Olabode W Ojoniyi | University of Maiduguri (original) (raw)

Papers by Olabode W Ojoniyi

Deleted Journal, Mar 7, 2024

national Theatre, Nigeria, 2023

Perhaps, building on Derrida’s deconstruction oppositional thought pattern as a basic mode of sel... more Perhaps, building on Derrida’s deconstruction oppositional thought pattern as a basic mode of self-apprehension or consciousness, Cixous, querying the propriety of ‘the Son’s emergence from the Father without a Mother’ in her feminist consciousness unthinkable, argues that thought always works by its contraries (Derrida, 1988, Cixous, 1988, Ojoniyi, 2020). Of course, this position is not novel to Cixous as it only re-echoes Blake’s thesis in The Marriage of Heaven and Hell. In fine, it could be argued that the Son emerging from the Father is only a form of the manifestation of a ‘hell’ that Cixous and most Feminists could probably not marry to their imaginary existential ‘heaven.’ It is a patriarchal hell, a similitude of an illusory deconstructionists’ Centre that must be ruptured to give the right of way to a matriarchal heaven of a free play. Nevertheless, it seems that what is actually at the stake is arguably to be seen as a form of psychological fixation of a ‘Self’ in an eternal opposition to the ‘Other[s]’ it sees as its enemies. Unfortunately, those enemies are not always in the nebulous ‘Other[s]. The enemy is arguably always in a false Self that seeks to constitute itself to a new/ultimate Centre at the expense of the Otherness. It is in engaging these issues that this paper critically examines the need for the death of this Self by analysing the works of the author on himself after he was blackmailed and his character was defamed in a Sex scandal in Osun State University. In essence, it examines how the author achieves what he identifies as the mutilation of him-Self to escape being initiated into criminality through its theatre of intentionality.

Keywords: Self-apprehension, Ego-inversion, mutilation, consciousness, centre, reconstruction

Ede: Journal of Humanities and Social Sciences, Oct 31, 2020

After Nietzsche declares the death of God through his oracle, Zarathustra, a lot of critics in th... more After Nietzsche declares the death of God through his oracle, Zarathustra, a lot of critics in the West like Barthes, Foucault, Fish, Derrida and others begin to equally proclaim the death or the desirability of the death of the author and his intention in Western literary temper of mind. To foreground the justification for the call for the death of the author, they attack his writing, his text, declaring that the text is unreadable and without meaning, as meaning, if there is any, is eternally deferred. This paper is my response to their works as it critically re-examines the call for and the actual proclamation of the death of the author. I declare that text is essentially readable, arguing that meaning is not actually postponed but, as a constituent of the totality of the body of knowledge, it is progressively revealed and it only cumulates. I conclude that the call for the death of the author and his intention amounts to literary fallacy, a collection of intellectual myths in Western criticism that is based on the fear of the pervasive image of the author on the consciousness of critics who seek to privilege themselves by deconstructing the image of authors. Keywords: Text, author, God, critics, death

Privileging is arguably essentially natural in most gender discourses, for beyond any facile argu... more Privileging is arguably essentially natural in most gender discourses, for beyond any facile argument, gender discourses are primarily concerned about social construction, reconstruction or deconstruction of gender narrativity. For instance, even in Derridian dialectics of rupturing, where the assumed ‘logo-centre’ is to be eliminated for a privileged ‘free-play’ of ‘signs’, and where the logo-centre could be seen as representing patriarchy (a god) while the emerging world of free-play could be feminist’s or, perhaps, genderless, free-play is essentially privileged above logo-centrism. In essence, fundamental to any narrativity is privileging, be it covert or overt (Ojoniyi, 2017). And, taking Tracy Chima Utoh-Ezeajugh’s selected plays as representing dramatic narrativity of prevailing contentious gender relationship, how is privileging employed by her to foreground the dialectics of libidinal politics of power and economic survival in the home, at work and in public spaces between men and women in the plays? How is such libidinal politics played against the backdrop of resistance and the forceful renegotiation of power and economic balance between the two sexes in the plays? Are there ways through which ‘signs’ and their ‘significations’ are subtly employed to privilege women’s interests above men interests in the plays? And, how contentious are such ‘signs’ and ‘significations’ to resolving gender conflicts within real-time social realities in Nigeria and perhaps, in Africa? These are part of the issues that are critically examined in this paper based on the theory of dialectical-text-consciousness.

