African stories and tales serve a multifaceted purpose within their communities. They educate and instruct, imparting moral lessons and teaching values, ethics, and social norms to both children and adults. The stories also play a crucial role in preserving history and culture, passing down knowledge of historical events, cultural traditions, and societal beliefs through generations.
Tales
"Hawu, hawu, hawu, my children," Gogo began one evening. "You know, cleverness is a very important thing to own! Why, cleverness has helped Nogwaja out of the cooking pot more than once!" "The Jackal is also a clever animal.......
Tales
Once upon a time, a long time ago, there lived a spider named Anansi. Anansi's wife was a very good cook. But always, Anansi loved to taste the food that others in the village made for themselves and for their families....
Tales
Once upon a time, a crow and a jackal became bosom friends, and they agreed that the crow should support the jackal in the hot weather and the jackal support the crow in the rainy season.
Tales
The story of Wamugumo is not a story. He was a person just like you. He did not die a long time ago. His body had scales like this tree, called Muiri. He was a tall person, like eight feet tall. And Wamugumo would eat a whole cow alone. He worked at Ovori with Delamere .......
Tales
once upon a time there lived a man who wasted all his money, and grew so poor that his only food was a few grains of corn, which he scratched like a fowl from out of a dust-heap.....
Tales
Wanjiru was the most beautiful girl in all the nine hills. She had milk-white teeth which made the men stop and look whenever Wanjiru laughed. Her laughter echoed and re-echoed in the nine hills when Wanjiru and the other girls
Tales
Once upon a time Sim′ba, the lion, Fee′see, the hyena, and Keetee′tee, the rabbit, made up their minds to go in for a little farming. So they went into the country, made a garden, planted......
Tales
In a country which is full of wild beasts of all sorts there once lived a jackal and a hedgehog, and, unlike though they were, the two animals made great friends, and were often seen in each other’s company.
Tales
Once upon a time, there was a small village in Mali, in the land where golden sand meets the sky. In this village lived a curious and brave little girl named Aminata. She liked the stories narrated by her old, rather wise, grandmother griot (storyteller). Every night
Tales
Once there was a man named Go′so, who taught children to read, not in a schoolhouse, but under a calabash tree. One evening, while Goso was sitting under the tree deep in the study of the next day’s lessons ....
Tales
One day Soongoo′ra, the hare, roaming through the forest in search of food, glanced up through the boughs of a very large calabash tree, and saw that a great hole in the upper part of the trunk was inhabited by bees......
Tales
Once upon a time Kee′ma, the monkey, and Pa′pa, the shark, became great friends.