josh: Racism.
Tracy: Aww.
Josh: Because white people tried to steal it.
Tracy: Of course. Surprise.
Josh: So, for example, do you know who the Andrews Sisters are?
Tracy: Aren't they those three white ladies who are always like (singing)?
Josh: Yeah, exactly. Boogie Woogie, Bugle Boy, Company B. Exactly.
Tracy: Yeah. Right, right.
[CLIP] “Boogie woogie Bugle Boy” by the Andrews Sisters
Josh: Like you know, where Christina Aguilera's Back to Basic era came from.
Tracy: Mmhmm
[CLIP] Christina Aguilera singing “Candyman”
Josh: So the Andrews Sisters are in an Abbott and Costello movie called In the Navy in 1941, right? But remember, Cab Calloway's dictionary comes out in 1938.
Tracy: I see where this is going.
[CLIP] Scene from “In the Navy” (sung by Andrews Sisters): If you want to shake my hand, like they do it in Harlem. Stick your hand right out and shout, “Give me some skin, my friend.”
Tracy: Oh, I don't like this. Surprisingly, do you know what this reminds me of?
Josh: What?
Tracy: Aladdin, the movie, the Disney movie.
Josh: Wait, what?
Tracy: I know. Hear me out. Hear me out. Big hit, huge hit. Robin Williams played the genie. Robin Williams-
Josh: Uh-oh.
Tracy: you know, I liked, but as I grew up, I noticed that a lot of the voices that he does is kind of… [music stops] racist.
Josh: [laughs]
Tracy: He was trying to be delicate. You know what I'm saying? God bless the dead, but he did love himself a blaccent. And there's this scene in Aladdin where the genie, he's reunited with the magic carpet, right? And then they have this secret handshake that looks real cool, but Robin Williams is like:
[CLIP] from Aladdin, Robin Williams: Yo, rug man, haven't seen you in a few millennia. Give me some tasse-yo. Yo yo.
Josh: Oh, Uh-uh! [laughs]
Tracy: I'm just like, I don't know that that was necessary? You can have a cool handshake and not do an audio black face. I don't know what you would call it. I don't know.
Josh: Audio black face! [laughs]
Tracy: That's how we got to Aladdin from the Andrew Sisters in 1941.
Josh: I hear it. I hear it. Just a through line. But Tracy, what if we wanted to take it even further, go beyond the greetings, get a little bit deeper?
Tracy: Um, I don’t know what you mean? Whatcha talking about?
Josh: How about I give you a hint - then the answer after the break. [Music starts building up]
Tracy: Alright, I can live. I can survive with that.
[Music break]
Child One: My name is Chloë Leigh Morgan, and I’m ten years old.
Child Two: My name is Jett Latham Morgan, and I’m seven years old.
Child Three: My name is Madison Leigh Morgan and I’m seven years old.
Chloe: Here are the rules. So you basically have to do (claps) one...two… Keep going, but the thing is you can’t say five. If you say anything with five, then that means you’re out and we have to start over.
Jet: I first learned “Slide” when I was five. (You have to use both hands!)
Chloe: If we’re waiting somewhere and we get bored, or one of our parents has to go shopping or do grown-up stuff, then we’ll maybe play a hand game.
[sounds of them laughing and playing, music fades]
[16:42]
Josh: So, Back Issue - we’re back.
Tracy: Heyyyy, we back we back we back.
Josh: [laughs] I wanted to take a little side bar and talk less about how we use our hands to greet each other and talk about how we use our hands when we already know each other, and we’re like friends, you know?
Tracy: Right, right, right.
Josh: So Tracy, what do you know about a hand clap game?
Tracy: Those were the first raps I ever memorized.
Josh: Okay! Bars.
Tracy: [laughs] I love clap games so, so, so, so much.
Josh: Me, too. Me, too.
Tracy: And I don't know how universal they are, right? Because when I say handclap games and you say handclap games, we know that we're both talking about Miss Mary Mack.
Josh: She was a IG baddie.
Tracy: Listen, had silver buttons all up and down her back?
Josh: Down her back. Okay?
Tracy: Listen!
Josh: I see you sis.
Tracy: Is it a black thing? Is it a white thing? Is it just a regional thing?
Josh: I guess it's whether you're hitting each other's hands on the one and the three, or the two and the four. [laughs]
Tracy: [laughs] Wow. Oh, wow. You just blew my mind. Oh my gosh. Do you know the hand-clapping game Rocking Robin?
Josh: (singing).
