Storyteller spins tales of African heritage for campuses
Nigerian native helps TCC celebrate Black History Month
by Jason Palmer, reporter

    “Atii,” an African storyteller greeted South Campus students last week.

   Receiving confused looks from those in attendance, John Owhonda, a native of the Ikwerre ethnic group of Nigeria, again said “atii.”

   “That means ‘are you with me’?” he said with a distinct accent.

   Owhonda, who also spoke to students on SE Campus yesterday, is a griot, a professional storyteller of African history. The stories that he tells come from learning from a griot when he was a youth growing up in Nigeria.

   “I hope to take something from you and you to take a part of me with you,” he said.

   Much of what is known about the heritage within tribes has been passed orally through generations. The tradition of the elders teaching the young has persisted for centuries.

   “If you teach the young properly, they will lead the way,” he said.
Owhonda began a story about disobedient youth, a common theme in his presentation. He said he knows about disobedient youth because he knows himself.

   “The youth in my village began to revolt against the elders because they said the elders made them do all of the work,” he said.

   They proceeded to cast the elders out of the village and rule themselves.

   “After a black cobra confronted the new young ruler, he did not know what to do and neither did his fellow warriors,” he said.

   A young warrior said the elders would know what to do if they were there, so the youth of the village asked for help from the elders.

   “This is why the young people sit at the feet of the elders and listen to their stories and gain their knowledge,” he said.

   Owhonda’s presentation also stressed the commonality of the human race. African tradition says that one should share in sorrow with their neighbor.

   “It is heartless to not feel pain when others cry, and that is not an African thing … that is a human thing,” he said.

   Owhonda says he feels a bond with every person that he comes into contact with.

   “I know them, because I know myself,” he said. “The things that the youth of today do are not all that different from the things that I did, or the things that my grandfather did.”

   Owhonda mentioned the step routines performed by different African-American fraternity groups and explained that they are a version of the dances of the old tribes. The tribes used the variation of movement to accentuate different ideas. No two tribes had the same dances.

   “Nobody is an island; we all learn from one another,” he said.

   The theme of commonality culminated with Owhonda relating that humans learn from our past.

   “A house divided against itself cannot stand,” Owhonda, quoting Abraham Lincoln, said.

   As a backdrop for the presentation, Owhonda brought several artifacts from his recent trip to his home village in Africa.

   He stood on a zebra skin rug as he spoke.

   “Griots are wise men and are permitted to use the hides from zebras and gazelles, which are considered gentle animals,” he said.

   Owhonda also had an example of royal kente cloth, which can only be woven in the king’s court.

   The fabric had a symbol of a golden stool that was repeated in the vest that Owhonda wore. The stool is a sacred symbol for his people, much like the Ark of the Covenant to Judaism.

   “Even the king himself is not allowed to sit on the stool,” he said.
He also had authentic tribal masks ranging from warrior designs to a royal mask for a king. The royal mask was much larger than the other masks.

   The royal mask represents the connection between the king and the world that surrounds him.

   “The king is the representative of the natural world to the people of his tribe,” he said.

   Owhonda came to America to attend Texas Christian University but returns to his village at least once a year to maintain relations with the people and to keep a firm grasp on his roots. He graduated from the University of Titograd, Yugoslavia, in 1981 with an associate’s degree in Slavic language. He graduated from TCU in 1985 with a B.A. in international affairs.

   He is an author of a novel and a children’s book. Widely recognized for his ability to relate his stories to the audience, Owhonda is working on a book about the Congo region of Africa. He has filmed a Nigerian film for cable broadcast at the Dallas Nature Center and received awards on several occasions for his writing.