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Journal articles on the topic 'African folktale'
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1
Mabaso, Eric. "FOLKTALE NARRATION IN THE INDIGENOUS SOUTH AFRICAN LANGUAGES: AN ARTFUL CUL-DE-SAC?" Southern African Journal for Folklore Studies 26, no. 2 (2017): 24–37. http://dx.doi.org/10.25159/1016-8427/671.
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This article highlights the problem that the print mode that the indigenous South African languages (IndiSAL) have largely adopted to preserve the folktale is inadequate. It raises shortfalls in support of the contention that not enough is being done to preserve the art of folktale narration and suggests a way out of the cul-de-sac. Most works on IndiSAL folktales focus on the value of preserving the art itself rather than the mode of preservation. The research follows a performance-centred approach as advocated by inter alia Marivate (1991), Bill (1996), Dorji (2010) and Backe (2014). Compared to countries such as Nigeria and Malawi, IndiSAL are lagging behind in digitization for the preservation of folktales. The article is an empirical study based on the author’s experiences and observation of folktale narration and the analysis of the transcribed form. The article critically reviews the various preservation modes and highlights their pros and cons.
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Khan, Khatija Bibi. "SHONA FOLKTALES AS CHILDREN’S LITERATURE: THE CASE OF A.C. HODZA’S NGANO DZECHINYAKARE (1980)." Commonwealth Youth and Development 13, no. 1 (2016): 99–112. http://dx.doi.org/10.25159/1727-7140/1161.
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Some scholars of the genre of the folktale have argued that since time immemorial, folktales have been children’s literature created by adults for children’s pleasure. The main attraction in so describing African folktale as children’s literature was that this form afforded children entertainment as they listened to the stories narrated mostly by the adults, and some sometimes by the children, to other children. Other scholars agreed that folktale are stories of what can happen, but did not actually happen, also worked as a conduit for socialising African children into the cultural values of their society, which values were invariably created by the older generation. Both views are to some extent correct. However, in reducing the impact of folktales on children to entertainment and social conformity, a myth was also promoted that fails to appreciate that children listening to stories can decode certain meanings from the folktales. The aim of this article is to highlight the significance of folktales as sources of aesthetic pleasure for children and also as imaginative sources that aid socialisation of children to the community’s mores. But the article complicates this instrumentalist approach of the role of folktales, whose meanings go beyond descriptions of them as an artistic force-field that merely secure the purchase of domesticating children for adult interests. Children are not passive listeners of stories, and as such can construct alternative worlds that provide useful critiques to society through its folktales.
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Olugbemi-Gabriel, Olumide, and Mbasughun Ukpi. "The signifying culture: An intercultural and qualitative analysis of Tiv and Yoruba folktales for moral instruction and character determination in children." F1000Research 11 (April 25, 2022): 455. http://dx.doi.org/10.12688/f1000research.75732.1.
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Background: In the study of African communities, folktales have remained a constant element. With their origin in the culture of oral storytelling, folktales have often been used by older age groups to guide and mould behavioural patterns in children. In ancient and traditional African societies, children were gathered at the end of the day by older members of the community for tales by moonlight sessions aimed at guiding their moral decisions. With globalisation and its consequent effects such as migration, dislocation and disindigenisation, the culture of communal folktale sessions is experiencing a quick death. This paper engages with the relevance of folktales as moral guides for children in African societies and as a renewed path to increased societal stability facilitated by morally set individuals. Methods: The folktales were randomly selected from a pool of Tiv and Yoruba folktales in Nigeria. Two animal-based folktales which are part of shared folk culture were picked from the Tiv society and one from the Yoruba society. The study follows a narrative and content analysis approach where the selected folktales are corroborated by four key informants, two males and two females within the ages of 50-65. Results: With particular focus on the benefits of promoting and re-introducing the folktale culture to encourage positive behavioural traits amongst individuals in the society, the study primarily highlights folktales as reflective of human life. In identifying this similarity, the character of children is largely influenced by the moral values inherent in these folktales. Conclusions: There needs to be an increased use of media and audio-visual tools to expand the knowledge and accessibility of indigenous African folktales in order to preserve ethnic, national and social identity as well as to provide a moral compass for children.
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Olugbemi-Gabriel, Olumide, and Mbasughun Ukpi. "The signifying culture: An intercultural and qualitative analysis of Tiv and Yoruba folktales for moral instruction and character determination in children." F1000Research 11 (April 25, 2022): 455. http://dx.doi.org/10.12688/f1000research.75732.1.
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Background: In the study of African communities, folktales have remained a constant element. With their origin in the culture of oral storytelling, folktales have often been used by older age groups to guide and mould behavioural patterns in children. In ancient and traditional African societies, children were gathered at the end of the day by older members of the community for tales by moonlight sessions aimed at guiding their moral decisions. With globalisation and its consequent effects such as migration, dislocation and disindigenisation, the culture of communal folktale sessions is experiencing a quick death. This paper engages with the relevance of folktales as moral guides for children in African societies and as a renewed path to increased societal stability facilitated by morally set individuals. Methods: The folktales were randomly selected from a pool of Tiv and Yoruba folktales in Nigeria. Two animal-based folktales which are part of shared folk culture were picked from the Tiv society and one from the Yoruba society. The study follows a narrative and content analysis approach where the selected folktales are corroborated by four key informants, two males and two females within the ages of 50-65. Results: With particular focus on the benefits of promoting and re-introducing the folktale culture to encourage positive behavioural traits amongst individuals in the society, the study primarily highlights folktales as reflective of human life. In identifying this similarity, the character of children is largely influenced by the moral values inherent in these folktales. Conclusions: There needs to be an increased use of media and audio-visual tools to expand the knowledge and accessibility of indigenous African folktales in order to preserve ethnic, national and social identity as well as to provide a moral compass for children.
