African Traditions Quotes

Africa is my continent. It is where I opened my eyes.

I think hip hop allows us to talk about everything, and Africa is what I choose to talk about now. If people are not talking about Africa, that's them, that's cool, there's nothing wrong with that. But this is who I am, this is what I have to say, this is what I have to offer.

I'm a polygamist. I can afford to have as many wives as I can afford to have. All Africans believe in it. My dad has four wives.

I admit that living in Nigeria sounds romantic, but Africa isn't America by a long shot. It's a different world and a different place in time...

If science ever gets to the bottom of Voodoo in Haiti and Africa, it will be found that some important medical secrets, still unknown to medical science, give it its power, rather than the gestures of ceremony.

My roots are African. The birds I remember, the fruits I ate, the trees I climbed, they're African.

I realized that you cannot think European and want to write or create something African. You have to think African in everything.

Just going to Africa is amazing; it all comes back to the motherland. It's pretty much where everything started.

We are guys from North Hollywood singing about Africa. What do we know about Africa?

George Kimble said, 'The only thing dark about Africa is our ignorance of it.' So let's start shedding light on this amazing eclectic continent that has so much to offer.

My children have to know where they come from and the way of life in Africa.

When I was born, my dad and my mom gave me names, but in Africa, when your child is born, especially close family members can suggest names they want to add on. Maybe your grandmom and your grandpop have something to add to the name of the child.

For as long as I can remember, I have been passionately intrigued by 'Africa,' by the word itself, by its flora and fauna, its topographical diversity and grandeur; but above all else, by the sheer variety of the colors of its people, from tan and sepia to jet and ebony.

We must learn to live the African way. It's the only way to live in freedom and with dignity

A man who lived on the banks of the Niger should not wash his hands with spittle.

Toyin Falola has given us what is truly rare in modern African writing: a seriously funny, racy, irreverent package of memories, and full of the most wonderful pieces of poetry and ordinary information. It is a matter of some interest, that the only other volume A Mouth Sweeter Than Salt reminds one of is Ake, by Wole Soyinka. What is it about these Yorubas?

There's a lot of Kenya that's not like me. I like Birkenstocks, granola, my dog Pops.

If you want to know about Africa, read our literature - and not just 'Things Fall Apart,' because that would be like saying, 'I've read 'Gone with the Wind' and so I know everything about America.'

I am living in the Africa I have always longed for, always felt stirring in my blood.

Some black people want to get in touch with their African roots. But then you got some black people that just don't give a damn. You tell them, 'Hey, I just got back from the motherland.' "They're like, 'Where'd you go - Detroit? Did you see The Temptations?'

Let's face it - think of Africa, and the first images that come to mind are of war, poverty, famine and flies. How many of us really know anything at all about the truly great ancient African civilizations, which in their day, were just as splendid and glorious as any on the face of the earth?

Unoka went into an inner room and soon returned with a small wooden disc containing a kola nut, some alligator pepper and a lump of white chalk. "I have kola," he announced when he sat down, and passed the disc over to his guest. "Thank you. He who brings kola brings life. But I think you ought to break it," replied Okoye passing back the disc. "No, it is for you, I think," and they argued like this for a few moments before Unoka accepted the honor of breaking the kola. Okoye, meanwhile, took the lump of chalk, drew some lines on the floor, and then painted his big toe.

The best way to get to know Africa is to go there and see what it is. To know somewhere that crazy and that magnificent, you have to spend some time among people, the rhythm of their lives.

I read a lot of biographies and books with an African background.

I haven't traveled in Africa nearly as much as I'd like to. I've been there a few times, and I'd like to learn more about the various cultures in Africa. But that's the basis point of where all of the music that I love is based upon, from Africa to Cuba to Puerto Rico to South America.