Sharing Stories, Linking Lives: Literacy Practices Among ... - CPLS

Perry Sudanese Refugees
individuals. It is interesting to consider that the participants in this study have transformed some
aspects of schooling into a community-oriented domain; for the participants in this study,
individual schooling has become part of a duty to the larger Sudanese community, particularly
those left behind in Africa.
Religion. Religion plays a central role in much of southern Sudanese culture (see Figure
1). Deng (1995) suggests that there is a close link between southern Sudanese religious beliefs
and identity, regardless of whether those religious beliefs are Christian or traditional animist. In
fact, he suggests that many southern Sudanese adopted Christianity precisely because it
complemented their traditional cultural, spiritual, and moral values. Bok (2003) states that
approximately 20% of southern Sudanese identify as Christian, and he frequently cites God as
the power which helped him to survive and escape enslavement.
18