Tracy: (singing). What did you call that song?
Josh: Rocking Robin?
Tracy: We caught it Tweetly Lee.
Josh: [laughs]
Tracy: Right? Oh, you know what? One of my favorite ones is though, that I forgot about until recently. And hip hop artists even referenced, and sampled it in a song. This artist is Nelly. Do you know the song?
Josh: I know it's the one about drive by shootings, right?
Tracy: Oh, this got dark.
Josh: I'm sorry. [laughs]
Tracy: I actually don't...no no no
Josh: Isn't it?
Tracy: No, no, no, no. I'm talking about the one that's (singing). No, it is. It is. Why did he do that to this song? Oh damn, Nelly.
Josh: [laughs]
[CLIP] “Country Grammar” by Nelly
Josh: (singing).
Tracy: Oh shit. Shit. But did you ever play the original version? (singing).
Josh: No.
Tracy: (singing) It's actually really fucked up. Can I do the whole thing?
Josh: Yes, please.
Tracy: Okay, okay. So I am maybe six or seven. I used to play this with the little girls next door, right? It goes: (singing).
Down down baby, down by the rollercoasters
Sweet sweet baby, I’ll never let you go
Shimmy shimmy cocoa pop
Shimmy shimmy why
Tracy: I don't know what the why is... (singing). And here's the complicated part.
Josh: Uh-huh (affirmative).
Tracy: Okay. And as I do this part, remember that the ethnicities were often interchangeable, depending on how you felt.
Josh: Okay.
Tracy: Yeah, okay. (singing).
I like coffee, I like tea
I like a black boy, he likes me
So jump back, white boy, you don’t shine
I’ll get the black boy to kick your behind
He’ll kick it high, he’ll kick it low, he’ll kick it all the way to Mexico [laughs]
And while you’re there, hold your hair, and don’t forget your dirty stinky underwear.
Josh: Oh my god. I love this. This is hilarious, but also racist.
Tracy: Yes. Yeah.
Josh: [laughs]
Tracy: First time I heard it, I think we used to say, I like a colored boy and he likes me?
Josh: Ooh, just mark in the times.
Tracy: Right, yeah, yeah.
Josh: (singing).
Tracy: We gotta update Cab Calloway's book of jives.
Josh: Is there a BIPOC now?
Tracy: Do you know what? (singing).
I like a BIPOC and he likes me
Josh: Oh no! [laughs]
Tracy: [laughs] So shout out to Nelly who made that about drive-bys. How dare he?
[Music fades and ends]
[20:29]
Josh: But this episode, Tracy, is not about Nelly.
Tracy: Are you sure? Because we just talked about Nelly for a long time.
Josh: I mean I’m always down to talk about Nelly, shoutout to the band-aid under one eye. What a choice. But I do think that it is time that we talk about the high five. I always thought that the high five had been around since cave days, like did not know. But that’s WRONG! Do you know where it comes from?
Tracy: Oh I know this story.
Josh: Do you really?
Tracy: It's just that I happened to know this story, because it takes place in my hometown of Louisville, which I know you still can't say, it's fine. But just know that I see you.
Josh: The high five was actually started in my hometown of Los Angeles.
Tracy: Sounds fake. I don't know.
Josh: [laughs] Ok ok - all joking aside - I did a bunch of research and I found this reporter. His name’s Jon Mooallem and he did a bunch of work for ESPN magazine, right?
Tracy: Ok
Josh: And the truth is that there’s an origin story for Los Angeles and there’s an origin story for Louisville. And it’s kind of impossible to know which one happened first.
Tracy: Yeah, I mean that’s the thing with origin stories, like there’s a billion origin stories for everything so I will concede that sure, it’s technically unknowable but I’m gonna say that Louisville’s story is BETTER.
Josh: Ok… we’ll see. We’ll see. [crosstalk]
Tracy: (singing) Might be a little bit biased… But I said what I said
Josh: (singing) A lot biased
Tracy: [laughs] Seriously, this is a story that I grew up knowing and hearing. Because Louisville, you know, small place, lots of black folks, not too much happens that you can tell stories about. There's Muhammad Ali, and horses, and bourbon. And the high five. So here's how it came about, right?
[Baseball music starts]
Tracy: Louisville's basketball team, '78, '79, they were called the Doctors of Dunk. Because that's what they did, they dunked on motherfuckers all the time. Everybody's like 8,000 foot tall, really quick. I want to shout out the star of the team, Mr. Darrell Griffith. He and I went to the same church. When I went to school, he gave me a scholarship. It was like a thousand dollars-
Josh: Eyyyy
Tracy: - shout out. Still remember you. And we also went the same Alma mater.
