>
>Brittingham Scholar Braima Moiwai  September 2001
>
>Braima Moiwai, a renowned artist, musician, teacher and storyteller from
>Sierra Leone, West Africa now based in Durham N.C., has been invited as
>Brittingham Scholar by the German Department to teach a workshop on
>"Storytelling and Oral Traditions." He will be in Madison from 10-14
>September 2001 and will give a public lecture on "Storytelling and Oral
>Traditions" on Thursday, September 13, 2001 (Memorial Union, for location
>please check TITU-Today In The Union).
>
>Braima Moiwai will speak about the importance of storytelling and oral
>tradition for the handing down of traditional knowledge and history in
>non-literate societies, giving examples from his own childhood in rural
>Sierra Leone, West Africa. He grew up as the seventh of nine children in a
>farming family, the only one to receive a formal education outside of the
>traditional practices. He attended college at the University of Sierra
>Leone, studying history, but was equally influenced from an early age by
>his mother, a traditional healer and community leader of the Mende tribe of
>Sierra Leone, West Africa.
>
>He just returned from a trip to his native Sierra Leone, and will give an
>assessment of how the long civil war in his country has severely disrupted
>the traditional ways of life. It interrupted the transmission of knowledge
>and values from the elder to the younger generation, since many older
>members of the communities could not escape the rebels and were among the
>first victims of their brutal raids. In the shelters of the refugee camps,
>the daily struggle for survival leaves no room for the traditional
>education and initiation of the children.
>
>Braima Moiwai has developed educational programs for schools, libraries,
>civic groups, museums and historic sites, exploring the influence of
>African languages, customs and traditions on American culture. His main
>interest is in the historical, cultural and linguistic connections between
>the Gullah people of the South Carolina and Georgia Sea Islands and their
>West African origins. He recently served as an expert on African oral
>traditions, languages and music that survived among the slaves of the
>American southeast for the civil war movie "The Patriot" with Mel Gibson,
>and has played a Gullah musician in the film.