INTRODUCTION In order to treat African indigenous literature in its own right, our main focus of attention should be on the established cultural traditions and historical experiences, together with those aspects of the social and political life of the Africans which are the most helpful sources of our inspiration and techniques. The transformation of African literatures from traditional form to high standard has its own well-founded historical reasons. It is necessary, therefore, to understand that the critical study of the African literary landscape requires setting out criteria for its evaluation. This view is gaining convincing ground in contemporary Africa that oral literature should not be judged by the criteria which have been used in the evaluation of non-African literatures and cultures, though considering universal similarities is of fundamental importance. In this connection, Palmer (1979: 2) argues that if the purpose of criticism is to display as accurately as possible the genuine quality of a work, then our aim should be to use criteria which will be the most useful in bringing out that genuine quality. When we study folklore genres in a broader literary form, we reframe them to make our judgement and show their artistic functions in a particular light. By using certain reliable yardsticks, we can explore oral literature in order to construct the narrators’ worldviews in a different way and develop our own sense of poetic beauty and identity. One of the central points I have given prominence is that oral tradition is also a kind of history about the past situations; and it is, therefore, not surprising to find it in the form of a historical structure which conforms to the generic Oromo model. Furthermore, literary tradition, like human history, is anecdotal in that it contains a particular amusing event which helps scholars construct new ideas and values. The way Oromo oral literary genres have been told thus inevitably reflects intriguing historical events, as well as the interests and motives of those traditional custodians (artists) who pass down the dramatic performances of their times to posterity. If our task is to enquire into the artistic sense and aesthetic world of African oral narrative, we must first and foremost convince ourselves that an oral text as an academic subject has its own poetic meaning and peculiar characteristics. Here, I have also suggested that a qualification of such belief is necessary because it avoids bewilderment and paves the way for drawing a concrete research strategy in this field of study. The new trend in Oromo oral 2 literary studies is to address the endangered treasured arts of the past within the framework of historical setting; and in the process, to unfold the untold stories. This may be seen, as it used to be, by certain individuals and groups, strange and disturbing. As many others, my effort is to recover the valuable literary culture that has been lost. The aim of exploring oral literature in a contemporary setting is to transform it from abstract narrative to expressive form (intellectual discourse); and in this respect, it seems hard to make a distinction between the intriguing nature of oral art and modern art. In thematic and aesthetic terms, verbal art shares common ground with modern fictions simply because both are meant for teaching and entertaining through the medium of artistic language and images; which when combined, can create a social mirror and desirable effects. Through the historic moment, the language and character revelation may take a different form. We find in both, common characteristics: fitting descriptions, the portrayal of certain images relevant to social situations, within which the characters operate, and other creative techniques and devices. Surely it is possible to apply a modern style of writing to oral literature, but what is most important here is to try to distinguish the process by which each literary art comes into being, its specific function in a given space and time, and the context within which it is told or written. This is probably what makes us grasp the distinction between traditional arts and the elite literature (modern fiction). It is most likely that besides formal elements, the former involves national pride, ethical issues and identities; whereas the latter focuses mainly on formal elements such as characters, devices, plot, artistic merit and others. The literate world has inherited a comprehensive body of knowledge from the pre-literate world of verbal communication. This compendium of oral tradition from whatever ultimate origin is practically universal in character both in time and space. Being subject to the skilled and the unskilled of those who pass down the tradition, Oromo oral literature has undergone continuous changes over the course of changing generations. These changes have significant effects on its functions and permanence as literary culture. This work is the outcome of a growing sense that one of the defining characteristics of recent Oromo culture and literature has been its insistence on examining the marginalized identity, and 3 that literary culture as the quest for knowledge and identity empowerment, has come to be the focus of my concern. I have specifically chosen the representative genres and the historical moments as points of greater emphasis mainly because I believe that the comprehensive textual and contextual approach will inevitably lead me to a better understanding of the functions of this kind of literature, as well as its intriguing nature. The Oromo oral narrative is the representation of a new wave of cultural and literary movement that reflects post-modernism and contemporary critical methods in which the indigenous literary culture is resituated in the context of other modern literatures, without being dictated by the traditional assumptions based on rigid analyses; and which aims at developing the concept of cultural identity and democratic conduct. The work involves a broad interdisciplinary discourse of some of the vital issues concerning the greater sensitivity of representation, interpretation and evaluation of folklore genres. Oral narrative critics need to move beyond the stereotyped discourse and the worn generalizations about the image of the past. The aesthetic categories of Oromo verbal art still remain unknown to most modern critics, and it is, therefore, necessary to employ New Historicism or deconstructive approach to our study in which oral literary texts are regarded as a material product emerging out of social, cultural and political situations. My attempt is, therefore, to open up Oromo oral literary universe to readers, students and scholars and to explore the way the interplay of culture and oral literature has enabled the society to develop a complex social system characterized by collectivism and egalitarian norms. The exploration of the meanings and themes of oral narratives in a broader social context and the significant role the variant folklore genres play in maintaining collective wisdom, national identity, solidarity and traditional moral values are also points of great concern in this study. The search for new ideas, the interpretation of cultural and literary events are ceaseless human activities and every step forward seeking alternative lifestyle and broadening knowledge demands a new way of thinking which enables man to re-assess the existing values and modes of behaviour. In every human civilization, the process of successful social transformation depends upon the creative needs of the new generations and their continuous effort to re-construct or recreate the wisdom of their ancestors, which inspires a greater sense of freedom, self-respect and dignity. This work presents a corpus of oral tradition of the Gadaa egalitarian movement without which the Oromo can hardly be understood as an independent nation in cultural terms. It discusses 4 the practical critique, the different ways in which oral literature can be evaluated and how this body of knowledge serves as a unifying and nationalizing factor when utilized by a marginalized nation seeking to establish cultural identity, emphasizing the investigation of the functions of various literary genres in cultural and historical situations. I think, the effort made to examine and clarify the new trends in scholarship and criticism will enrich our sense of the complexity of Oromo oral art and historical experience. Though each genre is discussed within the scope of its peculiar characteristics, my intention in broader terms is to discuss the universal and peculiar features of Oromo folklore and the way this body of knowledge functions as historical and cultural evidence. It seems to me most interestingly connecting the study of Oromo culture and literature in its general approach to a universal set of concerns; all of them related to human virtues and follies. In my argument, I have emphasized that the oral narrative tradition is constituted by poetic configurations and the effective aesthetic response can happen if the mode of analysis of these configurations takes into account the interpretive dimensions and historical reception as one of the vital criteria. The study of oral tradition requires an ability to give coherent shape to each literary genre by redefining and interpreting its artistic role so that it reflects contemporary needs and outlook. The primary object of the work is contextual investigation (Critical Practice) and appreciation rather than Critical Theory, though the two