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Out of Omo is a digital platform dedicated to fostering human connections through immersive African storytelling

We find and share stories that reach back to the African continent—a figurative “Omo” that represents our shared origins—and showcase the profound impact of Africa on cultures around the globe. Whether through direct accounts set in Africa, tales of the African diaspora, or stories that reveal the ways in which Africa has influenced and been influenced by the world, Out of Omo’s storytelling illuminates the rich, complex, and deeply interconnected nature of our global story. These narratives come from authors and storytellers whose voices are often unheard, offering fresh insights and challenging conventional wisdom.

When it launches, the platform will feature a rich tapestry of stories—both fiction and non-fiction—that shed light on the diverse experiences that shape our world. But Out of Omo is more than just a collection of stories. We also celebrate the power of oral storytelling traditions, such as those of the African griots. It is a space for dynamic conversations and deep engagement, where we host discussions with our featured authors and topical experts, provide a forum for readers to ask questions, share their own perspectives, and explore themes and issues raised in the stories.

We are planning to expand our offerings to include audio, visual arts, and short-format videos that bring these stories and conversations to life in new ways. We aim to create a rich and multifaceted platform that caters to different learning styles and engagement preferences. Whether you are inclined to read, watch, listen, or discuss, Out of Omo will have something for you.

Our mission is to amplify African and diasporic voices and share perspectives that have historically been overlooked.

The Power of Stories

We have found that literature has an incredible power to expand minds and hearts. Through stories, we can gain insight into the lives of people from different backgrounds, visit places we’ve never been, and explore contexts that are unfamiliar to us. Reading allows us to see the world through someone else’s eyes, fostering empathy and understanding.

In particular, we enjoy reading stories rooted in the cultures and geographies of the author’s own lived experiences. Such narratives offer a window into diverse perspectives and help us appreciate the richness and complexity of the human experience. They remind us that there is no single story, but rather a tapestry of stories that make up our shared humanity.

For readers passionate about exploring diverse stories and connecting with others, we invite you to stay connected with Out of Omo. Together, we can create a more empathetic, understanding, and connected world, one story at a time.

Collaborations

Out of Omo creates a space where storytellers from diverse backgrounds can come together, share their perspectives, and inspire one another. Through these collaborations, we foster a global community of storytellers and readers who are passionate about exploring our shared humanity and celebrating our different destinations.

At Out of Omo, we collaborate with a diverse range of established and emerging storytellers, including:

  • Writers and authors of fiction, non-fiction, and poetry
  • Historians and scholars
  • Visual artists and illustrators
  • Filmmakers and video creators
  • Podcasters and audio storytellers
  • Photographers and photojournalists
  • Performers and spoken-word artists

In phase one, we are proactively reaching out to potential collaborators so we can establish a strong foundation of curated content for the platform’s launch, though we also welcome inquiries from individuals and teams interested in contributing to the conversation. If you are a historian, scholar, fiction or non-fiction writer, director, photojournalist, or any other type of storyteller interested in collaborating with Out of Omo, we encourage you to sign up here.  

Behind the Name

“Out of Omo” holds a special meaning to our founder, Monique Maddy. Her daughter was born in the Omo Valley of Southern Ethiopia and is a member of the Aari tribe, part of the Omotic people indigenous to Omo Valley of Ethiopia. There are fewer than 500,000 ethnic Aari in Ethiopia today. 

The Omo Valley is also where some of the earliest human remains, dating back around 230,000 years, were discovered. Taken together, this place—which holds our shared human history, and her family’s window into future generations—offers a bridge between past and future, and between diverse communities.“Out of Omo” symbolizes our common starting point, our diasporic journeys, and all the unique cultures, and perspectives we’ve built along the way. It’s a reminder that despite our differences, we are all part of the same human story—a story that began in places like the Omo Valley.

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Unite in Africa, Out of Omo, and Pioneers of African Unity are initiatives of Monique Maddy. To learn more about Monique and her work, please visit moniquemaddy.com.

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The Omo River Peoples

The Omo River rises in the Ethiopian highlands and flows southward for over 375 miles before emptying into Lake Turkana on the Kenyan border. Since Richard Leakey’s excavation of hominin bones there fifty years ago, the valley has been a prime candidate site for the first development of anatomically modern humans: homo sapiens. Remains have been reliably dated as close to 200,000 years in age, and while older modern human traces have since been found elsewhere in Africa, continuous habitation here has produced an incredibly culturally and ethnically diverse modern indigenous population.

Climate and Lifestyles

The lifestyle of the Omo River tribes is conditioned by its unusual climate and ecosystem. The valley is semi-arid, with rainfall averaging around 15-20 inches annually. However, actual rainfall can vary significantly from year to year, and locally within the valley: what rainfall there is tends to be concentrated in two peak spells, from March to April, and October to November. These brief spells create short-lived periods of widespread water availability in pools and tributaries of the Omo. Until recently, the main river itself rose on a different cycle, reflecting rainfall at its source in the Ethiopian plateau, and reaching its peak in August and early September. When in spate, the Omo floods its banks, creating broad mudflats rich with alluvial silt on the lowlands near Lake Turkana Upstream, the flood zone is much narrower and more intermittent, often concentrated around bends in the river. This climatic regime creates an ecosystem that affords the tribal inhabitants three distinct components for their subsistence: cattle herding in the wooded grasslands of the upper slopes of the valley, wet season crop cultivation on the lower ground near the river, and floodbelt cultivation of land inundated by the Omo.

Depending on location, the main crops are sorghum, maize, yams, gourds, and beans. The tending of cattle is a male preserve, but women will raise goats and maintain beehives. The balance of these components varies tribe to tribe depending on the location of their territories. The Kwegu, who generally congregate around the valley bottom, rely on a diet of fish, while the Mursi and Nyangatom are pastoralists, and the Dassanech, whose homeland is on the levels close to Lake Turkana, have traditionally been able to achieve the bulk of their sustenance through floodbelt cultivation. 

The Omo Valley Peoples

In the highlands further from the river, tribes like the Suri and Nyangatom are predominantly pastoralists. There is substantial trade, of both artifacts and foodstuffs. For instance, the Kwegu, who are accomplished hunters, will exchange bushmeat (hippopotamus, antelope, giraffe etc.) and skins for cattle meat and milk. 

The tribes are famous for their vivid decorative body art, which includes lower lip plates for women and ear discs for both sexes. Body painting is practiced widely (especially amongst the Suri and Mursi), typically using yellow sulfur, white kaolin and limestone, grey ash and red ochre. This acts both as a form of sun protection and conveys information about the wearer’s status, feats in battle and so on.

Inevitably, the traditional way of life of the Omo Valley tribes has been impacted by the encroachment of western civilization. In 2006, the Ethiopian government commissioned the commencement of a huge dam on the River Gibe, which flows into the Omo. Work was completed in 2015, effectively aborting the annual flooding upon which many of the valley tribespeople depend for their crops. Proponents of the dam have argued that natural flooding could be replicated by artificial releases of stored water through the dam, but this has yet to be implemented.

It now appears that most of any water that becomes available will be reserved for the irrigation of large parcels of land in the Lake Turkana floodplain, which have been sold for plantation cultivation of cotton and sugarcane. Under such pressures, it is difficult envisaging a future for the tribes other than as a “tourist experience.”

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From the Blog

The Girl With the Smile

August 14, 2024

Beti and I first shared our story at ZEG Tbilisi Storytelling Festival in June. The excerpt below is the beginning of our journey as mother and daughter as originally published in Stranger’s Guide. Our full story—of building a family, finding belonging, and feeling home—is the focus of my second memoir,

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