Josh: Okay.
Tracy: So the team is killing it this season, right they're the Doctors of Dunk. And there are two particular men on the team. One's name is Wylie Brown, which, what is a blacker name than Wiley Brown? I can't think of one. And Derek Smith. So, they're practicing, right?
Josh: Mmhhm.
Tracy: But then Wylie Brown and Derek Smith, they're kind of playing around, and they had a moment, right? So Wiley went to go give Derek a low five, right? And Derek was like, nah, nah, man, nah, we jump high. So we going to keep it high, and do the five up high.
[CLIP] Speaker 5: You see the handshaking above the head, you know what the guys call that? A high five.
Speaker 6: High five?
Speaker 7: There's another freshman going in [crosstalk 00:22:54].
Speaker 5: There it is.
Speaker 6: [crosstalk 00:22:54].
Speaker 5: They're high fiving out there right now.
Tracy: Wham, bam, diggity diggity dong. High five is born. Thank you, Louisville. Round of applause. Round of applause.
Josh: [laughs] All right, that's a great story Tracy.
Tracy: And that's true. That's the truth. That's it. It's history. It's fact.
Josh: That's a great story. Love it. Gang gang. But I must say, the Los Angeles story hits different.
Tracy: I mean… I’m sure it do. tell your lil story.
[Dodgers music starts]
Josh: Picture it. Los Angeles, 1977. Palm trees everywhere. Funk music playing, low riders, living their lives. You got Dusty Baker, you got Glenn Burke. They're both on the Dodgers. Glenn Burke is the one that you're going to focus on for this story, right?
Tracy: Got it.
Josh: He's young. He's super athletic looking. He's black. He's openly gay.
Tracy: Oh your story is already better. You cheated.
Josh: After he retired, this is way after the story, he actually becomes the first openly gay Major League Baseball player in history. And one of the first openly gay pro athletes, period. And according to his teammates, he was the life of the party. There’s this ESPN 30 for 30 short called the “The High Five” where you can hear his teammates describe him.
[CLIP] Speaker 9: You know, we went out, he'd be the life of the dance floor. And he was always making us laugh.
Speaker 10: He was one of the most entertaining, engaging likable people I've ever been around.
Josh: October 2nd, 1977, Dusty, Glenn's teammate, hits a home run. And it's a really big deal because it's Baker's 30th home run, and it made the Dodgers the first team in history to have four hitters with at least 30 home runs in a single season.
Tracy: Wow.
Josh: Big deal.
Tracy: That sounds like it. I don't quite understand, but-
Josh: Just stay with me. Stay with me.
Tracy: Okay. I'm here. I'm here.
Josh: So, Glenn Burke, right? He was waiting on deck, and he raised his hand up in the air after Dusty Baker ran around the bases.
Tracy: Mmhmm.
Josh: And he puts his hand up in the air, and Baker didn't really know what to do, so he just awkwardly just reached up, hit his hand, and he was like, it just seemed like the right thing to do.
Josh: Boom. You have it. The high five is invented.
[Crowd roaring and horn sound effects fade into music]
Tracy: And I mean, I'm assuming that Glenn then printed high five t-shirts, and then he made mugs, and then he had the reality show.
Josh: [laughs]
Tracy: And then he got a Only Fans, where he gave fake high fives, and stuff like that.
Josh: Not exactly, Tracy. [laughs]
Tracy: Right?
Josh: Not exactly. So Glenn Burke, after he invents the high five, he gets traded to the Oakland A's and he ran into a little bit of pushback, and his career basically just didn't go the way that he wanted it to go. So in 1979, two years after he created the high five, he actually left baseball. And he moved from Oakland to San Francisco where the gayborhood was popping.
Tracy: I would imagine that that is where you would want to be. And what year is this?
Josh: '79.
Tracy: Yeah.
Josh: Yeah.
Tracy: I bet it was lit.
Josh: I mean, that’s what they said in that ESPN 30 for 30 short I brought up earlier, from 30 for 30.
[CLIP from ESPN 30 for 30 short] Speaker 12: He was basically a symbol of what all these guys were trying to show the rest of America they could be. Which was masculine, athletic, and the high five was really part of that mystique for Glenn Burke. People in the neighborhood knew that he had invented the high five.
Josh: And according to that same documentary a lot of the social life around that time actually centered around a gay softball league?
