Oral storytelling has always been a survival tool, a legacy builder, and a cultural map in Black communities.

Before we had the power to read, write, or publish freely, we had our voices. Storytelling is a form of resistance to erasure and a method for preserving memory and identity.

We weren’t just passing time—we were passing down knowledge, safety strategies, and soul-saving wisdom.

Oral storytelling wasn’t optional; it was sacred. It remains one of the most powerful ways we claim space and narrate our own realities.

Digital spaces have become the new front porch, barbershop, or kitchen table—places where community values, warnings, pride, and humor are passed down in coded, creative ways.

Williams (2020) shows how memes are used not just to entertain, but to call out injustice, express collective grief, and archive joy in the face of struggle.

The Pew Research Center (2024) confirms that Black Americans are more likely to engage politically through digital platforms, often using cultural creativity to do so. This content becomes both a mirror and a microphone.

In the absence of mainstream platforms that get it right, we build our own digital language—funny, sharp, and heavy with meaning. And just like our ancestors' tales, these memes carry our truth in ways that outsiders can’t always decode—but we can.

Cultural imperialism, as described by Hall (1980), occurs when dominant groups control how culture is produced, circulated, and valued—often silencing marginalized voices in the process.

On platforms like TikTok, Black creators routinely go uncredited for viral trends, from Peaches Monroe’s “on fleek” to original choreography and memes like the Jordan Crying face.

This erasure is modern-day colonization of Black expression, where joy, pain, and creativity— the “Blue Monday” image—are consumed without context or compensation.

The risk is erasure.

Producing unapologetically Black media in this climate means walking a tightrope between staying authentic and staying employable.

Sanders (2021) reminds us that while Black art is in demand, the emotional labor of telling our stories can be draining and underprotected.

Pew (2024) notes that even with increased visibility, Black voices still lack decision-making power.

But the reward? It’s legacy.

When done right, it connects us to each other, it tells the truth, and it becomes medicine. We create new routes to add to the blueprint.

Solange used interludes—particularly the voices of her mother Tina Knowles and Master P—to act as griots, threading generational wisdom into the album’s core.

She didn’t just sing; she documented. The personal stories became cultural commentary. These interludes are oral storytelling in the truest sense: reflections on hair, respectability, and economic resilience. They hold space for grief, pride, and clarity.

By centering her family’s lived experiences, Solange gave us a communal soundtrack to healing.

The album doesn’t ask for permission to be Black—it just is, and in doing so, it reminds us that our stories have always been worthy of being heard in our own voices.