Rüdiger Schott (Bonn)

Erotic Folktales of the Bulsa

   Sex has been sadly neglected in studies of African folktales. The present book assembles 29 erotic folktales of the Bulsa. They were selected out of a corpus of more than 1,200 Bulsa folktales, collected by the editor and his Ghanaien and German collaborators in the years 1966-1989. Most of the Bulsa stories rendered in this book had been tape-recorded in Buli, the language of the Bulsa. They are reproduced in this language together with an English translation.

   Part I of the book contains stories about Sexual Organs, often represented as individuals behaving in a comical way. The telling of these stories frequently causes laughter among the audience. Part II comprises stories about Sexual Intercourse. The erotic folktales of the Bulsa are investigated and commented in the context of their religious beliefs and their social practices. The book will thus give an intimate view not only of sexual views and practices, but also of the ethos, the moral principles and the world-view of the Bulsa. The publication was preceded by two volumes containing Bulsa folktales on Naawen, the Sky-God of the Bulsa (Schott 1993a, Schott 1996a, see Franz Kröger's bibiliography in Buluk 4, 2005, p. 34).

   Sexuality is God's gift to humanity for the procreation of children. When sexuality is abused, it is burdened with many conflicts, anxieties and frustrations. These are given vivid expression in many of the stories presented in this volume.

   Rüdiger Schott was born in Bonn in 1927. He inaugurated research on Bulsa culture and society 40 years ago, in September 1966. During three stays in Buluk he spent altogether about 21 months among the Bulsa, studying not only their rich oral literature, but also many other aspects of their culture and society, mainly their oral history, their traditional law and their original religion. At present, he lives in his »home-town«, Bonn, as Emeritus professor of Ethnology (Cultural Anthropology) at the University of Münster, Germany.

Rüdiger Schott (Editor), 2006: Bulsa Sunsuelima - Erotic Folktales of the Bulsa in Northern Ghana. In: Research on African Languages and Cultures, ed. by Rüdiger Schott, Volume 11, Berlin, LIT Verlag.