From palava huts to TikTok: How Liberians are preserving their past

What the report says

Al Jazeera reports from Monrovia that young Liberians are increasingly using TikTok, Facebook, YouTube, podcasts and digital archive projects to document history, culture and family memory. The article frames the shift as a continuation of older oral traditions rather than a replacement for them, with digital spaces serving as a modern equivalent of community gathering places where stories were once exchanged among elders and younger people.

One example is Archive Liberia, founded by Bilphena Decontee Yahwon, which Al Jazeera describes as a memory and political education initiative focused on research, archives and public storytelling. Yahwon told the outlet that her own search to understand war, migration and Liberian identity led her into broader work on the country’s past. Historian Patrick Burrowes added that while Liberia did not have the formal griot caste associated with parts of the Sahel, elders long played a similar role in passing down cultural and historical knowledge.

The report says Liberia’s civil wars from 1989 to 2003 severely disrupted that intergenerational transmission, with an estimated 250,000 people killed and many more displaced. Urban migration has also changed where young people encounter family and community histories. Al Jazeera cites Liberia statistics showing internal migrants make up 46.7 percent of the urban population, compared with 13.6 percent of the rural population.

The digital turn also brings risks. Al Jazeera notes that internet access remains limited, citing World Bank figures that just over one-third of Liberians use the internet, and says misinformation is harder to control without traditional checks by elders. The Liberia Tourism Authority is reportedly working with historians, cultural institutions and creators to improve access to historical resources and support accurate storytelling.