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Kwami, Robert. "A West African Folktale in the Classroom." British Journal of Music Education 3, no. 1 (1986): 5–18. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s026505170000509x.
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The author describes an investigation into the use of West African folklore in the school curriculum by means of an African folktale which became the basis for a project in the class music lessons. Starting with research into West African folklore, particularly children's stories and songs, in Ghana and Nigeria between 1979 and 1983, music was composed in a basically African style to go with an adaptation of one of the stories.The practical work in a London primary school investigated ways of minimising the apparent dichotomy between African and Western musics in the curriculum.
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Makaudze, Godwin. "African Leadership in Children's Literature: Illustrations from the Shona Ngano (Folktale) Genre." International Research in Children's Literature 13, no. 2 (2020): 321–32. http://dx.doi.org/10.3366/ircl.2020.0361.
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Feminist scholarship sees African society as traditionally patriarchal, while the colonists saw traditional African leadership as lacking in values such as democracy, tolerance, and accountability, until these were imposed by Europeans. Using Afrocentricity as a theoretical basis, this article examines African leadership as portrayed in the Shona ngano [folktale] genre and concludes that, in fact, leadership was neither age- nor gender-specific and was democratic, tolerant, and accountable. It recommends further research into African oral traditions as a way of arriving at more positive images of traditional Africa and her diverse heritage.
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Adeoye, EA, AO Okeowo, AF Yusuf, and O. Rotimi. "Proposing an Indigenous Nigerian Folktale Therapy as a Counselling Model for Character Training and Behaviour Change among School Children." Journal of Science and Sustainable Development 5, no. 1 (2013): 29–35. http://dx.doi.org/10.4314/jssd.v5i1.3.
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Using the Yoruba race of Nigeria as fulcrum for the study, this paper examines the universality and didactic significance of archetypes in African folklore. The authors contend that Africa folklore, by virtue of its highly moralizing and didactic elements made possible by an embedded commonality of instructive archetypes, offers a lifeline that counsellors andpsychologists can use in combating the moral decay in the Nigerian society. Based on this premise the paper goes on to present a counselling model for character training and behaviour change through the use of an indigenous Nigerian Folktale Therapy (I.N.F.T). The model is a response to the needed paradigm shift in the counterproductive traditional punitive method of combating undesirable behaviours that seem to have become rampant currently in Nigerian society. This model could indeed serve as springboard for adaptation in other African settings which are very rich infolklores.Keywords · Folktale · Therapy · Counselling psychology
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Letsie, M. M. "The unwritten textbook of the folktale: A case study of 'Morongwa le Morongwanyana' (The Messenger and the Small messenger)." Literator 25, no. 3 (2004): 1–16. http://dx.doi.org/10.4102/lit.v25i3.262.
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This article explores the unwritten textbook of the folktale in the case of “Morongwa le Morongwanyana” [The Messenger and the Small messenger], a South African folktale recorded and published by A.T. Malepe. Against the background of current problems with the folktale tradition, it is argued that the unwritten textbook can help improve three educational practices, namely the practice of educating children at home, the practice of teaching and learning at school, and the practice of educational mass media. The nature and content of the unwritten textbook of the Batswana culture as defined by Ong (1982) and other scholars on orality are examined in a case study of the selected folktale. Lastly, the implications of the case study and of the unwritten textbook for the three practices are spelled out.
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Naidoo, S. "THE STRUGGLE FOR AUTHORITY IN GEORGE MCCALL THEAL’S KAFFIR FOLKLORE (1882)." Southern African Journal for Folklore Studies 24, no. 1 (2016): 78–97. http://dx.doi.org/10.25159/1016-8427/1674.
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This article focuses specifically on George McCall Theal’s collection of folktale texts, Kaffir Folklore (1882), as an example of an early South African ethnographic publication, and argues that the folktale transcriptions contained therein, although a part of Theal’s general colonialist project, are hybrid, containing the voices of both coloniser and colonised. The key argument is that the presence of the African voices in this text reveals simultaneously that Theal’s editorial aspirations were never absolutely imposed, and that agency and influence (albeit limited) of the colonised Xhosa co-authors were present. The article offers an analysis of the paratext (the preface, the introduction and the explanatory notes) of Kaffir Folkore, rather than a close reading of the tales themselves. To facilitate an understanding of Theal’s editorial practice, Kaffir Folkore is compared to Harold Scheub’s The Xhosa Ntsomi (1975). More generally, drawing on postcolonial folklore and book-history scholarship, the article explores how folklore texts of the colonial era, although contributing to the establishment of a literary and cultural orthodoxy in modern South Africa, constitute a telling hybrid genre, which invites a re-evaluation of colonial relations, and of individual texts themselves. In short, these texts synthesise different literary traditions (European and African), different mediums (the oral and the written), different disciplinary approaches (ethnography, folklore, literature), and most significantly, the voices of different subjects. Kaffir Folklore (1882) epitomises this synthesis.
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Small, Jean. "Doing Theatre: Theatre Pedagogy through the Folktale." Cultural and Pedagogical Inquiry 11, no. 3 (2020): 80–91. http://dx.doi.org/10.18733/cpi29505.
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Theatre Pedagogy holds that cognition is body-based. Through performance the body’s unconscious procedural memory learns. This information learned through repeated interaction with the world is transmitted to the brain where it becomes conscious knowledge. Theatre Pedagogy in this case study is based on the implementation of a Caribbean cultural art form in performance, in order to teach Francophone language and literature at the postsecondary level in Jamaica. This paper describes the experience of “doing theatre” with seven university students to learn the French language and literature based on an adaptation of two of Birago Diop’s folktales. In the process of learning and performing the plays, the students also understood some of the West African cultural universals of life which cut across the lives of learners in their own and in foreign cultural contexts.
