Rabbit and Anansi the Spider

1992

Rabbit and Anansi the Spider folktales originate from the Akan people of present-day Ghana.

Enslaved West Africans carried stories of Rabbit and Anansi the Spider with them during the Transatlantic Slave Trade. Known by many names—including Brer Rabbit and Aunt Nancy, Ba Anansi, and Anansi and Conejo (rabbit)—these stories are rooted in Black communities across the Americas. These folktales transmit cultural knowledge and moral guidance through storytelling, religious rituals, family gatherings, and community festivals.  

In this video, Afro-Ecuadorian oral historian Juan García Salazar and white American sociologist Chuck Kleymeyer perform Rabbit and Anansi the Spider folktales in Spanish and English.