Analysis on Laura Bohannan’s R

In her essay “Shakespeare in the Bush,” Laura Bohannan attempts to illustrate whether there is a “universal understanding” through her experience of sharing Hamlet with the Tiv in West Africa. Throughout the story the Tiv object to some of its details, however, overall they are able to understand Hamlet, a very English play. Different cultural backgrounds not only make the Tiv and Bohannan have very different interpretations of Hamlet ,but also the general ideas of …

…be read and interpreted and maybe it does not even matter. Its meaning changes as the cultural context changes. Bohannan and the Tiv’s relationships well illustrate that humans are able to understand the basic plots though not all the details in stories because we all face the same basic problems and questions in our lives and the only difference is in how we manage to overcome our problems and fulfill our basic human needs.