My Paper Topic:

After going back and forth on different paper topics, I finally decided to write on African Oral Traditions. My father spent a lot of time in Africa when I was growing up and grew close with some of the tribes. Because of this, I have always been fascinated with the culture and people for it is so different that what people are used to in the United States. I found some African quotes that I think are complimentary to my topic.

“…It is only the story that can continue beyond the war and the warrior.
It is the story that outlives the sound of war-drums and the exploits of brave fighters.
It is the story...that saves our progeny from blundering like blind beggars
into the spikes of the cactus fence. The story is our escort; without it, we are blind.
Does the blind man own his escort? No, neither do we the story;
rather it is the story that owns us and directs us."

--Chinua Achebe, Anthills of the Savannah (1987)

"I will tell you something about stories....They aren't just entertainment...
They are all we have...to fight off illness and death.
You don't have anything if you don't have the stories."

--Leslie Marmon Silko, epigraph to Ceremony (1977)