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Dr. Vizovono Elizabeth. "‘The Ancestor as Foundation’ in Toni Morrison’s Tar Baby." Creative Launcher 5, no. 4 (2020): 34–38. http://dx.doi.org/10.53032/tcl.2020.5.4.06.
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Toni Morrison makes use of elements of ‘Black art’ as a literary technique in her fictional works. She has developed her own theoretical concept of this art in her essays and critical writings. The focus of this paper is to analyze how she applies her theoretical concepts drawn from oral tradition into her fictional works through a study of her characters and storytelling technique in Tar Baby. The novel can be considered a reinvented folktale in which the author has presented relevant complicated issues of identity set against the backdrop of colonization. The paper highlights Morrison’s use of folkloric elements both stylistically and thematically in her recreation of an African American folktale by embedding it in a contemporary tale that reveals the complexity of a postcolonial identity in the face of cultural erosion. Central to this is her concept of ancestral wisdom, found in the ancestors, as a source of cultural identity, which is the major theme of the novel.
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Porter, Laurence M. "Lost in Translation: From Orature to Literature in the West African Folktale." Symposium: A Quarterly Journal in Modern Literatures 49, no. 3 (1995): 229–39. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00397709.1995.10113498.
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Morgan, Winifred. ""The Coon in the Box": A Global Folktale in African-American Tradition." Journal of American Folklore 118, no. 470 (2005): 492–93. http://dx.doi.org/10.2307/4137672.
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Goldberg, Christine. ""Dogs Rescue Master from Tree Refuge," an African Folktale with World-Wide Analogs." Western Folklore 57, no. 1 (1998): 41. http://dx.doi.org/10.2307/1500248.
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Inggs, Judith. "What is a South African Folktale? Reshaping Traditional Tales through Translation and Adaptation." Papers: Explorations into Children's Literature 14, no. 1 (2004): 15–23. http://dx.doi.org/10.21153/pecl2004vol14no1art1273.
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El-Shamy, Hasan M. "Twins/Zwillinge: A Broader View. A Contribution to Stith Thompson’s Incomplete Motif System—A Case of the Continuation of Pseudoscientific Fallacies †." Humanities 10, no. 1 (2020): 8. http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/h10010008.
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Explaining the rationale and main objectives for his motif system; Stith Thompson declared that it emulates what “the scientists have done with the worldwide phenomena of biology” (Thompson 1955, I, p. 10). In this respect; the underlying principles for motif identification and indexing are comparable to those devised by anthropologists at Yale for “categorizing” culture materials into 78 macro-units and 629 subdivisions thereof used to establish “The Human Relations Area Files” (HRAF). By comparison, 23 divisions (chapters) make up the spectrum of sociocultural materials covered in Thompson’s Motif-Index system. Thompson’s cardinal themes are divided into 1730 subdivisions permitting more specificity of identification (El-Shamy 1995, I, xiii). Historically; the disciplines of “anthropology” and of “folklore” targeted different categories of the human population; with “folklore” assigned to populations stratified into “social classes” (Dorson 1972, pp. 4–5: For details, see El-Shamy: “Folk Groups” (1997b, pp. 318–322, in: T.A Green, gen. ed. 1997c, p. 321); El-Shamy 1980, p. li; compare El-Shamy (1997a), p. 233 (“African hunter”). The limitations Thompson placed on the goals of his motif system (along with its tale-type companion) were triggered by the fact that “folklore” was; then; primarily interested in literature (prose and verse). The sociocultural milieu surrounding the creation of the literary forms occupied minor roles. Considering that a folktale is a “description of life and/or living” including all five universal culture institutions; the relevance of the contents of folktales are of primary significance for understanding the community in which they were born and maintained (El-Shamy 1995, I, p. xiii). Consequently; for the present writer; a folktale is considered a sixth (universal) culture institution. Also; because Thompson’s Motif-Index sought global coverage; many regions and national entities didn’t receive adequate attention: significant fields of human experience are missing or sketchily presented. This article offers two cases as examples of: (1) How editors of folklore publications ignore novel ideas incompatible with established trends; and (2) Samples of the spectrum of current psychosocial issues addressed in an expanded Thompson’s System (with more than 26,000 new motifs and 630 tale-types added).
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Canonici, N. N. "B.W. Vilakazi and the birth of the Zulu novel." Literator 31, no. 2 (2010): 15–44. http://dx.doi.org/10.4102/lit.v31i2.45.
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B.W. Vilakazi is rightly famous for his Zulu poems that integrate the Zulu creative genius with established European poetic trends. He was also the creator of the Zulu romantic novel, having written the first three examples of the genre dealing with both personal and national romantic ideals. These are, however, seldom analysed. This article reflects on the emerging literatures in African languages, their aims, contents and forms. After a general introduction on Vilakazi’s life and innovative approach to creative writing within the context of the African mini-renaissance period of the 1930s, there is a brief exposition of Vilakazi’s vision of an African literature, rooted in the need for self-identification, and recognition of perceived historical greatness. Then each novel is contextualised and analysed, through a description of the characters that exert the greatest influence on the events, since plot and character are also the highest achievement of the folktale, when told by expert performers. An attempt is also made to identify Afro-centric narrative elements and to justify perceived shortcomings in plot construction.
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Morgan, Winifred. ""The Coon in the Box": A Global Folktale in African-American Tradition (review)." Journal of American Folklore 118, no. 470 (2005): 492–93. http://dx.doi.org/10.1353/jaf.2005.0051.
