Professor I. A. Akinjogbin: On Yoruba History & Culture

We announced the death of Professor I. Akinjogbin here on halftribe.com on July 26th this year. He died early Sunday July 27th 2008 at age 78. Professor I. A Akinjogbin, BA, PhD, Emeritus Professor of History, was the first Professor and Head of Department of History, Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Nigeria. About a year before he died, we were honored and privileged to be granted an interview with Professor I. A. Akinjogbin about his new book Milestones and Social Systems in Yoruba History and Culture. It was a very inspiring and educative conversation and we present it here for the first time on halftribe.com. Due to the length of the interview, we have broken it into several parts.

Part 1 of 4 – How History is Written (15 mins)

[audio https://halftribedotcom.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/conversationwithprofessorakinjogbinpart1.mp3]

Part 2 of 4 – History & Culture Defined (18 mins)

[audio https://halftribedotcom.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/conversationwithprofessorakinjogbinpart2.mp3]

Part 3 of 4 – Social Systems (14 mins)

[audio https://halftribedotcom.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/conversationwithprofessorakinjogbinpart3.mp3]

Part 4 of 4 – Social Systems Continued: From Family to Marriage to Divorce (16 mins)

[audio https://halftribedotcom.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/conversationwithprofessorakinjogbinpart4.mp3]

He had been Acting Director of the world-renowned Ife Institute of African Studies, the first indigenous Dean, Faculty of Arts, and former Deputy Vice-Chancellor. Professor Akinjogbin devoted his entire academic career to teaching and research in history and was the author of several publications including Dahomey and Its Neighbors, Topics on Nigerian Economic and Social History, Ife: The Cradle of a Race, and War and Peace in Yorubaland.

Milestones and Social Systems in Yoruba History and Culture is broken into two parts; the first part traces the history and development of the Yoruba people in various stages through continuity and change. There have been two schools of thoughts on the history of the Yorubas and their identity. The first claims that the Yoruba people are one originating from the same source, Oduduwa, in Ile-Ife. The second school claims that the Yoruba are a group of unrelated groups of people with nothing in common. The second school may have come about as communities rejected the idea of paying tribute to the Alaafin of Oyo, the political head of the Yoruba. In his book, Professor Akinjogbin promotes the idea of a unified Yorubaland based on extensive research initiated as far back as 1957 by Obafemi Awolowo, a renowned Nigerian leader.

The main source of research is Oral traditions from over a thousand years. What the Yorubas lacked in written history they more than made up for in oral history and traditions held together by families that were designated story tellers for the royal family and the people. This is not unlike Homer’s Odyssey in Greek mythology. Verification was done checking one story against the other. Another primary source was festivals and ceremonies, at which the history of the town, the community and its people, were told and retold for all to know. Other sources included installation and crowning ceremonies of Obas, Kings in Yoruba, which traced the history of the monarchy and of the town, and place names could be used to tell their history as well. In recent times, archaeology has been used to trace the history of the Yorubas and the Yoruba language has been scientifically proven to have been in existence for at least 2, 000 years. In Milestones and Social Systems in Yoruba History and Culture, the period covered is over 1, 000 years from pre-Oduduwa to the 20th century and highlights which kingdoms were in ascendancy and when. It also includes the 19th century when the age-long unity of the Yorubas disintegrated through a cent