Where are folktales for children?

Once upon a time, grandparents used to invite their grandchildren to a fireplace to tell them interesting stories. Perhaps this is the reason many children loved their grandparents.

Furthermore, children enjoyed the moonlight by coming together to dance chiterera.

“We enjoyed gathering around the grandparent and it was a wonderful period as we heard a lot of interesting stories and animals,” says 88-year-old Jeanress Sajeni Mchenga of Chiru village, T/A Chadza in Lilongwe. Indeed, gone are the days when children got edutainment from folktales and traditional quiz (ndagi/zilapi).

In the present generation, folktales and ndagi are totally strange words among children. What they are familiar with are computer games, modern toys, and television cartoons. In the past, children waited for their parents to arrive home to hear funny stories about animals but today what they wait for is their parent’s laptop on which they play games as their parent takes a nap.

Not only in urban areas are folktales dying a natural death. Even going down to rural areas, children are no longer interested in listening to folktales. With the electrification in many rural areas, many rural trading centres have video show rooms which attract many children.

Dyson Gonthi of Chewa Heritage has no kind words with how video shows have transformed children’s attitude towards folktales. “Today, if you mention the word folktale, today’s children take their eyes away from you because they think folktales are old fashioned and not of this current generation,” he says.

Group Village Headman Kachimbwi from T/A Chadza in Lilongwe also bears witness that in his village, children are more interested in watching movies at Mitundu trading centre than staying with their grandparents around fireplace to hear folktales.

“With the coming of video show rooms and movies that are translated in Chichewa, many children spend much of their time watching movies. Many of them watch these movies even at night hence they do not have time or interest to sit down and listen to folktales from their grandparents,” says chief Kachimbwi.

Gonthi says this is also the case in cities where children lock themselves in their rooms to watch movies. He adds that children in the present generation miss a lot as compared to the previous generations. He says the folktales were not only entertaining the children but also educating them to be clever and wise.

“The folktales were helping the children to know the realities of life. Different animals have different behaviours so by telling children about lives of animals they were able to learn something,” says Gonthi adding: “For example hare [kalulu] is a clever animal while hyena is a dull animal. Therefore, by telling folktales about these animals, all children wanted to be like the hare not the hyena.”

Mchenga says lack of storytelling for children has contributed to bad behaviours among children. “Many children nowadays are unruly just because they are no longer being told folktales that used to teach them to respect elders,” she says.

Chief Kachimbwi also says the storytelling brought closeness between parents and their children a thing which is missing in many families these days. “Today it is rare to see a father and a child chatting. Everyone is minding his own business. Provided the father brings food in the home, today’s child has nothing to do with him,” says the chief.

Gonthi and Mchenga echo each other saying there is need to revamp the interest in children so that they should grow up with good morals and wisdom.

“Although the interest in folktales is dying, we should not give up; we should continue reminding our children that they cannot live by forgetting their roots and culture,” says Mchenga.

And Gonthi says: “Modernisation is good but we should remember that it is some people’s culture therefore we should not forget to be proud of our own culture as well.”