| Akintunde Akinyemi | University of Florida |
Before he joined the Department of African and Asian Languages and
Literatures, University of Florida in 2002, Dr. Akintunde Akinyemi was at the Department of
African Languages and Literatures ay Obafemi Awolowo University, Nigeria. Between 1999 and 2001,
he held the post-doctoral Research Fellowship of the German Alexander von Humboldt Foundation at the
Institute for African Studies, University of Bayreuth, Germany, and at the
Center of West African Studies, University of Birmingham, United
Kingdom, working on Yoruba Court Poetry. He is about to complete a book
manuscript on the oral historical tradition of the famous city of Oyo, to
be published under the Bayreuth African Studies Series of the Institute of
African Studies, University of Bayreuth in Germany. For the next few years
however, his research interest will be focused on Yoruba popular culture, primarily in film.
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Akintunde Akinyemi
Department of African and Asian Languages and Literatures University of Florida 470 Grinter Hall P.O.Box 115565 Gainesville, FL 32611-5565 Phone: (352)392-7082 Fax: (352)392-1443 Email: akinyemi@aall.ufl.edu |
A Charming King and Frightening Hero: Contradictory Representations of the Deity Sango in Yoruba Oral Poetry |
This paper hopes to examine the contradictory representations of Sango, the Yoruba hero-deity associated with thunder and lightning, in the deity's praise names. The bulk of the body of Yoruba oral poetry known as Sango Pipe (acclaiming Sango), used by Sango devotees in saluting their god and invoking its spirit, is made up of the deity's praise names (oriki). These praises reveal, in details, the process of deification of the god Sango, its nature, personality, power and excesses. One of the most striking revelations of Sango well documented in his praises is his contradictory nature. This paper, therefore, addresses these contradictions and argues that the deity Sango symbolizes the universal contradictory nature of man. Although strong and powerful, man, at the same time, could be frail. The constant oppositions of the character of Sango in his praise names is a necessary and explainable part of the poetic tradition known as Sango Pipe. |