June 26, 2011

Oral History


 From Sundiata: An Epic of Old Mail by D.T. Niane:
Other peoples use writing to record the past, but this invention has killed the faculty of memory among them ... with them everybody thinks he knows, whereas learning should be a secret.
Author's note: "According to the griots [storytellers] the Whites have vulgarized knowledge. When a Whhite knows something everybody knows it" (41).

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