Myth and Legend: A Retraditionalisation of The Cultural Episteme in Who Fears Death and Children of Blood and Bone

The fact that universal civilisation has for a long time originated from the European centre has maintained the illusion that European culture was, in fact, and by right a universal culture. This study investigates myth and legend in Nnedi Okorafor’s Who Fears Death and Tomi Adeyemi’s Children of Blood and Bone in order to reactivate the revival of some traditions or ancestral practices with the aim of sustaining the reimagining of an Africa whose identity is not conferred from outside but from within, bearing in mind that there are enabling influences from without. With the tools of Afrofuturism and magical realism, the study highlights the reawakening of African people who are taking an interest in their past. Through textual analysis, myth and legend are appraised and critiqued in terms of their spatio-temporal trajectory. The study recognizes that it is important for the African to reindigenise and reappropriate his own cultural consciousness and to identify more composite paradigms for his renaissance. The findings reveal that myth and legend in Who Fears Death and Children of Blood and Bone serve a didactic purpose, procure entertainment, critique social norms, shape the community identity, and form the African personality. The study concludes that Africans need to move towards renewed respect for indigenous ways and the conquest of cultural self-contempt in order to attain cultural relevance at global stage and a collective cultural consciousness

Keywords: Myth, Legend, Retraditionalisation, Culture, Episteme.