African oral literature

…In contrast to ordinary literary works, which have a written text and are enjoyed primarily by reading it with one's eyes, oral literature is literature that has been passed down orally, sung, and told. Kunio Yanagita was the first to use the neologism "oral literature" in Japan, based on the French term "la littérature orale," in his "Considerations on the History of Oral Literature" (1947), but as the author himself says, this contains a bitter contradiction. Literature was originally the name for something that was created and written with letters. …

*Some of the terminology used to refer to "African oral literature" is listed below.

Source | Heibonsha World Encyclopedia 2nd Edition | Information

…文字で書かれた一巻のテキストがありそれをもっぱら目で読むという形で享受する普通の文芸作品に対し，口伝えに歌いつがれ語りつがれてきた文芸を口承文芸と呼ぶ。フランス語のla littérature oraleにもとづき日本で口承文芸なる新語を初めて使ったのは柳田国男《口承文芸史考》(1947)だが，この著者もいうとおりそこには一種ほろにがい自家撞着がふくまれている。文芸とは本来，文字でもって作られ文字で書かれたものの名であったからだ。…

※「アフリカ口承文芸」について言及している用語解説の一部を掲載しています。

出典｜株式会社平凡社世界大百科事典 第２版について | 情報