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Adeniyi, Emmanuel. "Ṣàngó’s Incest, Oxala’s Equanimity and the Permanence of African Myth-Legends in Atlantic Yorùbá Dramaturgy". Afrika Focus 34, № 2 (2021): 213–36. http://dx.doi.org/10.1163/2031356x-34020003.
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Abstract This article discusses the permanence of Yorùbá myth-legends in Atlantic Yorùbá dramaturgy. The dramaturgy is conceived as a genre of Atlantic Yorùbá literature produced by the scions of Yorùbá slaves in the New World and some òrìṣà worshippers in the Americas who claim an affiliative relationship with continental Yorùbá. I argue in favour of a myth-legend taxonomy of oral prose narratives as against the Western classification of traditional tales into myth, legend and folktale. Yorùbá traditional tales, also called pataki by the Atlantic Yorùbá, are dubbed myth-legends due to the shared features of myths and legends immanent in them. The article examines these traditional tales, drawing insights from psychoanalytic and postcolonial models to foreground the Ọbàtálá–Jesus parallelism, primeval rivalry between Ṣàngó and Ògún, and the paraphilia of certain Yorùbá hero-gods. It affirms the Euhemerisation of these deities to accentuate their apotheosis and possession of human attributes.
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Snyman, Elisabeth. "Véronique Tadjo: Is there hope beyond the divisions in contemporary Africa?" Tydskrif vir Letterkunde 55, no. 1 (2018): 18–27. http://dx.doi.org/10.17159/2309-9070/tvl.v.55i1.1646.
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This article proposes a reading of three texts The Blind Kingdom (1990), Queen Pokou. Concerto for a sacrifice (2004) and Far from my Father (2010) written by the Ivorian author Véronique Tadjo, in order to examine the author's representation of, and reflexion on separation and division, be it within a nation, amongst groups, or in the heart of a family. In Tadjo's novelistic universe, such divisions often require the intervention of a female protagonist, whose own existence is deeply influenced by tensions and frictions between two opposing camps. I shall argue that the agency of these protagonists is never futile and may even point to a way to go beyond the original divisions. Tadjo's representation of division in these three texts goes beyond generic boundaries to open up a rich variety of perspectives on the problems she deals with. I shall demonstrate how the author draws on various genres such as poetry, the African folktale, the novel, as well as autofiction in order to engage the reader in a profound reflexion on the current state and future of the African continent.
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Mayowa, Alade Samuel. "Development of a 2D Digital Animation for Yorùbá Folktale Narrative." International Journal of Art, Culture and Design Technologies 9, no. 1 (2020): 47–61. http://dx.doi.org/10.4018/ijacdt.2020010104.
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Yoruba folktales are endangered in the face of globalization, Westernization, and inter-ethnic interaction, with the few that are available not being competitive with foreign cartoons and movies. The purpose of this work is to develop a digital animation film using Yoruba folktale narrative as a case study with a view to providing a framework to enhance the production of animated folktales as well as supporting Africa's rich cultural heritage, using relevant technology resources. The resulting folktale animation was evaluated by both the target audience and multimedia experts. The formal digital animation system resulting from the study is useful for formal and informal children's education and enlightenment as well as a source of enlightenment for society on different sociocultural problems which invariably results in a more conscious and civilized society.
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Saktiningrum, Nur. "Framing a Trickster Character in Two Different Media and Eras: A Study on Br’er Rabbit in Uncle Remus’ Stories and Disney’s Song of the South." Jurnal Humaniora 29, no. 2 (2017): 198. http://dx.doi.org/10.22146/jh.24205.
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This article analyses Br’er Rabbit, a trickster character in African-American folklore. As a trickster Br’er Rabbit possesses a paradoxical nature. On the one hand, Br’er Rabbit acts as a hero but on the other hand, he constantly plays tricks on others and by doing so, he is also violating the prevailing values. These two opposing aspects of trickster’s nature offer an interesting subject for the research. The questions considered worth focusing on in discussing the subject are: How can trickster character be described? What values are represented by trickster character? Is there any shift in the description and represented values in different media and over time? The study presented in this article was aimed at investigating the transformation of how the trickster is characterized and values represented by trickster Br’er Rabbit in Uncle Remus’ folktale version of “The Wonderful Tar Baby (1881) and The Laughing Place” (1903) written by Joel Chandler Harries and the same trickster character in the same stories featured in Disney’s “Song of the South” (1946). By comparing and contrasting both narratives in different media and eras, it is uncovered that there are some changes on the depiction and nature as well as values represented by Br’er Rabbit, the trickster character. The study presented in this article was aimed at investigating the transformation of values represented by trickster Br’er Rabbit in Uncle Remus’ folktale version of “Tar Baby and The Laughing Place” (1879) written by Joel Chandler Harries and the same trickster character in the same stories featured in Disney’s “Song of the South.” The research questions of this study are answered by applying Barths’ theory and method in studying headlines news. This model of research enables the researcher to understand and interprete values represented by the trickster character in different times and media.
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Saktiningrum, Nur. "Framing a Trickster Character in Two Different Media and Eras: A Study on Br’er Rabbit in Uncle Remus’ Stories and Disney’s Song of the South." Jurnal Humaniora 29, no. 2 (2017): 198. http://dx.doi.org/10.22146/jh.v29i2.24205.
