Call For Submission: An Anthology of Poetry in Honour of Professor Oloruntoba Oju at 50

As part of a series of activities marking Professor Omotayo Oloruntoba-Oju's 50th birthday, we are currently seeking poems that celebrate her ideological vision, commitment, and consistency, her vibrant contributions to the critical reception of African and African Diaspora Literature, and her selflessness in transforming lives in the academia. We will appreciate poems that are rooted in African oral tradition, postcolonial politics and democracy, freedom, justice, love, and gender issues. The basic rules for submission include the following:

1. Language: English only
2. Each poem submitted must not be more than 50 lines
3. No more than three poems can be submitted
4. Indicate appropriately when and where first published, in case the poem(s) submitted have previously been published
5. Provide brief biographical information about yourself
6. Poems submitted must be original as plagiarized poems will be disqualified
7. All contributions should be sent to tayoojuatfifty@gmail.com
8. The deadline for all submissions is March 30, 2016.

The anthology will be co-edited by Sola Owonibi and Daniel Ajayi, both of the Department of English Studies, Adekunle Ajasin University, Akungba-Akoko.

About Professor Oloruntoba-Oju

Professor Omotayo Oloruntoba-Oju teaches in the Department of English Studies, Adekunle Ajasin University, Akungba-Akoko, Ondo State, Nigeria. With close to three decades of teaching literature at University of Ilorin and Adekunle Ajasin University, Akungba-Akoko, Professor Omotayo Oloruntoba-Oju’s several academic papers straddle African Drama & Cinema, Caribbean Literature, African American Literature, among others. As the pioneer and current Director of Ajasin Varsity Theatre (AVT), she has equally directed a number of Convocation plays for the institution, some of which include Once Upon Four Robbers, Morountodun, Esu and the Vagabond Minstrels, all by Femi Osofisan, Aikin Mata (The Lysistrata of Aristophanes), translated and adapted by T.W. Harrison and James Simmons, and Ola Rotimi’s Kurunmi. Besides these, she has to her directorial credits many Command Performances and other theatre productions, some of which include Wole Soyinka’s TheTrials of Brother Jero & The Lion and the Jewel, Rasheed Gbadamosi’s Behold My Redeemer, Femi Osofisan’s Birthdays Are Not for Dying & A Restless Run of Locusts, Ola Rotimi’s Our Husband Has Gone Mad Again, Grip Am & The gods are not to blame, Wale Ogunyemi’s Eniyan, Ahmed Yerima’s Ajagunmale, Zulu Sofola’s Tales by Moonlight etc. A former Head of Department of English Studies at Adekunle Ajasin University, Prof. Oloruntoba-Oju is a member of Association of Nigerian Authors.

IYIN NLA RESURRECTS IJALA AND APALA GENRE OF YORUBA MUSIC IN A GOSPEL ALBUM BY AKIN OGUNDOKUN aka WINRINWINRIN

Album title: Iyin Nla

Artiste: Akin Ogundokun aka Wirinwirin

Year: 2016

Reviewer: Olutayo Irantiola

Different genre of Yoruba music has been relegated to the background; some of which include Ijala (the hunter’s song) and Apala, but there are some exceptional people like Akin Ogundokun popularly called Wirinwirin have taken time to study and come up with a gospel album using these genres.

The 45 minutes album with 6-track opened with an Ijala track that extols God and thereafter prayed for a meaningful life. The second track, which is the longest in the album, is also full of praises with original songs; he spiced the track with well known choruses in English, Igbo and Pidgin that he sang in with Apala. The third track is about the greatest gift that nature bestows on anyone which is a child; it is equally a prayer for those praying for the fruit of the womb.

The fourth track of the album is very creative in its mix of Yoruba and English words with a Yoruba hymn in Apala. The fifth track is a prayer for all categories of road users: pedestrians, riders and all automobiles drivers. The sixth and the last track is for his alma mater, Obafemi Awolowo University, the leadership of the institution, as at the time of going to the studio, his lecturers and his fans.  This album equally gives rise to the Apala variant of the school anthem.

As a whole, the album is full of lyrical rhythms typical of the Yorubas and prayers which everybody desires. Each track is peculiar and different people would easily identify with it. The music compilation is ingenious and engaging. This album is a revival of the genres that people have missed for some years because many gospel artistes have not excavated cultural genres and present it to people of our age in an appealing form. Kudos to Akin Ogundokun for serving us this lyrical ‘meal’ for consumption at this point which is a sequel to his first album.

11^th January 2016