In a 2003 paper, David Redmon of Emerson College argued Mardi Gras behavior fits nicely into sociologist Erving Goffman's 1963 theory of "backspaces" — places where people can escape the glare of judgmental neighbors and bring out hidden sides of their personalities. Redmon referred to this out-of-town behavior as "playful deviance," noting it usually occurs "when small groups of tourists travel to symbolic spaces of leisure to participate in temporary forms of transgressions." To study this phenomenon, Redmon spent a total of 500 hours at seven New Orleans Mardi Gras celebrations, ... Read More

In a 1992 issue of the journal Deviant Behavior, Craig Forsyth introduced the term "beadwhore" into the academic literature. The head of the criminal justice department at the University of Louisiana, Lafayette, recounts hearing it for the first time at a Mardi Gras parade. He was wondering why the float riders weren't throwing any beads to his 3-year-old son, whom Forsyth was carrying on his shoulders. The ritual of tossing trinkets to the crowd had been part of the Mardi Gras tradition since the 1830s, and Forsyth and his son were yelling out the traditional plea of "Throw me something, ... Read More