This paper examines the enactment of cultural medical practices in the narratives of African writers. It aims at promoting the application of folk medicines in addressing the health problems of patients as enacted in artistic productions of fiction writers. It will celebrate, propagate and preserve these approaches to preventive and curative medical practices, which are indigenous to the African people. The study will be beneficial to health caregivers, researchers, health educators, health agencies and policy formulators, who are determined to promote the cultural healthcare system in society. It will reawaken and strengthen medical practitioners, patients and researchers, who may which to apply folk medical practices as an alternative treatment for health problems in socio-cultural settings. This research is field survey and library-based, with the literary texts carefully and purposively selected according to their thematic thrust and qualitatively analysed. Oral interviews were conducted to gather first-hand information and data on traditional medical practices from respondents, who have profound knowledge of the topic. The respondents were elderly men and women with profound knowledge of traditional medical practices, and they were drawn from various Urhobo communities, such as Ughelli, Akperhe-Olomu, Orogun, Okparabe, Edjekota-Ogor, and Agbarha-Otor. Among those interviewed were traditional medical practitioners, diviners, and patients, who often apply trado-medicines as alternative and supplementary treatments. Apart from the primary materials, scholarly works that are relevant to the current study were also consulted by the researchers. Findings showed that African societies are endowed with diverse forms of folk medicine, including the use of herbs, hydrotherapy, heat therapy, use of ointments, hot food as an intervention, talk therapy, etc. The study concluded that African writers are conscious of the utilitarian functions of their indigenous healthcare interventions, and so they integrate some of the practices into their artistic works, not only for the documentation but also to activate the awareness of readers on the efficacy of the traditional medicines. The various folk medical practices can serve as alternative and complementary treatments for people who cannot afford western healthcare interventions in contemporary societies.

This study examines African trado-medical diagnosis and treatments of affliction in Ola Rotimi's The Gods Are Not To Blame. Though different studies have been done previously by scholars on treatments of diseases across the world, the aspect of trado-medical diagnosis and treatments of affliction in dramatic works has not been explored. This literary text is purposively chosen due to its contextual relevance and qualitatively analyzed. The study adopted the Freudian psychoanalytic approach which focuses on characters' psyche and the motivations responsible for their negative thoughts, emotions and actions as presented in the chosen text. It found that abominable offences attract the wrath of gods, evil spirits and ancestors which cause afflictions in African societies. However, non-scientific methods like divination and indepth interviews and focus group discussions can be employed to diagnose the cause of the life-threatening disease while forms of treatment such as sacrifices, herbal medicines, counseling and so on are provided.

Several forms of performance arts are underutilized for in the past few decades and the Urhobo riddles are not left out. This paper therefore examines various methods of preservation and transfer of riddles in traditional society. This study adopted the survey-descriptive approach as the data and information were collected from natural environment and analysed. It is underpinned by Sigmund Freud’s psychoanalytic theory that focuses on the unconscious mind of people as the storehouse of latent materials which can be activated and brought to the conscious awareness. The information were collected with sound recordings which were afterward deciphered and deciphered from the Urhobo dialect into the English adaptation. In-depth interviews were also conducted to obtained first-hand information from respondents. The respondents were purposively selected and interviewed. The data collected in the field were qualitatively analyzed using descriptive and analytical methods. Findings reveal that riddles perform utilitarian functions like entertainment, education, knowledge transfer, coping and distractive strategies and so on. These linguistic resources should be preserved and documented due to their cultural values. Though there are problems hindering the growth of the riddles in contemporary societies, orators have devised the use of popular music as new way of preservation and transferring of oral traditions like the riddles from going into extinction.