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This article analyses Br’er Rabbit, a trickster character in African-American folklore. As a trickster Br’er Rabbit possesses a paradoxical nature. On the one hand, Br’er Rabbit acts as a hero but on the other hand, he constantly plays tricks on others and by doing so, he is also violating the prevailing values. These two opposing aspects of trickster’s nature offer an interesting subject for the research. The questions considered worth focusing on in discussing the subject are: How can trickster character be described? What values are represented by trickster character? Is there any shift in the description and represented values in different media and over time? The study presented in this article was aimed at investigating the transformation of how the trickster is characterized and values represented by trickster Br’er Rabbit in Uncle Remus’ folktale version of “The Wonderful Tar Baby (1881) and The Laughing Place” (1903) written by Joel Chandler Harries and the same trickster character in the same stories featured in Disney’s “Song of the South” (1946). By comparing and contrasting both narratives in different media and eras, it is uncovered that there are some changes on the depiction and nature as well as values represented by Br’er Rabbit, the trickster character. The study presented in this article was aimed at investigating the transformation of values represented by trickster Br’er Rabbit in Uncle Remus’ folktale version of “Tar Baby and The Laughing Place” (1879) written by Joel Chandler Harries and the same trickster character in the same stories featured in Disney’s “Song of the South.” The research questions of this study are answered by applying Barths’ theory and method in studying headlines news. This model of research enables the researcher to understand and interprete values represented by the trickster character in different times and media.
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Arndt, Susan. "Trans*textuality in William Shakespeare’s Othello: Italian, West African, and English Encounters." Anglia 136, no. 3 (2018): 393–429. http://dx.doi.org/10.1515/ang-2018-0045.
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Abstract William Shakespeare’s Othello (1604) displays a critical agenda towards the emerging colonialist discourse of his time and may have encountered, or even been influenced by, African oral literature. This thesis will be probed in this article by comparing Othello with the folktale “The Handsome Stranger” and the Trickster character, well known all across Western Africa, touching lightly on Leo Africanus’s The History and Description of Africa (1550) in the process. In doing so, Othello’s most acknowledged source text, “Un Capitano Moro” by Giovanni Battista Giraldi (1565), will be involved, thus complementing earlier comparative readings of “Un Capitano Moro” and Othello. This postcolonial comparative reading will finally embrace Ahmed Yerima’s adaptation of Othello, entitled Otaelo (2002). In doing so, the article will discuss striking parallels among all four texts, as well as differences and diversions. The latter are, however, not read as counter arguments to the possibility of an encounter; rather, discursive diversions are contextualised historically and trans*textually. Before delving into this analysis, the article will explore both historical probabilities and methodological challenges of reading African oral literature as possible sources of Shakespeare’s Othello, as well as theorise trans*textuality (as related to and yet distinct from Kristeva’s intertextuality and Genette’s transtextuality).This article has developed from two papers, one held in 2015 at a symposium dedicated to Michael Steppat in Bayreuth, who, ever since, accompanied this project with most helpful critical input; I owe him my sincerest gratitude. A second workshop on this topic was held in 2016 in Berlin in the presence of Shankar Raman, Christopher Joseph Odhiambo, and a student research group from Bayreuth with Taghrid Elhanafy, Weeraya Donsomsakulkij, Samira Paraschiv, and Mingqing Yuan. Taghrid Elhanafy dedicates her MA and PhD thesis to comparing Romeo and Juliet with several Arabic and Farsi versions of Layla and Majnun (Cf. Elhanafy 2018). Moreover, this article owes sincere gratitude to a most challenging and expert editing by Shirin Assa, PhD candidate at Bayreuth University, as well as Omid Soltani. Moreover, I wish to thank Dilan Zoe Smida and especially Samira Paraschiv for supporting me while doing research and working on notes and bibliography.
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Mckenzie, John. "‘NAKED IN THE OPEN AIR … THE WAVES … INVITED HER’: ECOCRITICISM AND THE PICTURE BOOK." Mousaion: South African Journal of Information Studies 32, no. 2 (2016): 74–105. http://dx.doi.org/10.25159/0027-2639/1691.
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It is an inconvenient truth that the state of the planet is likely to figure powerfully in both the real and the imagined lives of children, in whatever nation state children and young people are situated. Physical space as a literary trope, representing both outer and inner landscapes, has a long tradition in the telling of stories where the child listener/ reader/viewer is often positioned to see nature in terms of binary oppositions. From the survival story – where the island is represented as personally malevolent – to the country garden – where nature is represented as a benign healer; from the wild forest of the folktale – where the wolf-man/rapist roams – to the benevolent beach where children play innocently, children ‘read’ contradictory ideas about the natural world in the word. This article unlocks some of these binary oppositions in children’s literature through an examination of a range of South African and New Zealand picture books, seeking to reveal how various ideologies are inscribed in the visual and verbal space of the picture book. The article asserts that, in the context of globalisation, teachers must be awakened to the opportunity of including eco-criticism in a critical literacy curriculum, developing thus an emancipatory politic.
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Schevb, Harold. "African Folktales." African Arts 18, no. 2 (1985): 23. http://dx.doi.org/10.2307/3336185.
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Gebregeorgis, Mehari Yimulaw. "Gender Role Perceptions in Selected South-African Folktales." Folklore: Electronic Journal of Folklore 85 (April 2022): 181–200. http://dx.doi.org/10.7592/fejf2022.85.gebregeorgis.
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The objective of the study was to unpack gender role perceptions in selected South-African folktales. To this end, 65 purposefully selected folktales which reinforce character roles were analysed and interpreted, using narrative analysis. With the exception of a few that are used as instruments of contestation, the studied South-African folktales mainly serve as a tool to confirm the entrenched hegemonic philosophy of patriarchal communal life in terms of marriage, work, character traits, and authority. The rebelliousness of female characters against the patriarchal system in some folktales indicates that there is an emerging dynamism of discourse which aims at transforming the gender stereotype ideology inculcated in the folktales.
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Haring, Lee. "Eastward to the Islands: The Other Diaspora." Journal of American Folklore 118, no. 469 (2005): 290–307. http://dx.doi.org/10.2307/4137915.
