Dr. Ochieng' K'Olewe: Kenyan Folktales

In class this week, we had a presentation on Kenyan traditional folktales by Dr. Ochieng'. He is typically a professor from the Education department here at school, but he took time to regale our class of his culture and their folktales. He not only presented information to us that was congruent with the class, he made it interactive so that everyone played an integral part in the story-telling. He told stories, that sounded similar to those from "Anansi the spider" from an earlier lesson in the week; however the main difference with that it was "Kolulu the hare" that was always seemingly the main character. Each tale involved animals that were not just dumb, but had a complex thought process like humans and could talk. They'd commune with each other, trick each other and play together as humans would. I also found it interesting how Dr. Ochieng' would do this call and response type of thing with us before telling the story. He'd say "Ba-oo-kwa" and we'd respond "Pa-ko-wah". This was a way to begin the story and, to me seemed like a call to attention. After that, he'd begin his story, which was usually witty and complete with a moral. Unlike most of the fairytales we'd been introduced to, there was usually a specific time frame, location and specific important characters. Also, after each tale, he'd say "and this is the end of my story"; it was always "happily ever after" type of ending comparing this to the stories we'd been reading before. He also explained the main functions of story-telling within the Kenyan community; 1).entertainment, 2). morals, rules, and 3). connection between the old and young. Of everything that was different, i could clearly see that this recurring theme traveled everywhere around the world. It is important for story-telling to remain alive, because it is through this tradition that we are able to not only learn things we should, it keeps our minds fresh and quick.
I thoroughly enjoyed this presentation as much as the ASL story-telling presentation. I loved the fact that Dr. Ochieng' not only taught and gave examples, but we learned through  class participation. I think that's an important method to truly grasping and understanding information. It was soooooooooo much fun!!!!!!