Crossings: Journal of Migration and Culture, 2017

Journal of African Media Studies, 2017

American Journal of Educational Research, Jan 23, 2015

Education, particularly its form: aims, objectives and goals could be dangerous depending on the ... more Education, particularly its form: aims, objectives and goals could be dangerous depending on the intentionality of the giver of such education. From such theory of education as "classical conditioning" and some others, we know that the form of a permitted or given education may be to programme or condition the minds of a people to always conform to a social, cultural or psychological stereotype. So, education could be a tool to force social, cultural or political conformation on a people in a subtle way. Such education makes a robot out of the people who are not really able to think through issues themselves. As a teacher, I see and deal with passive students who act like robots without original thought and native intelligence. This may be a carryover of the perversion of colonialism on their psyches and the understanding of most of the teachers and educators who took over from the colonial masters-for no doubt, their understanding, interpretation and appropriation of the interpretations of their circumstances affect and influence the form of education they have passed down to this generation. This also accounts for one of the reasons no Africa State, in spite of the available data on the primacy of mother tongue education, has reverted or officially adopted mother tongue education till today. As a Performing Artist and a teacher, my interest is therefore in using the theatre to provoke my students to social, cultural and political deconstruction of the cultural, religious and traditional ways of life that have been subtly imposed on them through educational conditioning. I have tried to do this through what I called "Theatre of Intentionality". In this paper, therefore, based on my experience with the students in two theatre workshops, I like to explore what I perceive as the place of the theory of "dialectical texts consciousness" in analysing human intentionality in other to promote generative form of education that is capable of provoking societal transformations.

International Journal of Pedagogy, Innovation and New Technologies

There is a sense in which we can speak of two levels of dominant and peripheral sexual spaces wit... more There is a sense in which we can speak of two levels of dominant and peripheral sexual spaces within the Nigerian discourse of sexuality. The dominant space deals with the generally acceptable sexual orientation that essentially draws its legitimacy from the biological configuration of sexuality within the African temper of mind. It lays claim, at one level, to the public/cultural sexual space and, at another level, to the private sexual space which also, presumably, directly follows from the cultural sexual course. On the other hand, the peripheral sexual space is seen, to put it in Guarav Desai phrase, as “any nonnormative sexual practices” (2007, p. 736). This marginal sexual orientation has perhaps largely operated within the level of private sexual space, but now it seeks to renegotiate the Nigerian cultural/public sexual space. It is this attempt to renegotiate the dominant cultural/public sexual space that seems to have raised the tension within the discourse of sexuality in ...

International Journal of Pedagogy, Innovation and New Technologies

Journal of African Cinemas, 2015

After Nietzsche declares the death of God through his oracle, Zarathustra, a lot of critics in t... more After Nietzsche declares the death of God through his oracle, Zarathustra, a lot of critics in the West like Barthes, Foucault, Fish, Derrida and others begin to equally proclaim the death or the desirability of the death of the author and his intention in Western literary temper of mind. To foreground the justification for the call for the death of the author, they attack his writing, his text, declaring that the text is unreadable and without meaning, as meaning, if there is any, is eternally deferred. This paper is my response to their works as it critically re-examines the call for and the actual proclamation of the death of the author. I declare that text is essentially readable, arguing that meaning is not actually postponed but, as a constituent of the totality of the body of knowledge, it is progressively revealed and it only cumulates. I conclude that the call for the death of the author and his intention amounts to literary fallacy, a collection of intellectual myths in Western criticism that is based on the fear of the pervasive image of the author on the consciousness of critics who seek to privilege themselves by deconstructing the image of authors.
Keywords: Text, author, God, critics, death