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Abstract The Indian Ocean islands of Mauritius, Réunion, and Seychelles, named the "Mascareignes" after a Portuguese explorer, are products of an eastward African diaspora, almost invisible in the West except to a few historians. Empty of human population until European exploitation settled them with afew colonists and thousands of slaves from East Africa and Madagascar, their multicultural history demonstrates the astonishing durability of African and Malagasy cultures. Folktales provide the finest window into that history and its values. Through that window, creolization is revealed in its actual occurrence.
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Dewulf, Jeroen. "Flying Back to Africa or Flying to Heaven? Competing Visions of Afterlife in the Lowcountry and Caribbean Slave Societies." Religion and American Culture 31, no. 2 (2021): 222–61. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/rac.2021.12.
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ABSTRACTThis article presents a new interpretation of the famous folktale about enslaved Africans flying home, including the legend that only those who refrained from eating salt could fly back to Africa. It rejects claims that the tale is rooted in Igbo culture and relates to suicide as a desperate attempt to escape from slavery. Rather, an analysis of historical documents in combination with ethnographic and linguistic research makes it possible to trace the tale back to West-Central Africa. It relates objections to eating salt to the Kikongo expression curia mungua (to eat salt), meaning baptism, and claims that the tale originated in the context of discussions among the enslaved about the consequences of a Christian baptism for one's spiritual afterlife.
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Finnegan, Ruth, and William Bascom. "African Folktales in the New World." Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute 1, no. 1 (1995): 180. http://dx.doi.org/10.2307/3034246.
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Glazier, Stephen D., and William Bascom. "African Folktales in the New World." Journal of Religion in Africa 25, no. 2 (1995): 219. http://dx.doi.org/10.2307/1581280.
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McCall, Daniel F., and William Bascom. "African Folktales in the New World." International Journal of African Historical Studies 26, no. 3 (1993): 689. http://dx.doi.org/10.2307/220510.
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Tiffin, Jessica. "Nelson Mandela's Favorite African Folktales (review)." Marvels & Tales 19, no. 2 (2005): 303–6. http://dx.doi.org/10.1353/mat.2005.0039.
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Jenkins, E. R. "English South African children’s literature and the environment." Literator 25, no. 3 (2004): 107–24. http://dx.doi.org/10.4102/lit.v25i3.266.
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Historical studies of nature conservation and literary criticism of fiction concerned with the natural environment provide some pointers for the study of South African children’s literature in English. This kind of literature, in turn, has a contribution to make to studies of South African social history and literature. There are English-language stories, poems and picture books for children which reflect human interaction with nature in South Africa since early in the nineteenth century: from hunting, through domestication of the wilds, the development of scientific agriculture, and the changing roles of nature reserves, to modern ecological concern for the entire environment. Until late in the twentieth century the literature usually endorsed the assumption held by whites that they had exclusive ownership of the land and wildlife. In recent years English-language children’s writers and translators of indigenous folktales for children have begun to explore traditional beliefs about and practices in conservation.
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Cochrane, Thandeka. "The politics of literature in Malawi: Filemon Chirwa, Nthanu za Chitonga and the battle for the Atonga tribal council." Africa 92, no. 5 (2022): 819–38. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s000197202200064x.
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AbstractIn 1932, as Nyasaland (present-day Malawi) was heading to indirect rule, a small vocal community in the north of the country resisted the colonial government’s attempts to assign them a Native Authority. Instead, they proposed their own form of government: a council of thirty-two mafumu (chiefs) who would make decisions on an egalitarian basis, the Atonga tribal council. The champion of this alternative form of governance was a Tonga intellectual named Filemon K. Chirwa. At the height of the political manoeuvring to institute the Atonga tribal council, Filemon wrote and published his only book: Nthanu za Chitonga (Folktales in Chitonga). This article argues that this book was – and still is – an important piece of political literature. Through an exploration of the context of the creation of the Atonga tribal council, it sets out the stakes that were at play in the construction of local traditions and customs, and then shows how the book was part of a project of producing an image of these. It then explores the ‘afterlife’ of the book, as it became a symbolic force in contemporary village communities, not only articulating the sense of political marginalization experienced, but also capturing a new form of political agency. The article concludes by suggesting that Filemon Chirwa’s collection of stories is an astounding example of the deeply political role that folktale literature can play within colonial and (post)colonial Africa.
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Sone, Enongene Mirabeau. "The Folktale and Social Values in Traditional Africa." Eastern African Literary and Cultural Studies 4, no. 2 (2018): 142–59. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/23277408.2018.1485314.
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Irving, Evelyn Uhrhan, Bernard Binlin Dadié, Karen C. Hatch, Bernard Binlin Dadié, and Jains A. Mayes. "The Black Cloth: A Collection of African Folktales." World Literature Today 61, no. 3 (1987): 481. http://dx.doi.org/10.2307/40143483.
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Sebryuk, Anna N. "The legacy of Sea Island Creole English: Sociolinguistic features of Gullah." Vestnik of Saint Petersburg University. Language and Literature 19, no. 1 (2022): 195–209. http://dx.doi.org/10.21638/spbu09.2022.111.
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This paper builds on the renewed interest in preserving the multiethnic origins of the United States and recognizing a profound impact of the Black experience on the American nation. The article centers on the Gullah language, one of the primary roots of modern African American English and the only remaining English-related Creole language in North America. The pidgin language, which originally evolved as a medium of communication between slaves from various regions of Africa and their owners, is still spoken by Black communities across coastal regions of South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida. While inland African American English (AAE) has received much attention in linguistic circles over past decades, relatively little research has been done on varieties of AAE spoken in the rural American South. The purpose of this paper is to re-examine the origin and history of Gullah and to present a linguistic description of its most peculiar features. The Gullah language represents a combination of English and Central and West African languages. Geographical isolation, predominance of the Black population, and social and economic independence contributed to its development and survival. Also, in contrast with inland African Americans, the Gullah Geechee communities historically have had little contact with whites. Several folktales written in Gullah have been analyzed for discussing its persistent patterns. Characterizing Gullah is important for our increased understanding of the origins of AAE. Therefore, the article will be useful for scholars interested in Atlantic creoles and in African American and Diaspora Studies.
