African History as a Quest for Meaning: Research Recapitulation and Reflections on Adapting the Methods of Akinwumi Ogundiran's The Yoruba : A New History in Studying the Development of African Thought in its Environmental and Social Matrix

[Oluwatoyin Adepoju]

                                                 

                                                                                        

                                                                 

                                                         African History as a Quest for Meaning

                                                                       Research Recapitulation 

                                                                         and Reflections on

                                 Adapting the Methods of Akinwumi Ogundiran's The Yoruba : A New History

                                                 in Studying the Development of African Thought

                                                               in its Environmental and Social Matrix 

                                                                  A Brief Statement of Possibilities 

                                                            Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju

                                                                            Compcros

                                               Comparative Cognitive Processes and Systems

                                    "Exploring Every Corner of the Cosmos in Search of Knowledge"

                                                                               Abstract

An overview of my work so far on Akinwumi Ogundiran's The Yoruba:A New History, 2020,   responding primarily to his efforts at mapping the development of Yoruba philosophy and spirituality, indicating the inspirational power of this work and how it could be taken further in the exploration of the history of Yoruba thought in particular and of African thought in general. I also describe my working towards  the latter  initiative  through a speculative recreation of relationships between landscape and thought in the earliest  human settlement as discovered in Africa.

How did African systems of thought, approaches to interpreting  the meaning of existence, emerge and develop in Africa? This question is made more challenging by the fact that  most of these systems were only recently expressed in writing with the advent  of recording African affairs in European languages and of those indigenous writing systems which exist, such as the Nigerian Cross River Nsibidi script, the accessibility of these systems and their temporal scope, the period of time they cover, does not seem adequate as a means of gaining insight into the history of the bodies of knowledge they encode, if the Nsibidi case may be seen as applicable to indigenous African writing systems in general.

Akinwumi Ogundiran's The Yoruba:A New History, 2020, is a response to this challenge  in mapping the development of Yoruba thought within its environmental and social matrix. 

I describe the qualities of this book in its integration of social, economic, political, technological  and cognitive history in relation to the physical environment, a multidisciplinary scope developed through radiant prose, reflective power and architectonic brilliance in  "In Search of the Children of Ọmọlúàbí: Yorùbá as Way of Life Rather than as Ethnic Identity: Reading Akinwumi Ogundiran's The Yorùbá: A New History 1: The Preface and the Introduction", "Struggle, Triumph, Destruction and Resurgence in Yoruba History as a Great Human Narrative: Akinwumi Ogundiran's The Yoruba : A New History" and "The Journey of the Children of Omoluabi: Yoruba History as a Quest for Meaning in Akin Ogundiran’s The Yorùbá: A New History Part 1 [Edited]."

His method in working out the history of Yoruba thought is largely speculative, as I understand it, given the limitations of historical records in the oral culture, and the non-existence of even such oral histories in the pre-historic period from which Ogundiran begins his examination of Yoruba history. His speculative technique, however, is  richly informed and carefully coordinated.

He makes deductions  from known physical or  historical evidence, as with landscape or with the cultural centrality of Ile-Ife and its relationship to the use of glass beads as royal insignia and the development of a theology unifying Yoruba deities around the centrality of Ife employing the Ifa system of knowledge as an integrative vehicle.

The most accomplished achievement of this speculative technique, in my view, is his imaginative reconstruction of the relationship between landscape and cosmology among the proto-Yoruba, the ancestors of the Yoruba,  in the Niger-Benue confluence. 

Within a vivid picture of the landscape of these people, Ogundiran visualizes how this environment  could have shaped their world view, a construct that resonates with the contemporary picture, more than a thousand years later, of Yoruba cosmology, an explicit conjunction traceable across Ogundiran's later exploration of Yoruba thought in the same book, as I demonstrate in my examination of the significance of his  striking depiction of the proto-Yoruba, "Ecofeminism in Yoruba Thought: From Earliest Times to the Present: A Factual and Speculative Overview Inspired by Akinwumi Ogundiran's The Yoruba : A New History."

Ogundiran's other efforts at working out the development of Yoruba thought in relation to social history are also impressive, particularly as a pioneer initiative along these lines, as he ingeniously develops approaches to why and how particular strategies within Yoruba cosmology were constructed in response to social pressures.

The perspectives thereby developed are inspiring in their creativity. Particularly memorable and an enduring contribution to Yoruba cosmology is his summation of this body of ideas and practices  in terms of an image of  the orisa, the deities of Yoruba spirituality,  as  mirrors reflecting possibilities of social existence, within the infinity of possibilities that may be generated through an infinite complex of mirrors as the possibilities of social existence continually unfold.

Ogundiran's contribution to Yoruba thought is his development of the mirror motif in characterizing this cosmology  and his interpretation  of the hermeneutic processes represented by the construction of those mirrors of possibility, as this construction is shaped within natural and social environments dominant in various periods of  Yoruba history as well as contributing to the configuring of those social contexts.