Journal of African Cinemas, 2015

Drafts by Olabode W Ojoniyi

Abstract This paper engages the polemics in individuals’ predisposition to crime within a cultura... more Abstract
This paper engages the polemics in individuals’ predisposition to crime within a cultural milieu that both conditions to crime and expects decorum. Authorities expect young people to learn and promote national interest, security and cohesiveness but they often bring them up within the culture of impunity, degradation and violation of fundamental human rights. There is often a great gulf between what these authorities want and how they brazenly break societal values and standards. The implication of this on the consciousness of young people and their later years of existential struggle with crime can be traced in Maami. Therefore, this paper looks at the consciousness of crime in Maami. Theoretically, the paper combines psychoanalytical and existential consciousness theories in its analysis. The paper concludes that security can only be built on a fair and equitable system that encourages the supremacy of justice within the framework of the rule of law.
Keywords: Crime, existential, consciousness, justice, Values

Race and Class as demographic parameters for the identification/classification of humanity in hie... more Race and Class as demographic parameters for the identification/classification of humanity in hierarchical order of an assumed superiority can be very sensitive and absurd. This is not unconnected with the history of the havoc caused by racial and class supremacists who seek to annihilate other races and classes of people. Historically, in relation to the mayhem of absolutist racial and class apologists, instances like the holocaust, genocide, ethnic-cleansing, apartheid, xenophobia and colonialism with their attendant traumatic memories linger on in the minds of many. This history has continued to haunt the memories of the living, shaping and reshaping their interactions based on the apprehensions of the possibility of a repeat or a reprisal of such horrors, and a very strong desire for revenge. It is the likelihood of the irrational racial and class domination of race/class supremacists on the one hand, and of subjugation and dehumanisation of the vulnerable masses on the other hand that a lot of exposed races and classes seek and attempt to re-narrate, recreate and reconstruct their culture, history and identity. These re-narration, recreation and reconstruction assume different names and concepts such as race/class retrieval, race/class apprehension or race/class explication. In this paper, I am therefore concerned about how Olu Obafemi carries out the task of race/class re-narration, recreation and reconstruction in two of his plays, Ogidi Mandate and Suicide Syndrome to foreground the need for race/class retrieval and explication from the fatalism of race/class supremacists.

There is a sense in which African Diasporic contemporary narrative-centred drama helps in the re-... more There is a sense in which African Diasporic contemporary narrative-centred drama helps in the re-conceptualisation of images, identity and the perception of “self” against the “others” within the totality of the experiences of individual that form the sum of his/her consciousness. And, if we agree with Sartre that consciousness is intentionality, it means that such images, identity, conceptualisation and perception are prompts for narrative performance action and counter action. In essence, narrative consciousness is not a mere dormant awareness and recreation of a state of being; it is perhaps an agent provocateur of crisis that often motivates characters to destructive actions. This is what we see in the recreation of Oluwole’s life in The Hounding of David Oluwale. The tragic end of Oluwole appears to have a link to the consciousness of his black “self” against that of the white “others” and this seems to, even now, underscore the uneasy life of the new African Diasporas in their host communities. It appears there is an inherently sustained overt and covert conflict in the relationship between the Diasporas and their host. It is for this reason that one feels that the understanding of the narrative consciousness of the playwright and that of the characters in the play in existential dialectical terms is necessary as we continue to engage the challenges of the life of the African Diasporas. This paper therefore analysis the consciousness of the African Diaspora “selves” against the “others” of their hosts as reflected in the play.
Keywords: Narrativity, diaspora, performance, consciousness, identity, images

This paper centres on an existential consciousness reading of the production of “Abantu Stand” by... more This paper centres on an existential consciousness reading of the production of “Abantu Stand” by Rhodes University Theatre. “Abantu Stand” is a product of pieces of workshop sketches on current social, economic and political conversations in South Africa. From my participation in the back stage conversations of the artists and the production crew towards the final making of the production, to the discussions with the audience after each performance, I realise that, of a truth, as the closing song of the performance re-echoes, “It is not yet uhuru” for the South Africans, particularly, the people on the peripheral of the society!” In “Abantu Stand,” in spite of her post-apartheid status, South Africa appears as a volatile contested space. Of course, in reality, in many areas, 70 to 85% of lands remain in the hands of the settlers. There are towns and settlements outside of towns – for till now, majority of the blacks live in shanties outside the main towns. Inequality, mutual suspicion, mismanagement and oppression operate at different levels of the society – from race to race, gender to gender and tribe to tribe. There is the challenge of gender/sexual categorisation and the tension of “coming out” in relation to the residual resisting traditional culture of heterosexuals. The sketches in the performance are woven around these contentious issues to give room for free conversations. The desire is to provoke a revolutionary change. However, one thing is evident: South Africa, with the relics of apartheid, is still a state in transition.

