Introduction to Oral Literature | KCSE

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KCSE Oral Literature

An overview of oral literature

Oral literature is one of the areas tested in Literature in English of the Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education Examinations (KCSE). Other areas in this paper include:

  • Novel
  • Drama
  • Poetry
  • Short Story

What is Oral literature?

Have you ever imagined what life was like in the days of our great–great grandfathers? How did they spend their leisure time? Certainly, they did not spend their free time reading the works of their great writers. This is simply because they could not read. The civilization of reading and

writing was still at its rudimentary stage and in some parts of the world this civilization was unheard of. Books as we know them today are a much more recent invention.

But are we suggesting that simply because there were no novels or short stories as we know them today, there were no stories or poems or other artistic forms? Far from it! 

From time immemorial, man has always told stories. He has always recited poems. These stories and poems are a reflection of humanity at various stages of development. It is through stories and poems that people define themselves: who they are; what they believe in; what they value; their occupations; what they eat etc.

Since the art of writing was not as widespread as it is today, how were these stories, poems and songs preserved and transmitted? They were preserved in people’s memory and transmitted by word of mouth. In addition African societies for instance, the extended family would gather at the hearth (fireplace) in the evening after supper and spend time telling stories and posing riddles.

Children would memorize these stories and riddles and would so on start retelling them and when they grew up, they would hand them down to their children and the cycle would continue. This situation still obtains in many societies today. This is especially the case in many rural areas where one is likely to find communities that are largely homogenous. In these communities, oral literature is very much alive.

As mentioned above, oral literature is transmitted by word of mouth. For this reason, it is called oral.

As you revise oral literature, therefore, you should bear in mind that Oral Literature is spoken, generally performed and often dramatized by a skilled performer. That means that if you are reading a narrative for instance, you have to bear in mind that the narrative was performed to a live audience as opposed to a novel or a short story whose original format was the written form. You should also consider that the target audience for a particular piece of oral shares a common social, cultural and historical background. They could, for instance, be members of a particular ethnic community or even members of the same village or clan.

Oral literature: A misnomer?

Much of the confusion surrounding the study of oral literature stems from the very nature of the name of the subject: Oral literature. The Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary defines the word “oral” as “spoken; not written: an oral examination; stories passed on by oral tradition (i.e. from one generation to the next without being written)…

The same dictionary defines the word “literature” as ” writings that are valued as works of art, especially fiction, drama, and poetry….”

From the two definitions above we are quick to note that the term oral literature generates an obvious contradiction. That which is oral cannot also be written at the same time. It is because of the contradiction of this term, many scholars have suggested alternative terms to describe the subject. These include verbal art, orature, performed art etc. 


If you were asked to suggest a more suitable term to refer to the same subject, what would you use?

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