Tracy: What?
[CLIP] Speaker 12: And he helped them win games. He helped them beat the police. This is a time when the gay community and the police are not on very good terms.
Speaker 13: It was a big deal, but we beat them so bad they didn't want to play anymore. [laughs]
Josh: So in 1982, Burke came out to the entire world in an article called The Double Life of a Gay Dodger. And the writer of that article, an activist named Michael J. Smith, wrote his creation of the high five was quote “a legacy of two men hands touching high above their heads.” And he used the high five as a gay pride symbol during the gay rights movement.
Tracy: Wow. All right. So here's my thing, okay?
Josh: [laughs]
Tracy: When you got to the part about it being a gay pride symbol... That, okay, I get it. I get it.
Josh: That gets me thinking, how have we used Glen Burke's or the Louisville Cardinals' contribution to the culture? And I can tell you someone who's using it full-time. After the break!
[28:11]
Josh: So Tracy.
Tracy: Mmhmm
Josh: Before the break, we walked each other through the hotly contested history of the modern day high-five. And I hope you were paying attention and taking diligent notes because there will be a pop quiz.
Tracy: [laughs] No, there won't. I emancipated myself from the pop quiz industrial complex when I graduated eighth grade. Thank you very much. That is now beneath my pay grade.
Josh: [laughs] I'm actually really glad that you mentioned middle school. Something I never thought I would say.
Tracy: That's something I never thought anybody would say.
Josh: Middle school sucks. [laughs]
Tracy: It wasn’t great. Not my favorite, Bob. Not my favorite.
Josh: But you know what can make the biggest difference?
Tracy: What?
Josh: The right teacher.
Tracy: Okay, but I am confusion, because what does a teacher have to do with handshakes, and handclap games, and all the other stuff that we have been talking about today? That’s where I am lost.
Josh: [laughs] Well, this specific teacher - Barry White Jr.? He went viral in 2017 when more than 30 million people saw this video where he and his more than 80 students demonstrated that they all had their individual, swagged out, personal handshake.
Tracy: I cannot remember what color drawers I had on yesterday, let alone 80 different individual handshakes.
Josh: [laughs] I literally could never. But, I did think that he was the perfect person to talk about what a handshake could REALLY mean.
[Music Break]
Josh: Can you tell me the story of how you came up with the idea to have personalized handshakes with all of your students?
Barry White, Jr.: So how it initially came about is that in 2016, or '15, it would've been '15 for them. I was a fifth grade teacher, Ashley Park, Charlotte, North Carolina. And actually, one of my young students who would come to be in class with me next year was in fourth grade, she was across the hall. And what happened was each day, as I would come in and just do my usual routine, set my stuff out, all that good stuff. She'll come to my door and just say, Hey, what's up, Mr. White? I was the only black male the hallway. The cool teacher quote unquote. Yeah. Quote on quote. [crosstalk] I don't think I was a cool teacher, but Hey, you buy... I'll take it if you give it to me. So, she would come and greet me every day. And literally, I mean, literally It was so simple. Hey Mr. White. She wanted that interaction every morning. Hey, stop what I’m doing, go to the door. Hey, what's up? What's going on?
Barry White, Jr.: One day she came and said “hey, let’s do a fist bump!” I said okay, so I just gave a fist bump, and then she added a little twist to it. I said, okay, let's do that. And I kept doing that where I just saw how much it changed the trajectory of her day, especially in behavior. So this is one of my students who in the past might have been outside the classroom or inside the classroom. You might've heard her voice louder than others in the hallways. Right? So I just saw how that simple kindness that we just shared there, positive interaction, her mood was set. So I said, okay, if this is the recipe, I want a lot more of this, right?. So, then over the summer, I said you know what? I want to see what it feels like if everybody felt like this, how she feels. What if my entire grade level felt like this, what would that look like, right? So I just went for it. A few people, “Hey, you want to do a handshake?” Of course. And then once you know, it's contagious. Like once one got it, “How do you want it? Oh, I want it this way. I want one!”
Josh: [laughs]
Barry White, Jr.: And then it was a trickle effect. It became such a thing. And at that time I think I had 88 students. So after that, the next three years, I had classes of 85 and then 83. And we know we all had our... but they all definitely wanted that, that jumpstart, that handshake. And I made sure to give it to them. It didn't matter who you were. I had a little kindergartners, and first graders walking by after the video went viral. They'd put their little hand out. So, I would swing my hand out and dab with them.
Josh: Can you still do all these handshakes?
