Anansi Stories and Their Importance to Culture Anansi the spider lives in stories heard and told by millions of people. Originating in Nigeria, the Ashanti people tell these morally driven stories in order to correct, rebuke, and even inspire the people who hear them. The reoccurring character, Anansi the spider, serves as a familiar guide through all of these tales. He functions both as a hero and a villain because he possesses character traits that are both beneficial and harmful, just like humans. Though he is sometimes heroic and brave, other times he is greedy and selfish. The central challenges of these stories correlate to the location where the story is told. Generally, because the Ashanti people value community and a rural lifestyle, …show more content…
the stories tend to focus on a conflict that impacts those areas. Each story contains a lesson or moral, usually highlighting the importance of being generous towards others, not being greedy, or following cultural customs. I believe that Anansi stories, including McDermott’s, are worth studying because they are useful for us as Americans in understanding African culture and our own. Gerald McDermott, an American writer, studied the ideas from these stories and wrote his own “Anansi the Spider” story that remains consistent to some of the African traditions, but diverges on others in order to adapt the story for an American audience. Upon first hearing this story, the reader may not know that this is not one of the traditional African ones. The main character is the same as in other stories. Even his typical mischievous actions begin the plot when he wanders off, ultimately getting lost and “falling into trouble” (Anansi The Spider). This story is also consistent with the traditional embracing of cultural ideals. In this story, Anansi’s children are devoted to their father and try their best to be the one that he is the most proud of. This emphasis on parental approval echoes expectations of the culture. The story also functions as a pourquoi. If an Ananse story does not teach a moral lesson, than it is used to explain why something is the way that it is. This story in particular explains to the reader why there is a moon in the sky. In this version, however, there is a divergence from tradition. Anansi has six children, each with different abilities, but all of them are good. In traditional stories, there is an antagonist, where in these, the only opposing forces are nameless animals with small roles. McDermott’s story also does not have rural cultural markers, such as farming, references to yams, or the oral culture. He uses the importance of family to reach out to a different audience. By diverging from the tradition, his stories become more accessible to wider variety of readers. Americans who know nothing about rural African life can understand the lesson being taught in this story because they are familiar with the role that a father plays in the lives of his children. In using the form of a typical Anansi story but changing the way that he presented the lesson, McDermott brings a pourquoi story to an audience that may not have understood it before. I think that I would include this video of McDermott’s “Anansi the Spider” if I were to teach a unit over Anansi stories because it contains beneficial information and would serve as a good introduction.
His story is very similar to the other African ones, so without telling the students, they may assume that it is no different than the others. I think it would make an interesting discussion to have them watch his story first before reading the traditional ones. This way they have a more “Americanized” version to begin with as a way to ease into the other stories. Also, I believe that the beginning to the video would serve as a nice way to introduce the entire Anansi folklore unit. I like the way that the speaker at the beginning introduces these types of stories, saying that they “give beauty to the ways of man…They express they joys of life. They prepare men for adult life and place him within his culture” (Anansi The Spider). Hearing this may help some students realize why it is important to study these stories as they relate to learning about the values of a culture. This story could also tie into a study of other pourquoi folklore stories from different cultures. The explanation of this group of people, their work, and their values would greatly benefit a study of Anansi …show more content…
stories. If I were to teach a unit on Anansi stories, I believe that I would include this “Anansi the Spider” video by McDermott, “Why Spiders Hide in Corners,” “Anansi and the Turtle,” and “A Story, A Story” because each of them is different, but together they would create the most dynamic view of Anansi.
I would begin with the video mentioned above as an introduction to the unit and folklore in general. Then I would move to “Anansi and the Turtle.” This story seems to be relatable to American customs more than the others, which would allow for an easy transition after the video. The students may already be familiar with the cultural custom of letting an unfamiliar traveler in and sharing food with them and it would be beneficial to recognize Anansi’s faults (greed and selfishness) early on in the unit. Then, I would have the students read “A Story, A Story,” so once again they could see a different set of character traits from Anansi, including bravery, trickery, and wit. This story would also be a good opportunity to introduce the function of pourquoi stories and have the students recall the first Anansi video that they watched. I think I would end the unit with “Why Spiders Hide In Corners” because it may be the least accessible to the students until this point. By this time in the unit, they could better understand the cultural background of these stories, so it would be easier to understand. It would also wrap up the study of folklore and pourquoi
stories. Anansi stories allowed the Ashanti people to teach lessons, but they are also useful for us as Americans in understanding African culture and our own. Anansi has flaws that are similar to humans of any culture. Gerald McDermott contributed to the Anansi canon by remaining mostly faithful to tradition, but adding just enough of a difference that the stories could be accessible to a wider audience. If I were a teacher, I would welcome his video into the classroom as a way to introduce a unit over African folklore and Anansi stories while not straying too far from what my students were used to. Finally, as a teacher I would study this video and three other Anansi stories in a specific order that would show the different manifestations of Anansi in literature and showcase why these stories are just as relevant to us now as they were when they were first orally recited.
The performance of the storyteller was not particularly frightening at any point in the story. It was told for the purpose of entertainment, and the storyteller certainly kept his audience interested throughout the tale with hand gestures and body motions. At ...
