The Oral Tradition as a Source of African History

Extract

If there is an obvious fact for the observant it is the proliferation of studies or popular writings on the history of Africa. The past of this continent has been abundantly assessed. And still, it is a long time since Egypt, who produced one of the oldest, one of the most dazzling civilizations of all time, has been known as being situated in Africa; but actually the renewal of interest does not concern that Africa, it concerns the interior, that which qualifies it to be called the “dark” continent. The non-Mediterranean Africa is the most studied, Why? First, because its peoples are in the process of liberating themselves. They are searching for their identity. They are trying, not without difficulty, to reassemble the scattered elements of their personality of which the past is one of the most important facts. Their history, which, up to now was only considered and studied as an appendix, like a piece of the history of another country, is being understood more and more from the point of view of an autonomy.