This achievement is taken to its most detailed scope in his reconstruction of how Ile-Ife became the cultural centre of the Yoruba people. His imaginative recreation of the thought world of the proto-Yoruba, however, is the most representative, among his recreations of the developmental contexts of Yoruba thought, of the depth of meaning of a cosmology for the people who construct and use it, of the manner in which their physical and social environment  may influence their understanding of ultimate meaning and how this mutuality of space, society and thought may in turn shape social and material realities.

His other efforts, impressively creative as they are, are nevertheless overly circumscribed by his interpreting various developments in Yoruba spirituality primarily as intellectual constructs employed as political strategies or as means of demonstrating economic values.

This perspective is not as robust  as his earlier descriptions of the harmony of metaphysics and landscape in  making meaning of existence in its broadest parameters at the intersection  of time, space and evocations of infinity suggested by the seeming agelessness of the imposing hills of the landscape of the proto-Yoruba.

In moving from deductive foundations in the natural constructs represented by landscape to cultural constructs demonstrated by Ife's cultural centrality, for example, he downplays the motivational scope that could have enabled the cosmological synthesis strategic to this centrality, even as he describes beautifully the processes through which this synthesis was achieved through the Ifa system of knowledge as a correlating instrument. 

I examine these issues in "Fact and Speculation in Historical Narrative: Akinwumi Ogundiran’s The Yorùbá: A New History: Yorùbá History as a Quest for Meaning" (  Parts One, Two and Three)'',  "The Dilemma of a Babaláwo :  Ogunbiodun and the Tension between Politics and Spirituality in Classical Ifè'' and " Convergence and Divergence of Politics and Spirituality in the Yoruba Origin Ifa System of Knowledge: A Dilemma Emerging from Conflicts Between Akin Ogundiran as Scholarly Book Author and Social Media Contributor."    

The ambitious scope of Ogundiran's book as perhaps the first effort to map the development of Yoruba thought, and almost certainly the first to attempt this task within such a temporal scale, is further highlighted by the strengths and limitations of the execution of the project, as I point out in  my earlier efforts in this series of essays inspired by his book.

The stirring character of his description of his aspirations and the imaginative boldness within a disciplined intellectual framework  through which these aspirations are actualized could inspire others to build on his achievements and take them further. 

Such future initiatives could  develop approaches to the history of Yoruba thought integrating both the imaginative depth and embodied resonance of his account of the proto-Yoruba and the largely  intellectual and politically and economically centred scope of his other descriptions of the growth of this body of knowledge. 

These future efforts could also go further to foreground approaches to interpreting human experience developed within Yoruba thought as a means of exploring the history of this thought. Such a centring in Yoruba philosophy as an investigative vehicle of its own development could advance Ogundiran's own goals beyond the level of his actualization of them, since his investigative tools are largely drawn from Western scholarly techniques and concepts, used in understanding Yoruba thought,  even when referencing scholarship on Yoruba thought and history. His use of Yoruba proverbs, though illuminating and memorable, is not foundational to the styles of thinking and the ideational configurations that shape his investigative method.

Such an approach as I suggest would foreground Yoruba thought as an investigative tool. Such an orientation, could, for example, explore how Yoruba history may be better understood through the examination of Yoruba ideas about human potential and developmental processes.

Such approaches could examine  Yoruba history by exploring the integration of human, non-human and cosmic processes. This ideational conjunction could be seen as evoked in the Yoruba concept ori, on the nature of the self as representing a fusion as well as a tension between immediate and transcendental possibility.   

These ideas could also be seen as suggested by the Yoruba concept, ase, individual embodiment of creative potential as a universal quality of existence, as these Yoruba concepts may be described in an effort to tease out their interpretive range,  highlighting the opportunities they provide for critical engagement with the stances on the nature of being that they represent.

These investigations could be carried out  within the framework of the intersection of narrative and history, imagination and reality, art, spirituality, economics and politics as these may be shown as  converging,  through the adaptation of  such Yoruba hermeneutic systems as Ifa divination.

I examine these possibilities in general terms in "Developing a Historiographic Method Inspired by Yoruba Thought 1 : Motivated by Akinwumi Ogundiran’s The Yoruba : A New History, on Yoruba History as a Quest for Meaning," "Ifa Divination as Historiographic Paradigm: Between the Sacred and the Secular, Politics and Spirit in Akin Ogundiran's The Yoruba: A New History on Yoruba History as a Quest for Meaning : Part 2 : Very Short Reflection" and ''What Can an African Philosopher Gain from Hegel, Abhinavagupta and Ramana Maharshi? : Developing African Philosophy through the Inspiration of German Idealism and Indian Philosophy in Relation to Yoruba History as a Quest for Meaning in Akinwumi Ogundiran's The Yoruba : A New History.''