This story is about a hungry spider that wanted to eat at all the feasts in different villages. For the spider to be able to do this he left ropes at each village and when there is a feast, the villagers are instructed to pull the rope. The unexpected thing that the spider did not know was going to happen was that every village food was ready at the same time, and the spider had the rope tied around his waist. Due to the villages food ready at the same time the spider was pulled in all directions and was not able to eat any of the food. The novel’s purpose of this fable is to tell a story of why do spiders have small waist, but it is also supposed to show the both Ishmael and the audience that live is unpredictable even when things are
Gordon Grice, author of “Caught in the Widow’s Web” tells a compelling tale about black widow spiders and their dangers. Grice reaches out to readers through the use of modes, literary devices, and diction. In his essay Grice references the eternal question: Why is there evil in the world?
These stories taught that you should accept your culture and that people all over feel embarrassed by their culture. You should not be afraid to be how you are just to impress a boy like amy did in fish checks. Nor should you have to change the way you dress or look like the girls did in I Want To Be Miss America, or be classified as a slow learner just because you were taught a different way than other people. People should not be ashamed of their culture just because people do not understand it and think it is weird. You should be your self and if people can't accept that then it's their
Paul Santilli’s “Culture, Evil, and Horror” gives us several ideas of what horror means. Horror is a type of cultural breakdown. There is also a type of horror called Ontological Horror: “It is characterized as a disturbance before an indefinite and unnamed presence” (180). In the story “The Spider”, the men all suffered an ineluctable death. This story demonstrates an unnamed presence causing the loss of control.
Temptation, guilt, and good intentions: many associate these terms with the Bible but few with Spiderman. Niall Richardson is one of the few. He wrote, “The Gospel According to Spider-Man,” published in 2004 it compares the world of Spider-Man to that of a biblical allegory. Namely, that of Christ being tempted by the Devil after weeks of fasting in the desert. Through his use of biblical imagery and quotations Richardson successfully draws a parallel between the Bible and Spider-Man even though some of his further claims ultimately fall flat.
The first thing we discussed in our presentation was Hmong culture and family. This particular main point was the longest covered because it was so much information on Hmong culture. We covered how Hmong culture is a clan based and very family oriented. The Hmong
For the first course objective, throughout different lessons in the course, I learned that not all cultures are the same or have the same values. In older European countries when Grimm’s brothers collected and told stories, the society was patriarchal which is reflected in the fairy tales as well. The girls are passive, damsels in distress, who are unable to save themselves but instead they need to wait for the man to help them. Nevertheless, in different tales like Tatterhood which was created at a later time, women have been given more power and they are active. Furthermore, another major difference between different cultures (American vs. Jewish, Mexican, African, Islamic) is the endings. The American stories, along with the other fairy tales always have a happy ending, while the Islamic stories and the Jewish stories differ from that in the sense that they do not have “happy ending.” Native American fairy tales along with Aboriginal fairy tales were unique stories that delineated cultures that not everyone has had exposure to. Each of these cultures was similar in the sense that they focused on nature loving...
... Short Stories for Students. Ed. Kathleen Wilson. Vol. 1. Detroit, MI: Gale, 1997. 105-107.
Increasing your knowledge in many cultural backgrounds can be beneficial to you and to understand how life is for other people with different cultural upbringing than you. Three stories I found that would be really interesting to not only the students but also to the other teachers that I could be working with are “From Shadows of a Childhood” by Elisabeth Gille, “From Catfish and Mandala: A Two-wheeled Voyage through the Landscape and Memory of Vietnam; Last Gamble” by Andrew X. Pham and “Shadows on the Wall” by Charles Mungoshi. I have chosen some articles that will provide more information on the topics and to help understand and explain that learning about other cultures will help the children become more educated with other cultures that
The two videos that I like the most from this class was the ted talk name “America’s native prisoners of war” by Aaron Huey, and the documentary “When Your Hands are tied” by Mia Boccella and Marley Shebala. These two videos brought my attention because in the first video which is the ted talk the author of the video is an outsider of the society that he is trying to represent he did not go through the experience that the native people that he is trying to defend went through. In the documentary when your hands are tied this is a little bit more personal I think because this is a documentary where people from the tribe and people that went through all this obstacles are trying to heal themselves.
The word danger probably makes you want to turn away and stop doing whatever it is that you are doing. Well, what do you do when you see the words, “The Danger of a Single Story?” These words had me nervous about what I was going to be watching. However, there was a lot of information that was explained throughout this 20-minute TED talk from Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. This paper will explore compelling ideas she mentioned that relate to things I have experienced when I went to another culture, the risks of telling a single story narrative in intercultural interactions, ways to protect myself from single story misconceptions, and how I was able to see how a single story might affect the way I communicate with others in different cultures.
As an ignorant Western society, we use single stories as a way to educate others on cultures that we don’t even know about. They are the false pictures we have of foreign cultures that our societies
Story telling has been around for generations, people are told folklore at a really young age whether they hear it from school, their parents read them it, or they research it themselves. Africana folklore has always told a story which may be to entertain or teach a lesson. The African folklore story called Anansi the Spider, which was about a spider that had 8 legs and loved food, this story taught a lesson. The spider was offered food from many different animals and he agreed to take all the food and told the animals to let him know when the food was ready by tugging on his leg which he tied up to each of them. At one point all the animals tugged and well the rest is self-explanatory.(“Why Anasi Has Eight Thin leg” ) This taught a lesson of learning not to be greedy. Another story is called The Lion’s
When you where a kid did your parents ever tell you stories about your culture or about your family’s values? Chances are they where telling you a folk tale. Folk tales are stories passed down usually by word of mouth but often they are written down. Folk tales teach a valuable life lesson while entertaining the reader or in some cases the listener. This essay will give examples of three folk tales and go into depth on how they teach lessons and still remain entertaining for children and even adults.