Read complete books and articles on: African Folklore

Folktale - general term for any of numerous varieties of traditional narrative. The telling of stories appears to be a cultural universal, common to primitive and complex societies alike. Even the forms folktales take are demonstrably similar from culture to culture, and comparative studies of themes and narrative techniques have been successful in showing these relationships. Among the foremost folklorists of the 19th cent. were Oskar Dähnhardt in Germany, S. O. Addy in England, Paul Sébillot in France, and Y. M. Sokolov in Russia. Major 20th-century scholars in the field include Franz Boas, Richard Chase, Marie Campbell, and Stith Thompson. Folklorists make distinctions among the categories of folktales. Legends and traditions are narratives of an explanatory nature concerning creation and tribal beginnings, supernatural beings, and quasi-historical figures (e.g., King Arthur, Lady Godiva). These stories are related as fact and concern a specific time and place. Fairy tales are entirely fictional and often begin with such formulas as "Once upon a time…" and "In a certain country there lived…." Popular examples recount the supernatural adventures and mishaps of youngest daughters, transformed princes, mermaids, and wood fairies and elves (e.g., Cinderella, Rumplestiltskin, Snow White, Sleeping Beauty, and Hansel and Gretel). Animal tales abound in every culture; most of them are clearly anthropomorphic, the animals assuming human personalities. Such tales are classified according to three subdivisions: the etiological tale, or tale concerning origins (e.g., Great Hare of the Native North Americans); the fable pointing to a moral (Aesop's fables); and the beast epic (e.g., Reynard the Fox; see bestiary). Myths, which are more difficult to define satisfactorily, treat happenings of a long-ago time; they generally concern the adventures of gods, giants, heroes, nymphs, satyrs, and villains, as well as etiological themes. See also mythology; monsters and imaginary beasts in folklore; elf; fairy; goblin; gremlin; troll.

Bibliography

See S. Thompson, The Folktale (1946); V. O. Binner, American Folktales (1966) and International Folktales (1967); R. M. Dorson, America in Legend (1974); H. Courlander, A Treasury of African Folklore (1975), A Treasury of Afro-American Folklore (1976), and The Tiger's Whisker and Other Tales from Asia and the Pacific (1995); A. Clarkson and G. B. Cross, World Folktales (1984).

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14 of the Best Books and Articles on: African Folklore

as selected by Questia librarians

1.

The Black Cloth: A Collection of African Folktales » Read Now
by Bernard Binlin Dadie, Karen C. Hatch. 140 pgs.

Collections: Literature, Entire Library

...are also popular in West African folklore, and Dadies collection gives...Dan Ben-Amos, Introduction: Folklore in African Society , in Lindfors...this area, in...
2.

Romancing the Real: Folklore and Ethnographic Representation in North Africa » Read Now
by Sabra J. Webber. 295 pgs.

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...contact with other cultural models. Folklore enables a particular performer...real life counterparts, to North African history, and to the past and present...folklore...
3.

Folk Poetics: A Sociosemiotic Study of Yoruba Trickster Tales » Read Now
by Ropo Sekoni. 141 pgs.

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Of all the different sub-genres of oral prose fiction among the Yoruba of Nigeria, the trickster tale is the most popular, especially among the nonruling stratum of society. Sekoni describes and explains literally what makes the trickster tale a trickster tale. The focus is to establish the...
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Of all the different sub-genres of oral prose fiction among the Yoruba of Nigeria, the trickster tale is the most popular, especially among the nonruling stratum of society. Sekoni describes and explains literally what makes the trickster tale a trickster tale. The focus is to establish the phenomenology of the trickster tale discourse from a sociosemiotic perspective. More specifically, Sekoni attempts to investigate the sociological and narratological conditions that govern the formation, transformation, and persistence of the trickster tale primarily among the Yoruba masses and secondarily among contemporary Yoruba authors writing in English.
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4.

Ideology and Tradition in South African Black Popular Theater, in Journal of American Folklore » Read Now
by David B. Coplan. 26 pgs.

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...face of apartheid. The South African political economy has even inspired...become part of Durbans black urban folklore ( 1984 :106-107). As an event...Poetry of Southern...
5.

Allegories of the Wilderness: Ethics and Ambiguity in Kuranko Narratives » Read Now
by Michael Jackson. 326 pgs.

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6.

Escaped Tricksters: Runaway Narratives as Trickster Tales, in Griot » Read Now
by Alexis Brooks De Vita. 10 pgs.

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...oldest surviving forms of oral literature is trickster tales. Africans used trickster tales before the existence of African slavery in the Americas. The likelihood that the...
7.

Walkin' over Medicine » Read Now
by Loudell F. Snow. 311 pgs.

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8.

The Power of Words in African Verbal Arts, in Journal of American Folklore » Read Now
by Philip M. Peek. 25 pgs.

Collections: Entire Library
9.

Mythatypes: Signatures and Signs of African/Diaspora and Black Goddesses » Read Now
by Alexis Brooks De Vita. 204 pgs.

Collections: Literature, Entire Library

...Dr. Alexis Brooks De Vita analyzes African/Diaspora women's literary voices and images in ways which enhance and expand upon their unique--and uniquely inherited--symbols...
10.

African Oral Literature: Backgrounds, Character, and Continuity » Read Now
by Isidore Okpewho. 392 pgs.

Collections: Literature, Entire Library

." . . its pages come alive with wonderful illustrative material coupled with sensitve and insightful commentary." -Reviews in Anthropology
11.

Epic Traditions of Africa » Read Now
by Stephen Paterson Belcher. 304 pgs.

Collections: Literature, Entire Library

Epic Traditions of Africa crosses boundaries of language, distance, and time to gather material from diverse African sources. Stephen Belcher explores the rich past and poetic force of African epics and places them in historical and social, as well as artistic, contexts. Colorful narratives from...
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Epic Traditions of Africa crosses boundaries of language, distance, and time to gather material from diverse African sources. Stephen Belcher explores the rich past and poetic force of African epics and places them in historical and social, as well as artistic, contexts. Colorful narratives from Central and West African traditions are illuminated along with texts that are more widely available to Western readers -- the Mande Sunjata and the Bamana Segou. Belcher also takes up questions about European influences on African epic poetry and the possibilities of mutual influences throughout the genre. This lively and informative volume will inspire an appreciation for the distinctive qualities of a uniquely African form of verbal art.
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12.

African Culture: The Rhythms of Unity ("Oral Literature" begins on p. 111) » Read Now
by Molefi Kete Asante, Kariamu Welsh Asante. 284 pgs.

Collections: History, Entire Library
13.

Southern African Literatures (Includes discussion of African folklore in multiple chapters) » Read Now
by Michael Chapman. 568 pgs.

Collections: Literature, Entire Library
14.

Encyclopedia of Literature ("African (Negro Folklore)" begins on p. 3) » Read Now
by Joseph T. Shipley. 1188 pgs.

Collections: Literature, Entire Library

...U.; former Pres. Am. Folklore Soc. African; Africans in fiction...See Greek. AFRICAN Negro Folklore I NEGRO FOLKLORE...in many collections of folklore from aboriginal...