       
I have adopted a similar strategy on a smaller scale employing Ifa hermeneutics in "Ifa Divination, Autobiographical Theory, and the Letters and Selected Paintings of Vincent van Gogh'' ( Reconfigurations, November 2009)  and the forthcoming   "Spatial Navigation as a Hermeneutic Paradigm : Ifa, Heidegger and Calvino" ( The Palgrave Handbook of Africa and the Changing Global Order) and ''Toyin Falola’s In Praise of Greatness in the Light of Classical Yoruba Hermeneutics.'' The first two essays operate as a dialogue between Yoruba and Western thought. The last is composed  in terms of a relationship between my own ideational constructs and Yoruba philosophy.

One may be inspired by Ogundiran's  powerful description of his aspirations and the ingenuity of his actualization of those aspirations even as one tries to better actualize them than even he has done.

Such an orientation may also be adapted to the study of African history, particularly of the development of African thought in its environmental and social matrix.

Such an investigation and reconstruction would involve deep grounding in a broad range of African systems of thought, in relation to their verbal, visual and performative expressions as these are shaped by and contribute to shaping  natural and social contexts, as these developments may be correlated in terms of various degrees of confluence across different  African cultures.

I intend to commence moving in this direction by adapting Ogundiran's visualizing of the origins of Yoruba cosmology among the proto-Yoruba and their response to their landscape through doing something similar with the Leakeys' account of the earliest human settlement in Olduvai Gorge in Tanzania. My inspirational centre would  be Thomas Coburn's description of his climbing Ol Doinyo Lengai, the Mountain of God, in Tanzania, not far from Olduvai Gorge, the volcanic ash from Lengai preserving the footprints from which the Leakeys' deduced the temporality of the site (  " Climbing the Mountain of God,'' Journal of the American Academy of Religion, 1995, Vol. 63, No. 1, 127-140).

 

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My Exploratory  Journey with Akinwumi Ogundiran's The Yoruba : A New History

 

Inspirational book description from Call For Papers  from Yoruba Studies Review journal  that led me to Ogundiran's book. 

 

General Summations

 

"In Search of the Children of Ọmọlúàbí: Yorùbá as Way of Life Rather than as Ethnic Identity: Reading Akinwumi Ogundiran's The Yorùbá: A New History 1: The Preface and the Introduction" 

 

 "Struggle, Triumph, Destruction and Resurgence in Yoruba History as a Great Human Narrative: Akinwumi Ogundiran's The Yoruba : A New History."

 

On Specific Themes

 

" Convergence and Divergence of Politics and Spirituality in the Yoruba Origin Ifa System of Knowledge: A Dilemma Emerging from Conflicts Between Akin Ogundiran as Scholarly Book Author and Social Media Contributor"    

 

 "The Dilemma of a Babaláwo :  Ogunbiodun and the Tension between Politics and Spirituality in Classical Ifè.

"Ifa Divination as Historiographic Paradigm: Between the Sacred and the Secular, Politics and Spirit in Akin Ogundiran's The Yoruba: A New History on Yoruba History as a Quest for Meaning : Part 2 : Very Short Reflection" [ With a discussion at this link]

  "Fact and Speculation in Historical Narrative: Akinwumi Ogundiran’s The Yorùbá: A New History: Yorùbá History as a Quest for Meaning" (  Parts One, Two and Three).  

"Developing a Historiographic Method Inspired by Yoruba Thought 1 : Motivated by Akinwumi Ogundiran’s The Yoruba : A New History, on Yoruba History as a Quest for Meaning."

''What Can an African Philosopher Gain from Hegel, Abhinavagupta and Ramana Maharshi? : Developing African Philosophy through the Inspiration of German Idealism and Indian Philosophy in Relation to Yoruba History as a Quest for Meaning in Akinwumi Ogundiran's The Yoruba : A New History.''

"Ecofeminism in Yoruba Thought: From Earliest Times to the Present: A Factual and Speculative Overview Inspired by Akinwumi Ogundiran's The Yoruba : A New History."

"Poetically Powerful Summation of Yoruba Origin Orisa Cosmology Integrating the Work of Akinwumi Ogundiran and Wole Soyinka"

Close Reading 

 

"The Journey of the Children of Omoluabi: Yoruba History as a Quest for Meaning in Akin Ogundiran’s The Yorùbá: A New History Part 1 [Edited] "

 

[Emeagwali, Gloria (History)]

Remember that Prof. Ogundiran is an archeologist

working with material culture, a

powerful mode of expression.

Professor Gloria Emeagwali
Prof. of History/African Studies, CCSU
africahistory.net; vimeo.com/ gloriaemeagwali
Recipient of the 2014 Distinguished Research
Excellence Award, Univ. of Texas at Austin;
2019 Distinguished Africanist Award
New York African Studies Association

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Subject: USA Africa Dialogue Series - African History as a Quest for Meaning: Research Recapitulation and Reflections on Adapting the Methods of Akinwumi Ogundiran's The Yoruba : A New History in Studying the Development of African Thought in its Environmental ...

 

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[Oluwatoyin Adepoju]

Thanks, Gloria.

His archeological specialisation is evident in his work, in which material culture at various levels of interpretation coalesces with historical narration and speculative reconstruction of Yoruba thought, qualities I discuss in this series of essays.

Could I know what makes you mention it?

Thanks

Toyin

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