The oral and written traditions of the Africans of South Africa have provided an understanding of their past and the way the past relates to the present. These traditions continue to shape the past by the present, and vice versa. From the time colonial forces first came to the region in 1487, oral and written traditions have been a bulwark against what became 350 years of colonial rule, characterized by the racist policies of apartheid. "The Uncoiling Python: South African Storytellers and Resistance" is the first in-depth study of how Africans used oral traditions as a means of survival against European domination.