Ife Agog, as Olupona’s Summer Institute Begins

Renowned Professors from around the world are currently in Ile-Ife, Osun State, for the 8th edition of the annual Ife Institute of Advanced Studies which commences tomorrow with the theme, ‘Building Communities of Practice: Interdisciplinary Collaboration and Academic Leadership in Africa.’Convened by Professor Jacob Kehinde Olupona of Harvard University, the institute boasts over five hundred fellows across the continent.

This year’s edition will play host to 70 in-resident early career, doctoral, and post-doctoral scholarsand over 100 others who will join remotely for two weeks of critical conversation, workshops, and mentoring sessions.Governor Seyi Makinde of Oyo Stateis expected asguest of honour while the keynote speech will be delivered by Adeleke Adeeko, Humanities Distinguished Professor of English and African American and African Studies at Ohio State University, United States.

The African Centre of Excellence, Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ifewill serve as venue for the Institute that welcomes distinguished scholars from various institutions across the world, including Harvard University; Wake Forest University, North Carolina; Princeton Theological Seminary; Amherst College; Elon University, North Carolina; Stony Brook University, New York; University of Pennsylvania; UMass Boston John W. McCormack Graduate School of Policy and Global Studies; Boston University; University of Delaware; Regent University; Yale University; Penn State University; Mount Royal University, Canada; York University, Toronto; Glasgow Caledonian University; University of Ghana, Legon; L’Ecole Normale Supérieure for the Letters and Humanities, Bouzareah, Algiers; University of Nairobi; University of Lagos; University of Ibadan, and the host institution, Obafemi Awolowo University, among others.

The Summer Institute, according to Olupona, aims to deepen knowledge by bringing together a vibrant network of professionals from diverse fields to engage in meaningful discussions and collaborative activities. “The theme underscores the vital role of interdisciplinary collaboration and strong academic and public leadership in addressing Africa’s complex challenges,” Olupona stated while explaining the programme for this year.

The programme features workshops on interdisciplinary research methods, community engagement, and leadership development. Panels will feature distinguished speakers sharing insights on building effective communities of practice within African academic and professional landscapes. “The Institute is designed to foster connections, networking opportunities, and collaborations among participants, encouraging the exchange of ideas and best practices,” Olupona told THISDAY at the weekend. “Participants will also tour cultural and heritage sites and visit the institute’s permanent site.By building communities of practice, we can drive sustainable development and innovation across Africa.”

A respected scholar of almost five decades, Olupona waslast year elected to the prestigious American Academy of Arts and Sciences. A letter jointly signed by Nancy C. Andrews, Chair of the Board, and David W. Oxtoby, President of the Academy, stated that the honour of the election “signifies the high regard in which you are held by leaders in your field and members throughout the nation.”

A professor of African Traditional Religion, Olupona earned his first degree from the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, before proceeding to Boston University in the United States where he completed his master’s and doctorate degrees. He began his career as a lecturer at the then University of Ife before moving to the University of California where he became a tenured professor. In 2006, he joined Harvard University where he is currently theChair of the Department of African and African American Studies.In 2007, the late President Umaru Musa YarAdua conferred on Olupona the Nigerian National Order of Merit (NNOM), the award given each year for intellectual accomplishment in the four areas of science, medicine, engineering/technology, and humanities.Olupona holds an honorary doctorate from the University of Edinburgh in Scotland and in 2018, he also received the Martin E. Marty Award for the Public Understanding of Religion.

The citation of Olupona on the Harvard University website reads in part: “His current research focuses on the religious practices of the estimated one million Africans who have emigrated to the United States over the last 40 years, examining in particular several populations that remain relatively invisible in the American religious landscape: ‘reverse missionaries’ who have come to the United States to establish churches, African Pentecostals in American congregations, American branches of independent African churches, and indigenous African religious communities in the United States. His earlier research ranged across African spirituality and ritual practices, spirit possession, Pentecostalism, Yoruba festivals, animal symbolism, icons, phenomenology, and religious pluralism in Africa and the Americas.

“In his book City of 201 Gods: Ilé-Ifè in Time, Space, and the Imagination, he examines the modern urban mixing of ritual, royalty, gender, class, and power, and how the structure, content, and meaning of religious beliefs and practices permeate daily life. His other books include Òrìsà Devotion as World Religion: The Globalization of Yorùbá Religious Culture, co-edited with Terry Rey, and Kingship, Religion, and Rituals in a Nigerian Community: A Phenomenological Study of Ondo Yoruba Festivals, which has become a model for ethnographic research among Yoruba-speaking communities. In 2012, he was named one of Harvard’s Walter Channing Cabot Fellows, for distinguished publications.”