African Folktales Essay - Custom University Papers.
The journal article, Black Ethos in Folktales, effectively specifies paradigms centered on courtship, marriage, and desired character traits of both black men and black women who were slaves. The journal specifically focuses on tales of “Folklore of the Sea Islands, South Carolina” (Garner, 1984, p. 54).
For example, in one African American folktale, Brer Rabbit, the quintessential trickster figure in African American folklore, succeeds in getting Brer Fox to rescue him from a well by asserting that the moon reflected in the water at the bottom of the well is really a block of cheese.
African- American folklore is arguably the basis for most African- American literature. In a country where as late as the 1860’s there were laws prohibiting the teaching of slaves, it was necessary for the oral tradition to carry the values the group considered significant.
African-American folktales are a storytelling tradition based in Africa containing a rich oral tradition that expanded as Africans were brought to the Americas as slaves.
African- American folklore is arguably the basis for most African- American literature. In a country where as late as the 1860's there were laws prohibiting the teaching of slaves, it was necessary for the oral tradition to carry the values the group considered significant.
African American Folktales. African-American folktales evolved from the need for African slaves to hold onto their culture in an environment where they weren't allowed to express themselves or keep their old traditions. The stories below are a mix of traditions from both side of the Atlantic, told for a modern audience and accompanied by.
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