Once Upon a Time...
What the Ancestors have to say about modern technology.
"Once upon a time…”
The real ones know that’s how every great story starts.
Once upon a time, our stories were oral. Passed on beneath trees in the cool of the evening, the goal was simple: to preserve the heritage and traditions of a people. And it worked. The stories made their way from one generation to the next, with many changes, of course. People remember and tell stories differently. But at its core, the foundation was the same. Each story pointed to one thing: the origin of the people.
Now there’s technology, and all the cool things that come with digital advancement, and it looks like, as we embrace the “white man’s culture,” we slowly forget ours. Somewhere above the fluffy clouds, the ancestors are going through the motions—anger, grief, disbelief, denial. They are screaming their hearts out (don’t ask me how that is possible if they are dead), begging us not to forget who we truly are.
I’ve had quite a number of conversations around this topic recently, and they always circle back to the same questions:
How would the ancestors feel about modern technology?
How do we maintain and preserve our cultures and traditions while keeping up with the rapid pace of technology?
Is there an intersection between culture and storytelling?
How do we create and build new things without creating resistance, and how do we handle that resistance if and when it comes?
How would the ancestors feel about modern technology?
I don’t think they’d be as shocked as we imagine. Our ancestors were innovators in their own right—they built tools, systems, languages, and ways of life from what they had. Change wasn’t foreign to them; stagnation was. What might trouble them isn’t the technology itself, but what we’re choosing to do with it. Are we using it to remember, to teach, to pass things on? Or are we letting it flatten everything into trends, forgetting the weight and meaning behind what we inherit?
Maybe the real disappointment wouldn’t be that we moved forward, but that we sometimes move forward without carrying anything with us. The real issue becomes the intent of technology and what we choose to do with it.
How do we maintain and preserve our cultures and traditions while keeping up with the rapid pace of technology?
Preservation does not mean freezing culture in time. Culture was never meant to be a museum exhibit. It lives, it moves, it responds. The real work is deciding what stays sacred even as the forms change.
Technology can help us archive, translate, record, and share—but it can’t decide meaning for us. That part is still human. If we’re intentional, technology becomes a vessel, not a replacement: a way to carry our stories forward without emptying them of context.
Is there an intersection between culture and storytelling?
Culture does not exist without storytelling. Stories are how values are explained, not enforced. They’re how history is remembered without feeling like a lecture. Culture lives in the stories we repeat, protect, and update for new ears.
Storytelling is how our cultures will transcend this time. This is why it’s important we tell the right stories, pushing the true narrative. If we tell the wrong stories, we push a false narrative, and a new “culture” is born. We are products of stories. It is our responsibility to preserve those stories in the way we tell them.
How do we create and build new things without creating resistance, and how do we handle the resistance if and when it comes?
In most systems, change is always met with resistance. Resistance isn’t always a bad sign. Sometimes it’s fear dressed up as protection, especially when what’s being protected has survived for generations. The work, then, isn’t avoiding resistance but listening closely to it—separating what needs guarding from what needs reimagining.
This is where storytelling comes in. Everyone responds to a good story. If we create a plausible story that advocates for the changes we want to make, people are more likely to be open to it than resist outright. Progress doesn’t have to arrive as a demolition. It can arrive as a conversation, one that respects where we’ve been while still making room for where we’re going.
So, here we are—living in a world where stories can travel farther and faster than ever before. The tools have changed, the platforms have changed, but the responsibility hasn’t. Once upon a time, our stories kept us connected to who we were. Today, they can do the same—if we tell them with care, intention, and respect. We are the custodians now, the ones who carry tradition forward, and how we choose to tell our stories will decide what the next “once upon a time” looks like.
Tell the stories that matter, or risk letting someone else tell them for you.
Tèmítópé, you write so well and I enjoy reading your pieces.
I did a course when I was in school called Traditional Medicine; we called it Babalawo 😂. Yes, all these incantations and herbs, and all of that—we were taught. Comprehensively, I must add. You'd be surprised at how explorative these guys were. They explored different aspects of nature and made sense of everything they had at their disposal.
One of the topics we covered was about preserving the authenticity of what worked for our ancestors—stories. Oral transmission alone is not sustainable. There are limitations to it. Firstly, the veracity of information can decline as it passes from one person to another. Secondly, what happens in the event of unexpected death? And, I should add, many of our stories have been lost or fragmented because of these challenges. I was reading a piece on African history sometime last year and this was exhaustively discussed (if I find the piece, I'd share it with you).
Now, writing would be an excellent option for preserving such information. And while writing, in different forms, is as old as the world itself, many of our ancestors didn't fully explore it—or when they did, documentation and preservation faced challenges. Don't get me wrong, African writing systems are one of the oldest. However, broader documentation and preservation faced obstacles and this due to some reasons, which I'll just leave for now.
Now coming to the advent of technology and civilization, generally. I think it does three things:
1. It helps us understand some practices better. Example: we now understand that what our ancestors called Abiku—children who seemed to die and return repeatedly—was likely linked to preventable causes of infant mortality like sickle cell disease, malaria, or birth complications. Modern medicine addresses the physical aspect, even as the cultural-spiritual understanding remains meaningful to many.
2. Technology and civilization give scientific context to some traditional practices. For example, the reason our forefathers collected plants early in the morning or at midnight is largely because that's when the concentration of active ingredients is highest. In the afternoon, because of the sun, the concentration won't be as high. We now understand why certain plants work in the management of certain diseases—not just that they work, but how.
3. And finally, technology helps us tell our stories better and more importantly, preserve them for future generations, as you have rightly said. Not to replace oral tradition, but to complement it.
Culture is dynamic. That's another thing we've come to understand more clearly with time. Culture isn't static. It's dynamic and vibrant, just like us humans. It adapts, it evolves, it responds to new realities while carrying forward what matters.
We have stories to tell, as individuals and collectively, and there's no better time to tell them. In essence, technology isn't the devil. If anything, it's a tool—like any tool, it can be used well or poorly.
We just have to be more conscious of the stories we tell and the culture we promote, because unlike before, digital records may not be as easily erased. That's both a blessing and a responsibility.
Omo, let me stop here. Tèmítópé, this writing is impeccable 👏🏾 👏🏾
We had better get back to rewriting our stories — and myths, really — our own way. It’s why I appreciate writers like Oyin Olugbile, and Nnedi Okorafor, who make obvious actions towards shedding light on African narratives.
This was such an enjoyable piece. I’m sorry I’m just getting around to reading it. 🧡✨