Conference Presentations by Olabode W Ojoniyi

Theatre, Counter Terrorism and the Nigerian Space, 2018

Deleted Journal, Mar 7, 2024

national Theatre, Nigeria, 2023

Keywords: Self-apprehension, Ego-inversion, mutilation, consciousness, centre, reconstruction

Ede: Journal of Humanities and Social Sciences, Oct 31, 2020

Crossings: Journal of Migration and Culture, 2017

Journal of African Media Studies, 2017

American Journal of Educational Research, Jan 23, 2015

International Journal of Pedagogy, Innovation and New Technologies

Journal of African Cinemas, 2015

Theatre, Counter Terrorism and the Nigerian Space, 2018

National Theatre, 2023

The making of the Nigerian theatre history is fraught with the canonical pedagoguery of diverse t... more The making of the Nigerian theatre history is fraught with the canonical
pedagoguery of diverse theatre iconoclasts within the frame of performance and literary theatre traditions. Whenever Nigerian theatre is referenced, as it is evident in many published book collections and essays, it is situated within the lenses and aesthetics of 20th century performance tradition and scholarship of theatre practitioners, playwrights/dramatists and critics such as Hubert Ogunde, Kola Ogunmola, Wole Soyinka, J.P. Clark-Bekederemo, Ola Rotimi, Zulu Sofola, Wale Ogunyemi, Femi Osofisan, Olu Obafemi, Bode Sowande, Tunde Fatunde, Jimi Solanke, Steve Abah, Tess Onwueme, Ahmed Yerima, Ebun Clark, Sam Ukala, Biodun Jeyifo, and Yemi Ogunbiyi, among others, who have strode, and still stride the Nigerian theatre scene. The thoughts and ideas of these
pedagogues still hold sway both in the manners and ways the Nigerian
academics perceive theatre, performance and criticism (Clark, 1979; Bamidele, 2013; Ogunbiyi, 2014). It is as though the Nigerian theatre history starts and ends with the contributions of these demagogues. One thing that makes the works of these dramatists and theatremakers still relevant, is the profundity of the themes and issues they treated. In fact, diverse attempts to punctuate their thoughts by 'new' artistic directions have proven abortive as only a few have passed the crucibles of becoming. Sunday Enessi Ododo (SEO) is one of the few iconoclasts of the 21st century whose oeuvres have gone through such scholastic
and practice crucibles and rightly deserves a place in Nigerian theatre history and epistemology. His works arguably compete shoulder to shoulder, and in most cases, trounce the thoughts of many traditional philosophies in theatre performance aesthetics, design and cultural studies in Nigeria.
In 2012, the life and the works of Professor Sunday Enessi Ododo (SEO)
was deservedly cerebrated and celebrated in academic compendia of well
researched papers titled A Gazelle of the Savannah: Sunday Ododo and the Framing of Techno-Cultural Performance in Nigeria 1&11 (edited by Osakue S. Omoera, Sola Adeyemi and Benedict Binebai, and published in Rochester, United Kingdom by Alpha Crownes Publishers). And, within the space of the last ten years after those major publications, the life, professional and academic contributions of SEO seem to have been propelled by such invisible powers that are attributive of what only the gods in their extraterrestrial glory can do or make happen. Just as the oracular Olu Obafemi in his foreword to the 'Gazelle books' had prophetically affirmed that “the Gazelle is a swift, savannah habitat antelopen with kinship with huger animals like the deer and the reindeer…Sunday Ododo is intellectually swift, even springy, in spite of the recent hugeness of his physiognomy, which aptly embodies the giantry of his intellect…I have been most privileged to watch this swift African antelope in the Okene Savannah, evolve into a physical, creative and scholarly Reindeer – large deer of the Savannah” ) nothing could have been truer of SEO's academic and professional strides” (Obafemi, 2012).
Without a doubt, SEO has become a pan-Nigeria theatre academic
Facekuerade, to borrow the term he coined in theorising the place of the maskless Ekuechi masquerades of the Ebira people of Kogi State, Nigeria (Ododo, 2004; 2007; 2008; 2009; 2010; Omoera, 2012). It is indeed to the credit of this academic enigma that African scholars and researchers have begun to robustly interrogate the liminality and theatricality of the presence of the ancestral spirits in African mask-less masquerade arts and acts (Ododo & Okoye, 2019). It is his work that opened up the exploration of the margins of human consciousness of space and time beyond the wearing of any physical masques in African masquerade arts. Today, all over the world, researchers have continued to interrogate the myths of Facekuerade aesthetics arts as a form of theatre on the margins of transcendental human performance consciousness (Omoera, 2012;
Ododo & Okoye, 2019).
The currency of Sunday Enessi Ododo's (SEO's) contributions to African
theatre appears to challenge the African philosophical thought that 'a tree does not make a forest.' It seems SEO is one tree that has become a forest considering the quantum and depth of his contributions to theatre, cultural studies, media arts, performance aesthetics, theatre technology, scenography, critical theory, arts, cultural administration/management and creative writing in Nigeria and beyond. SEO's multidimensional creative enterprise has created formidable platforms for his elders, peers, and mentees to luxuriate academically and professionally in Nigeria and elsewhere. The person, personality, and career of SEO as a theatremaker, anthropologist, theatre technologist, theatre manager, theatreprenuer, theatre teacher and culturologist is diachronically inspiring,
humbling, and challenging at the same time. This book comprises critical and honourific articles on the works of Sunday Enessi Ododo (SEO), theatre technology, literature, cultural communication, and humanistic studies generally. It is divided into five parts: perspectives on Sunday Enessi Ododo's dramaturgy and other literary works; sociology of literature and humanistic sciences; theatre aesthetics, technology, film and cultural communication; interviews with Sunday Enessi Ododo; and tributes, reflections and reminiscences.
The first section of this collection documents critical essays on SEO from
the standpoints of alterism, dialectics, theatre directing, design philosophies and phono-stylistics. It reinforces the creative energies of SEO vis-a-vis theintegral gears of “the orange economy” (Buitrago & Duque, 2013), which the CCIs encapsulate and revolve around. Importantly, the issue of 'publish or perish' in the Nigerian university system and how the radar is turning to 'fund or fail', especially at the level of research universities should be considered. It is imperative that academics in Nigeria strike a balance between 'publish or perish' and 'fund or fail' notions with a view to escalating their quota in the global marketplace of knowledge generation and dissemination. We thank all the
contributors for their cooperation, understanding and faith in us. We are
indebted to the celebrator and our families for their love, encouragement and goodwill. We thank God for the unity of purpose that enabled us to work together and berth a first-rate book.