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Quintero, Genevieve Jorolan, and Connie Makgabo. "Animals as representations of female domestic roles in selected fables from the Philippines and South Africa." Scholarship of Teaching and Learning in the South 4, no. 1 (2020): 37. http://dx.doi.org/10.36615/sotls.v4i1.121.
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South Africa and the Philippines are home to a number of indigenous groups whose cultures and traditions have not been tainted by centuries of colonization. This paper compares the pre-colonial literature of cultural communities in two countries, where one is part of a continent (South Africa) while the other is an archipelago (the Philippines). Despite the differences in their geographical features, the two countries share common experiences: 1) colonized by European powers; 2) have a significant number of indigenous communities; 3) a treasury of surviving folk literature. Published African and Philippine folktales reveal recurring images and elements. One of these is the use of animals as characters, performing domestic tasks in households, and representing gender roles. This paper compares how animal characters portray feminine characteristics and domestic roles in selected fables from South Africa and the Philippines, specifically on the commonalities in the roles of the female characters. The research highlights the relevance of recording and publishing of folk literature, and the subsequent integration and teaching thereof within basic and higher education curricula.Key words: Indigenous, Cultural communities, fables, folk literature, Philippine folk tales, South African folk talesHow to cite this article:Quintero, G.J. & Makgabo, C. 2020. Animals as Representations of Female Domestic Roles in selected fables from the Philippines and South Africa. Scholarship of Teaching and Learning in the South. v. 4, n. 1, p. 37-50. April 2020. Available at:https://sotl-south-journal.net/?journal=sotls&page=article&op=view&path%5B%5D=121This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
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Matiza, Vimbai. "African Traditional Art Forms, Democratic Governance and Economic Growth in Zimbabwe." Southern African Journal for Folklore Studies 27, no. 2 (2018): 55–66. http://dx.doi.org/10.25159/1016-8427/3184.
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The article seeks to explore the role of African oral traditional art forms and governance in Zimbabwe for economic development. African philosophies, embedded in oral literature were part and parcel of the people’s life. Everybody participated in the activities that affected them in society. Thus African peoples used oral literature, which is dependent on the performer who formulates it on a specific occasion—this forms part of issues of governance. Some problems, which people, and Zimbabweans in particular are facing, emanate from colonialism, and have led them to believe that they had no culture or anything to shape their way of thinking. These problems have always been there, and people had a way of circumventing them through the philosophies that were embedded in their oral art forms. It is against this backdrop that the researcher seeks to explore the place of oral art forms; which include proverbs, riddles, folktales among others; and governance as vehicles to drive economic growth in Zimbabwe. The article is based on a conceptual method of study, where examples of oral art forms used have been taken from various speech communities in Africa. The researcher’s arguments are guided by the Afrocentricapproach and the discussion establishes that issues of democracy and governance were part and parcel of indigenous people’s way of doing things, in a bid to achieve economic growth in their societies.
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Nzewi, Esther N. "Linking African and Western models through integration of trickster folktales in the application of Cognitive Behavior Therapy for depression." Psychology: the Journal of the Hellenic Psychological Society 16, no. 2 (2020): 146. http://dx.doi.org/10.12681/psy_hps.23810.
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The unique re-entry challenges of African psychologists trained in western universities is evolving strategies for applying general clinical theories and therapeutic techniques in ways that are clinically effective and culturally sensitive. This case study presents the cross-cultural application of Cognitive Behavioral Theory (CBT) for the treatment of Major Depressive Disorder (MDD) with a 12-year-old Nigerian adolescent. Cultural relevance is enhanced by the integration of culture-based trickster folktales in the cross-cultural application of CBT.The strategies for identifying major themes, contents, contexts, the characteristics of the villains and victims, nature of interpersonal relationships, emotions, behavior and consequences in trickster folktales are described. The case study further demonstrates how these components of trickster folktales are used for the implementation of core therapeutic techniques of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT). The outcomes are discussed in terms of the benefits of the therapeutic application of CBT, efficacy of modified CBT in nonwestern countries, and client’s characteristics important in the treatment of Major Depressive Disorder with culturally modified CBT in adolescents.
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Haring, Lee. "African Folktales and Creolization in the Indian Ocean Islands." Research in African Literatures 33, no. 3 (2002): 182–99. http://dx.doi.org/10.2979/ral.2002.33.3.182.
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West, Michaell, and Richard Donato. "Stories and Stances: Cross-Cultured Encounters with African Folktales." Foreign Language Annals 28, no. 3 (1995): 392–406. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1944-9720.1995.tb00807.x.
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Haring, Lee. "African Folktales and Creolization in the Indian Ocean Islands." Research in African Literatures 33, no. 3 (2002): 182–99. http://dx.doi.org/10.1353/ral.2002.0070.
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Akinwumi, Sesan, Azeez. "Yoruba Folktales, the New Media and Postmodernism." Khazar Journal of Humanities and Social Sciences 17, no. 2 (2014): 74–87. http://dx.doi.org/10.5782/2223-2621.2014.17.2.74.