Barry White, Jr.: Yeah, absolutely. if I see them it's going to flick up. Because the good thing about that, and if you saw the video, is that it was all based on their personalities, man. It was based on how I remembered them. Like, I started a step team at my former school, and you'll see that at my first school I was at you'll see that a lot of my students that are in my class were on my step team. So in our handshake, we doing steps. We doing when we doing steps.
Josh: I was gonna ask you! How did you make a handshake for each individual student, or did they make it themselves? How did you decide what goes into it?
Barry White, Jr.: Absolutely. A lot of it was collaboration. Some of it, they already had in mind where they wanted me to do. It was non-negotiable, right? But again, it was back to their personalities. A lot of my students were on my step team. They wanted to be a part of whatever I was doing, right? So a lot of my hand shakes were stepping, right? Substeps and all that. So my cool dudes, they were just smooth, right? So my guy Dexter, he the last one in that video, now he just smooth. You can tell that's the personality.
Barry White, Jr.: A lot of people were shy, so we just do a little salute. So it's all based on them man. And again, the best part for me is that it's how I remembered them. How I saw you during that time we was together. Now you might be all grown up. But if you come back in contact, “get over here, come here boy”. I'm going to show them love again. They're my babies, man. They're forever going to be my babies. A lot of them still hit me up on IG now. We keep in contact. But yeah. My memory would get triggered. I feel like I got a pretty good memory.
Josh: [laughs] I really feel like what you're saying around feeling seen from having that individual attention. Because I think that like a lot of times, especially if you’re a kid you’re thinking about all these grown-ups around you, like you don’t really trust a lot of people? And I think that having a teacher that you can trust is really important, and so how do you think that the handshakes helped in building that trust and what do you think you did with that trust?
Barry White, Jr.: You hit the nail on the coffin. It a hundred percent comes down to trust. That's fundamental to any relationship. How much can I trust you? How much do I believe you have my best interests at heart? For us, and for multiple years, in different classes, it was just the idea that, well, he's taking the time to do this. What do you want? Right. So I'm doing more listening than I'm doing directing, right? I'm asking, what do you want to do? And I think that's the biggest piece was just listening. This is observing and listening. What do you like, what do you want? And then I adapt to that and bring in my style to what you already are interested in and love. And once they see that you actually take the time to think about and sort through, okay, what interests me as a student, then it starts the bit I love.
Barry White, Jr.: Okay. He does. He does. It's not just talk of, I care about everybody. And I want everybody to succeed. Good old college try.
Josh: [laughs]
Barry White, Jr.: No, it's not. It's not that any more. It's about no, he's being intentional about making sure that I've had a voice that I'll make it, that I'm able to show up and present whatever move it is that I feel best represents me. And I'm joining in on THEM, on THEIR space and what THEY love. And that's what I think was the best part for me. I got to join in with them as opposed to them just joining whatever I'm directing them to do.
Josh: I know that you said that it had a pretty organic start with your student who just kept coming to your door. What about the process of having these individual handshakes with your students, what did it teach you that you didn’t know prior to doing it?
Barry White, Jr.: It taught me the power of intentionality. Because it does take some type of commitment to remember all of them, to remember to a tee, right?
Josh: Yeah.
Barry White, Jr.:Because the kid's going to hold you accountable. Many times.
Josh: Oh my god, if you get it wrong?? [laughs]
Barry White, Jr.: Listen, in early days, if I've missed a spin or something, it was “nah, now we got to do it over Mr. White. Come back, come back.” So once again it taught me the power of being intentional, and it's really having those intentional moves upfront and then seeing the fruits of the labor in the backend.
Josh: Mhhm. So what do you think it is about the handshakes specifically? Because it could be anything, right? But what do you think it is about the handshakes specifically that caused your students to feel what they felt?
Barry White, Jr.: There are studies behind this. Again, at the time I wasn't thinking about no studies or research; it was just something fun me and my students did together. But at the time, people brought to my attention that connection.
Josh: You started thinking about it.
Barry White, Jr.: I started thinking about it like, wait a minute, why IS this working so well? It's because that kinetic energy. It's just the fact that they each had their own one. It wasn't standard. It wasn't one size fits all.
Josh: That it was individualized.
Barry White, Jr.: It was individualized and they felt like it was theirs, they can own that. This is OUR thing, right? And there's a sense in that ownership that impels people to want to do more or want to lean into it when they have a sense of ownership, and that's with anything in life, right?