One Tree a Forest: Studies in Nigerian Theatre Poetics, Technology and Cultural Aesthetics: A Book in Honour of Sunday Enessi Ododo (SEO), 2023

The currency of Sunday Enessi Ododo’s (SEO’s) contributions to African theatre appears to challen... more The currency of Sunday Enessi Ododo’s (SEO’s) contributions to African theatre appears to challenge the African philosophical thought that ‘a tree does not make a forest.’ It seems SEO is one tree that has become a forest considering the quantum and depth of his contributions to theatre, cultural studies, media arts, performance aesthetics, theatre technology, scenography, critical theory, arts, cultural administration/management and creative writing in Nigeria and beyond. SEO’s multidimensional creative enterprise has created formidable platforms for his elders, peers, and mentees to luxuriate academically and professionally in Nigeria and elsewhere. The person, personality, and career of SEO as a theatremaker, anthropologist, theatre technologist, theatre manager, theatreprenuer, theatre teacher and culturologist is diachronically inspiring, humbling, and challenging at the same time. This book comprises critical and honourific articles on the works of Sunday Enessi Ododo (SEO), theatre technology, literature, cultural communication, and humanistic studies generally. It is divided into five parts: perspectives on Sunday Enessi Ododo’s dramaturgy and other literary works; sociology of literature and humanistic sciences; theatre aesthetics, technology, film and cultural communication; interviews with Sunday Enessi Ododo; and tributes, reflections and reminiscences.