Ananse
Sign in to saveAlso known as Brother Anansi, Ananansa, Anancy, Anancyi, Anansi Drew, Anansi-Tori, Anansie, Anansiil
Key facts
- Deity.type
- Akan
- Deity.artifacts
- Spider Totem of Knowledge, Stories, Trickery, and Wisdom
- Deity.image
- Anansi-34.png
- Deity.caption
- Illustration of Anansi by Pamela Colman Smith, 1899
- Deity.venerated_in
- Akan folklore
- Deity.symbol
- Spider
- Deity.ethnic_group
- Akan • African Americans • Afro-Caribs
via Wikipedia infobox
~73 min read
Encyclopedic overview
38 sectionsContents
- Origin
- Social relevance
- Oral Tradition
- Resistance
- Teaching Narratives
- Popular Anansi stories
- Akan-Ashanti Anansi stories
- How the Sky-God's stories came to be Anansi's stories
- Anansi and the dispersal of wisdom
- How Anansi's hind became big, and how his head became small
- Why men commit evil at night, children play in moonlight, disputes are settled in daytime, and Anansi is Nyame's messenger
- How diseases were brought to the tribe
- How Kwaku Anansi took Aso as his wife, and how jealousy came to the tribe
- How Anansi got a bald head
- Why Anansi runs when he is on the surface of water
- How Anansi tricked two gods
- Why Anansi's webs traps flies
- Jamaican Anansi stories
- How Anansi tied Tiger
- Surinamese Anansi stories
- How Dew tricked Anansi
- Gun is dead
- Anansi becomes a preacher, and why Cockroach and Anansi are enemies
- How Death came to the city
- Relationship between Anansi and Br'er Rabbit
- Anansi as a spiritual and mythological figure
- References in popular culture
- Books
- Comics
- Music
- Television and film
- Video games
- The Anansy Festival
- Other names
- See also
- References
- Sources and further reading
- External links
Anansi or Ananse ( ; literally translates to spider) is a character in Akan religion and folklore associated with stories, wisdom, knowledge, wit, mischievousness, cunning, and trickery, most commonly depicted as a spider. Anansi is a character who reflects the culture that he originates from. The Akan people are a close-knit people from present-day southern Ghana who rely on social order, which translates through the stories that come out of their culture. In many ways, Anansi is a paradoxical character whose actions defy this social order, but in incorporating rebellion and doubt into faith, his folkloric presence strengthens it.
Taking the role of a trickster, he is also one of the most important characters of West African, African American and Caribbean folklore. These spider tales were spread to the Americas via the Atlantic slave trade.
Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “Ananse” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.