Murle Folktales

Dr. Jon Arensen, professor of anthropology at Houghton College, is director of the Houghton in Tanzania program. He has spent many years with the Murle people, translating their language for Wycliffe Bible Translators. The folktales included are reprinted from his book Mice Are Men. The Murle people enjoy telling and listening to stories. Stories can be told at any time of the day and by anybody. However, storytelling usually takes place in the evening after the day’s work is done and the people are relaxing. It is in this setting that older men and women, renowned for their ability, regale their audience with tales of many different types. Many of them are tales about people, animals, and birds which live in an earlier fantastic world where they are not limited by the present restrictions of life. In a sense, these tales are metaphorical in nature in that there are often underlying meanings which can only be understood in the context of Murle society and by having a good knowledge of the language. These types of tales are not told to report historical facts but primarily for entertainment. The Murle use the verb kamici for the telling of a tale. In other contexts this verb can mean ‘play’, ‘converse’, ‘flirt’, and ‘sexual intercourse’. Even though tales are seen by the Murle people to be primarily for entertainment, they do give some insights about the world, both physical and social, in which they live.