Eastern African Oral Literatures Permeations into Global Literatures

Abstract

Between late November and early December 2023, a group of oral literature scholars and their postgraduate students met under the aegis of the Kenya Oral Literature Association’s Annual Conference in Diani, Mombasa, to delve into the broad theme: ‘African Oral Literatures: Resilience, Permutations and Permeations into Global Literatures’. The cascaded subthemes ranged from ‘Comparisons, Convergences, Divergences and Confluences of Oral Cultures’, through ‘Decoloniality, Histories, and Emerging Genres’ to ‘Research Centres of Excellence and Resources in Eastern African Oral Literatures.’ This was informed by the fact that African Oral Traditions have persisted alongside written and other oral literatures of the world. African Oralities from North, South, West, and South of Africa have contributed richly to the Literatures of the world and have exhibited similarities with the oralities of the Asian, Americas, Europe and Indian regions within diffusions approaches. African Oral Literature has benefited from a number of theories such as eco-criticism, ethno-poetics, deconstruction, psychoanalysis, feminism among other theories, originating principally from Anthropological, Sociological, Cultural, Linguistic and Literary disciplines. Major approaches like ethnography and multi-disciplinary practices have influenced research in African oral literatures with varying results. As the world evolves, the place and relevance of African oral literatures in contemporary society is still a vibrant scholarly debate. Further, globalization, cross-cultural communication and transport and reconfiguration discourses have afforded African oral literatures the opportunities to engage with world oral literatures.