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The Yoruba pristine orality in its entirety has been given new directions with the popularity of the postmodernist tenets as shown in the utilitarian use of the new media in literary production, dissemination and consumption. This paper seeks to examine how the postmodernist material and immaterial culture have influenced the literary and cultural values of Yoruba folktales. Data for this study are gathered through field investigations at Omi Adio, Aba Ebu ( Moniya) and Badeku, all in Oyo State, Nigeria. Archival documents on the subject matter are also consulted. It is observed that apart from affecting the physical and cultural landscapes of Africa, postmodernism/new media has also affected the literary landscape of the continent. It is concluded that Africa has not effectively utilized the resources of new media to promote the vitality of folktales. It is recommended that the teaching of Oral Literature should be made compulsory in the curricula of primary and secondary schools in Nigeria.
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Cruz, Joëlle M. "Akua Ananse Is a “She”." Departures in Critical Qualitative Research 10, no. 4 (2021): 7–29. http://dx.doi.org/10.1525/dcqr.2021.10.4.7.
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In this essay, I channel Kweku Ananse, the trickster in West African tales. Extending upon this figure, I re-gender Kweku Ananse as Akua Ananse and offer “spider stories” to make sense of my transnational identities as a West African and French woman, who is a professor in US academe. I offer a conversation between Akua Ananse, my French-speaking grandmother figure Marie, and my professional self. My spider stories subvert usual categories of knowledge and function as a form of episteme. They borrow from the genre of Indigenous folktales, which have historically been dismissed as appropriate knowledge under Western-centered worldviews.
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Argenti, Nicolas. "Things that Don't Come by the Road: Folktales, Fosterage, and Memories of Slavery in the Cameroon Grassfields." Comparative Studies in Society and History 52, no. 2 (2010): 224–54. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0010417510000034.
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Oku adults have a straightforward rationalization for the existence of folktales: the frightening cautionary tales of the child-eating monster K∂ηgaaηgu serve to warn children not to go to the fields or to stray too far from the house without their parents. But this rationalization is belied by the fact that adults in this chiefdom of the Cameroon Grassfields do not tell folktales to children. Rather, folktales are most often told by children amongst each other, with no adult involvement, and they are consequently learned by younger children from older ones. This is an unusual situation in West Africa, where the norm is for adults to tell folktales to children. For all we know, adult-to-child storytelling may have been the normal practice in the Grassfields in the past, but if it ever was, this practice has now passed into desuetude, and today adults look with mild scorn on folktales (f∂ngaanen, ∂mgaanen pl.) and generally remain aloof during storytelling sessions. Storytelling in the Grassfields is therefore a child-structured form of play in Schwartzman's (1978) sense: it is an activity mediated by children without adult input. Prior to the introduction of schooling in the Grassfields, children used to be made to guard the crops against birds and monkeys, an activity that left them to their own devices in the fields for long periods of the day (Argenti 2001; see also Fortes 1938; Raum 1940). In some cases, children actually slept in small shelters that they built in the fields, and they would consequently stay away from their homes and adult supervision for days at a time. It was in this context, away from the censorious gaze of adults, that children's illicit masking activities developed (Argenti 2001). It may also be in this context that children were able to indulge in prolonged bouts of storytelling without fear of reproof by adults, in whose eyes children should be seen but not heard. Today, children no longer guard the fields, and they have therefore taken to telling their folktales at home.
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Sheik, Ayub. "The more than beautiful woman - African folktales of female agency and emancipation." Agenda 32, no. 4 (2018): 45–53. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/10130950.2018.1535094.
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Ibrahim, Binta Fatima. "The appropriation of linguistic forms for better cognitive comprehension of the Nigerian pragmatic literature." Babel. Revue internationale de la traduction / International Journal of Translation 56, no. 2 (2010): 119–28. http://dx.doi.org/10.1075/babel.56.2.02ibr.
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The propensity of the English language to absorb native nuances by the African writers should be seen as a worthwhile stylistic device, despite the position of English language. Its adaptability to natural flavours should therefore be aimed at the writers’ intention to reach a wider audience. This also means that the attempt by writers to decolorize through literature the polluted African culture god through the use of appropriate notions and local nuances. The technique has, however, been to put on record traditional ways of life, the peoples’ customs, communal activities such as festivals, ceremonies, rituals, myths, folktales, proverbs, music, dance, songs, etc. in order to remind the African reader about the importance of these crucial aspects of the tradition in addition to the appropriation of language use. Hence most African writings can be said to have their foundations in the cultural heritage of their various groups. through the use of what one may call technically implanted African English, African coinages, direct translation, proverbs, local idioms transfers of mother tongues, local insertions/ect. Hence it is not enough to use the sociological and residual approaches to literature. The formalist and pragmatic approaches should also be considered paramount in the writing of African literature. For the choice of diction, narrative technique and the entire pragma-aesthetic implications of the African man’s speech is important to the reader of African literature, if he is to understand the theme
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Theron, Linda, Kate Cockcroft, and Lesley Wood. "The resilience-enabling value of African folktales: The read-me-to-resilience intervention." School Psychology International 38, no. 5 (2017): 491–506. http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0143034317719941.
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Resilience, or the process of adjusting well to adversity, draws on personal and social ecological resources (i.e., caregiving and community supports). Previous research—conducted mostly in the Global North—has shown that bibliotherapy offers a way to support children in identifying and utilizing resilience-enabling resources. In so doing, bibliotherapy has the potential to facilitate resilience. In this article, we confirm the resilience-supporting value of bibliotherapy for African orphans and vulnerable children (OVC). To do so, we report the quantitative and qualitative pre- and post-test results of the Read-me-to-Resilience Study ( N = 345). This quasi-experimental study showed that African children who listened to indigenous resilience-themed stories had a significantly increased awareness of personal and community-based protective resources post-intervention, than those who did not. Interestingly, there was no significant increase in their perceptions of caregiving resources. The findings suggest that school psychologists and teachers should include resilience-enabling stories in their support of children who are orphaned. However, further research is needed on how best to use stories in ways that will enable children to identify caregiving resources.