Folklore, passed on by grandmothers to grandchildren for centuries, often while they are sitting around a fireplace, has long been part of African tradition.
Though steeped in fiction, its importance in shaping and preserving language cannot be overstated.
While the stories told are often viewed as “make-believe”, they not only help preserve traditional indigenous African knowledge systems but are laden with moral lessons, profound warnings and teachings.
They often reflect some of the greatest injustices and paint a picture of human triumph in the face of great adversity, becoming part of many family traditions.
Though today they are accomplished academics and mothers well into their 50s, both Yoliswa Madolo, an associate professor at Walter Sisulu University and an author of isiXhosa story books, and Dr Matsie Ntsana Mokuoane can vividly remember some of the tales told to them and their siblings by their grandmothers when they were little girls.
The children would gather on the floor around their grandmother after supper in the evenings, eager to hear the next exciting tale.
With the world moving into a digital age, the two academics were among hundreds of people who gathered in Mthatha recently for a Southern African Folkore Society conference to thrash out ways to take these time-honoured fables into the new digital era.
The event, held at the Walter Sisulu University, was themed “Transformation of Folklore: From the Fireplace to the Digital Space”.
Delegates, many from institutions of higher learning, joined the discussions, exploring how to adapt traditional stories and cultural practices imparted through ancient oral traditions to the latest digital platforms.
Also under discussion was how ancient folk tales could hold the key to preserving cultural identity in modern, connected communities by protecting heritage for future generations.
Madolo, who grew up on a mission in Shawbury, in rural Qumbu, recalls her grandmother telling her a number of folktales hoping to ensure the message her grandchildren children carried away would be that they should listen to what the older generation had to say.
“She [her grandmother] was full of love but was also a strict disciplinarian and would pinch us children when we tried being naughty.
“But when she told those stories, the mood was always joyous. Sometimes as children we would join her in the singing while she was telling us those stories.”
Grandmothers would sometimes be persuaded to retell some of the tales to their eager audience. And in the end, the children would master the words to the songs in the stories.
Madolo can still remember a story of Mary, a young child labelled as naughty by her mother.
When the mother washed dishes or swept the floor, the child would do the same.
The irritated mother told her to go away and sleep. She obeyed but never woke up again.
When her worried mother called out her name, she heard a song being sung outside telling her not to bother herself because Mary had found her place outside.
“As an adult, when you reflect on that story, it shows that it is important to watch what you say to a child because it could break them or endanger their lives,” Madolo said.
“With each story that the grandmother told, it was always accompanied by the lessons they carried.”
She said the messages and the teachings imparted through storytelling had a central purpose; to build the right character in children.
Madolo said she agreed with the notion that indigenous knowledge systems were at the core of “who we are” as Africans.
“They were not just feeble stories meant to pass the time by keeping their audience entertained. Instead, they served more as edutainment.
“We identify ourselves through the knowledge that has been passed on from generation to generation. Even our language, including idioms and proverbs, are based on indigenous knowledge systems.
“Our understanding of the environment around us is also mainly through our grasp of indigenous knowledge systems,” she said.
Riddles or ooQashi qashi or amaqhina are a huge part of African folklore.
Traditional songs also form part of the African identity.
Madolo said in the African context, it was believed that a child found it easier to learn when the environment was a happy one, which was why relaying folklore was a big feature in families.
She said there was a need to move these stories into the digital space.
If children could be exposed to the stories, told in their native languages and adapted to modern times, they would be able to understand who they truly were.
Madolo said though children loved to read stories in traditional hardcopy books, they were increasingly also reading e-books on their smartphones.
Mokuokane believes that because the times have changed, a new approach is needed to preserve this heritage.
She grew up in a Basotho household in the Free State, shuttling between living with her parents in the township and her grandmother’s house on a farm.
She can still remember the story of Tselane le Dimo (Tselane and the Giant) as told to them by her grandmother more than five decades ago.
Tselane had refused to move with her mother into their new home and opted to stay at their old house.
Her mother told her that every time she would bring her food, she would sing a certain song so the child would know it was her and open the door.
But the giant, who wanted to steal Tselane, had hidden not too far from the house and overheard her mother every time she sang the song.
He then he went to a sangoma who advised him to take an axe and throw it into a huge fire.
When it turned red, he had to swallow the axe and his deep, manly voice would change to sound like that of Tselane’s mother.
He did as he was told and managed to convince the little girl that he was her mother by singing to her.
Even at home, I could not bear the thought of being left alone as I would be convinced in my mind that the giant would come
Mokuoane said: “As children, we would have imaginations. The giant lived in a forest and whenever I saw lots of trees, I would be too scared to pass by as I would be thinking of this giant.
“Even at home, I could not bear the thought of being left alone as I would be convinced in my mind that the giant would come. You’d lock yourself inside the house until the older people returned home.”
She said though times had changed, the moral lessons in those stories remained the same and remained relevant in today’s world.
It was therefore important to ensure that children not only got to know their African customs and folklore but were also able to receive those warnings and teachings.
She argued that instead of being outdated relics, riddles and fables played a vital role in the development of cognitive abilities and creativity in children, and were central cultural preservation.
Through the Digitisation of the Multilingual African Riddles Project, researchers from multiple universities are collaborating to document riddles across nine SA indigenous languages as well as dialects in Lesotho, Eswatini, Botswana, Zimbabwe, Namibia and Zambia.
The project also involves encouraging communities to coin new 4IR-inspired riddles to ensure the genre evolves with the times.
Researcher Thembinkosi Ngomane, who was among the presenters at the conference, said the “glow of the smartphone had replaced the glow of the fireplace”.
“Communities risk losing more than their stories but also their moral codes, historical memory and the idea of resilience embedded in those tales.”
One of the key speakers, Dr Ntsoaki Mokala of the University of Witwatersrand, said storytelling had always provided connections among people, the land and culture.
She later told the Dispatch that as a young girl, she and other 30 children in her family would huddle around their grandmother to listen to stories.
She said there was a push now to “intellectualise our languages” and make them relevant in the teaching space.
This meant it should be possible for a teacher to teach physical science in children’s home language.
She said for a long time, many SA languages had been marginalised, stigmatised and treated as underdeveloped.
It was now time to embrace the change, including making folklore and traditional stories available in the new digital space for the coming generations.
University of Johannesburg senior lecturer Dr Lukhanyo Elvis Makhenyane traced the evolution of folk story-telling to the days of Imbawula (where the community would gather around a fire).
It was evolving to digital platforms such as TikTok, memes on social media and hashtags, showing how tradition adapted to modern contexts without losing its essence.
Drawing from personal childhood experiences of songs, riddles and storytelling, Makhenyane reminded delegates that folklore had always been at the heart of African intellectual traditions, teaching problem-solving, values and cultural identity.
He cautioned, however, that while the digital era provided exciting opportunities for preservation and global reach, it also carries risks such as misinformation, cultural appropriation and intellectual atrophy.
Makhenyane challenged the delegates to go beyond simply digitising folklore and embrace true digitalisation, reshaping content to meet the needs of present and future generations.
He called for a new generation of “custodians of folk wisdom”.
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