Hi Friends!
In week three of our Jungian archetypes meets African myth and folklore series, we start on the story of Sundiata (AKA Son Jara) Keita, arguably one of the major figures from African legends about good and courageous rulership.
Sundiata is to the Manding people what Arthur of Camelot is to the British.
We preface things with a bit more contextualization of rulership as an archetype and then take a quick look at Sundiata’s life to lay the foundation for our discussion.
This is a big topic and I feel the weight of my own limited knowledge as I poke and prod at it. I ask for your understanding as we go along. I will try to be as thorough as I can be.
I hope you enjoy!
References
The Epic of Son Jara by John W. Johnson
Can’t Get Enough?
Son Jara, Dankaran Touman and the Jelimusows
This episode is brought to you by another instance of my brain refusing to give me peace until I worked out a puzzle it threw at me. Last week, we talked about the case of the AmaNdebele of South Africa and the Ashanti of Ghana who have versions of a birthright theft story very similar to that of Jacob and Esau in the Bible. My maniac of a brain has bee…
Need a book of African Mythology and Folklore?
The Watkins Book of African Folklore contains 50 stories, curated from North, South, East, West and Central Africa. The stories are grouped into three sections:
Creation myths and foundation legends (including the foundation legend of the Tuareg!)
Stories about human relationships and the cultural institutions they created
Animal tales (with a twist…the folktales are about some of the most unlikely animals!)
I thoroughly enjoyed digging into the historical and cultural context out of which the stories, their themes, and protagonists emerge. There is something for everybody!