[Music fades in]
Josh: When it opens up again and you’re able to be in physical contact with your students like you were, what do you want your handshakes to say then? What do you think is important to communicate?
Barry White, Jr.: Now and in any point in time I would want my handshake to say that I see you. I see you for who you are and now what you know. That's what I would want, that. I'll want that to speak volumes from the mountaintops.
Josh: Thank you.
Barry White, Jr.: So no, this is good, man. I appreciate this so much. Thank y'all for having me.
[Music break, fades into “Learn something from this” Bounce remix]
[37:34]
Tracy: You know, I don't claim to be the most optimistic person in the world, but this gave me some hope and optimism for the future of the human species. Amazing. Brava.
[Music fades]
Josh: [laughs] I know. That man is a legend. When he's doing some simple... Like DUH, intuitive. But I argue that he's tapping into something that's absolutely crucial about the way that we make space for children to learn and affirm relationships with each other, you know?
Tracy: Yeah, and see them as individuals.
Josh: Yeah.
Tracy: So Joshua?
Josh: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Tracy: Tyra Banks and I have a question that people have asked since last season.
Josh: Tyra Banks, the patron saint.
Tracy: The patron saint of learning stuff from things. Did we...
[CLIP] Tyra: Learn something from this!
Josh: I think we did.
Tracy: What did we learn?
Josh: We learned that we use physical touch for a lot of things, but one of the things that we really use it for is to affirm relationships that we value.
Tracy: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Josh:The thing that's banging around in my head is just that we were forced because of social norms into a lot of these different forms of physical touch that might not feel natural to-
Tracy: Yeah.
Josh: -each other, and so one thing that I hope that we're able to do is to kind of put a filter up and be like "nope, hated that, hated that, love that, love that" and just bring the things that we actually like and want into the now time.
Tracy: Yeah. Because I think that one thing that the damn-demic has taught us is that we can do away with-
Josh: Damn-demic is so good. [laughs]
Tracy: I am determined to keep saying that until somebody else picks it up.
Josh: Okay.
Tracy: Nobody else has.
Josh: Damn-demic. I'm on team damn-demic.
Tracy: Yay. I won something today.
Josh: [laughs]
Tracy: But there's so much stuff that was normal quote unquote before the damn-demic that we had to lose and get rid of, and we're generally okay now. Not everybody has to go to an office, surprise, surprise. You know what I mean? You don't have to see people as much if you don't want to, we are adaptable people. I've been thinking a lot about how I want my friendships and my relationships to look once this is over -
Josh: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Tracy: -because the damn-demic showed us that we can be adaptable and we can be amendable when somebody is maybe going through something and can't come outside because they're super, super depressed. You don't have to end a friendship or a relationship because of that. You know, girl, you can't come outside for a while? It's okay. I've learned how to keep in touch with you. If you want me to come outside, which I don't always love, I'm down to do it now because I've been in the house for seven years. You know what I mean?
Josh: Yeah, I hear you. I hear you.
Tracy: Also, we need a secret handshake.
Josh: I agree. Although, [laughs] I will say that I don't think I can think of anything more depressing than trying to make a secret handshake via Zoom.
Tracy: Aw, you're right.
Josh: But next time we're in the same room together Tracy, it's on.
Tracy: We got it. We should put it on Instagram.
Josh: Yes. Do you know what the theme song for our handshake should be Tracy?
Tracy: Oh, no, what?
Josh: Give Me Five on the Black Hand Side by Queen Latifah.
Tracy: Shout out to Queen La-damn-tifah.
[CLIP from “Black Hand Side” by Queen Latifah fades in and plays]
[Credits song plays]
Tracy: Back Issue is a production of Pineapple Street Studios.
Josh:This show was created and is hosted by Tracy Clayton.
Tracy: And Josh Gwynn! Our lead producers are Josh Gwynn and Emmanuel Hapsis.
Josh: Our managing producer is John Asante.
Tracy: Our senior editor is Leila Day.
Josh: Our associate producers are Alexis Moore, Xandra Ellin, and Briana Garrett. Our executive producers are Jenna Weiss-Berman and Max Linsky. Our engineer is Raj who made the original bops you are bopping to. Our intern is Arlene Arevalo.
Tracy: This show features music by Don Will. You can follow him @donwill on all the socials. You can follow me on the socials @brokeymcpoverty.
Josh: And you can follow me, Josh, @regardingjosh. Subscribe to this podcast wherever free podcasts are sold, and we'll see you next time.
[song ends]
Child: Thank you, that’s my work. Thank you thank you.