USA Africa Dialogue Series - Re: "Abiola Irele at 75: Why I Returned Home" [ Challenges of the African Scholar ]

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Chambi Chachage <chambi78@yahoo.com>
Date: 23 May 2011 at 21:30
Subject: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Re: "Abiola Irele at 75: Why I Returned Home"
To: USA Africa Dialogue <USAAfricaDialogue@googlegroups.com>

I had the privilege of attending a summer school that had F. Abiola Irele as one of the lecturers. Some students gave the Prof. a very hard time and almost ousted him. His take of it is something I am still trying to make full sense of - he told me they were behaving so because of 'postmodernism'.
 

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From: Moses Ebe Ochonu <meochonu@gmail.com>
To: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com
Sent: Mon, May 23, 2011 4:04:24 PM
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - FW: " Abiola Irele at 75: Why I Returned Home."

Many of us can relate to these words from Professor Irele. We all have personal examples of how you're expected to prove yourself to be the opposite of what they assumed you to be--a dumb, English-as-a-second-language, African Sambo. The hilarity of it comes out when they try to test you out or try to impose a certain pedagogical method on you--as this nameless young women did to Irele. But you turn the tables--and the joke--on the them.

 

SOME years back conditions in Nigerian universities forced some of you out. Now, you're back again into the same environment full circle. What could have changed? What is the motivation?

Well, what changed is that I felt I'd done enough over there. But I began to have a sense of 'I don't really ultimately belong over there'. And you know, there are problems as an African, as a black person. I don't want to abuse the American university; they've been very welcoming to us, and they've been very fair. But there's still a strong element, fairly discernable element of racism in the American system, which you encounter in small ways, in big ways, all the time, which made me uncomfortable.
In the bigger universities, it's as if it's a privilege they are doing you. And, sometimes the students doubt whether in fact you're capable; they have not read you; they haven't taken the trouble. I was teaching Aime Cesaire, one of them — a girl — she wanted me to give her the literal meaning of every line in the poem. That's not how to teach literature. A poems works by images, and I was explaining those images. And she kept asking what the lines meant as if it was prose. I couldn't do that.
This girl then said, in the assessment of professors that students do at the end of the year, and she wrote, I knew that it was her (they do it anonymously), that although Irele is a very brilliant man, he can't explain anything to us. She wanted a literal explanation of Aime Cesaire; I'm not going to do that. I did an edition of Cesaire's poems, a commentary. She didn't bother to even read that commentary. They expect you to be their servant; it's incredible. I'm going back to teach in the summer, and one of them who wants to enroll in my course has sent me two emails already asking me what they are expected to do, how many pages do you want us to read, how many books do you want us to read?
This is the kind of approach that I hate, that I'm very uncomfortable with in the American system, where the student is given this feeling that the professor is a servant to them. In the American system, the student is a client because they pay fees, and you have to satisfy them. It's very bad for learning. But let me not exaggerate; I've had some great students, particularly graduate students where you have one-on-one relation. I have some great experience. Although it's not been one-way but there is that aspect where you're not fully comfortable, and I felt let me go back home!

 

On Mon, May 23, 2011 at 7:03 AM, Ayoola Tokunbo <toks_ayoola@hotmail.com> wrote:

 

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From: toks_ayoola@hotmail.com
To: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: " Abiola Irele at 75: Why I Returned Home."
Date: Sun, 22 May 2011 22:22:10 +0000

From: GUARDIAN [NIGERIA] of Sunday 22 May 2011
 

 ABIOLA IRELE AT 75: WHY I RETURNED HOME...
 
By   ANOTE AJELUOROU in Sunday Magazine - Arts

 
Prof. Abiola Irele ranks as one of the leading literary critics on the African continent. Formerly Professor of French, University of Ibadan, Nigeria, he was for several years Professor of African, French, and Comparative Literature at the Ohio State University. After retiring from Ohio in 2003, he became Visiting Professor of African and African American Studies at Harvard University. Among his many publications are The Cambridge History of African and Caribbean Literature (edited with Simon Gikandi) and two collections of essays, The African Experience in Literature and Ideology and The African Imagination: Literature in Africa and the Black Diaspora. He is a contributing editor to The Norton Anthology of World Literature and General Editor of the Cambridge Studies in African and Caribbean Literature series. Last week Thursday at Ibadan, where he started out as a student and teacher, a colloquium was held in his honour, where ANOTE AJELUOROU sought audience with him on some of the literary theories he has propounded over the years and his appraisal of new writing from Nigeria. Excerpts:
How does the term 'Africanist' relate to you as an African scholar in view of Africa's poor, and indeed, failed attempt at modernity?
I don't call myself an Africanist. The term is usually used of Western scholars, who specialise in African studies. And I'm not in that category. I'm an African involved in African studies as a natural subject. My studies were in English Literature, and so I applied the methods that we were taught to English Literature produced by Africans. That was the pattern that I followed.
I took a degree in English and when Chinua Achebe's novel Things Fall Apart appeared, one of the very first articles I wrote was about Chinua Achebe. And I used the terms that we use in treating English Literature; I used those same terms in discussing Achebe's novel. So it was a transfer, shall we say, of methodology from the Western area to the African area. That doesn't really make me an Africanist.
An Africanist means someone who is foreign to the culture and comes to study it; it usually applies to Anthropologists. I don't do Anthropology or anything of the sort; I'm aware of the Anthropology that has been done on Africa, and I've read quite a lot of that. Sometimes I agree with it, sometimes I don't; but I don't do Anthropology as such and I don't do Africanist research. I do African studies; that is how I will like to define myself.
In the theory of alienation of the black man that you propounded, there is the possibility of harmonising the thesis, the antithesis and synthesis. But in reality, this hasn't quite happened from what African societies have turned out to be over the years, has it?
The notion of thesis, antithesis and synthesis was brought up by Prof. Dan Izevbaye at the colloquium on me, and he was trying to describe my struggle, more or less, in the African condition, the African predicament, the cultural contractions in Africa in the colonial context and the way that I went over to Friedrick Hegel, the German philosopher, to more or less look at the concept of alienation and what Hegel called the dialectic – the movement of the mind from thesis, antithesis to synthesis.
Well, for the African intellectual who has been given Western education, you know - that dilemma remains a constant. What is your relationship to the true culture in which you have been brought up? What is your relationship to your African background? In my own case, my African background was rather diverse. My parentage is Edo State; then I grew up basically as a Yoruba-speaking person. And, it's complex already within the Nigerian context. So, I have that problem.
Now, my relationship to what is Western assumes another dimension again. And, as Osofisan (Prof. Femi) said (also at the colloquium), it's an impossible proposition to resolve. That it's impossible to resolve in a definitive way. But it does not mean you do not look at it, analyse it and try and see how to come to terms with it and how to deal with it.
For example, take polygamy. In Europe it is treated as a kind of moral failing if you marry more than one wife. In fact, you will be sent to jail for committing bigamy if you do it. And they take it as a moral issue. For me as an African, I can see their own position in the judicial system, an ethical system in Western context. But they forget that even in Judeo-Christian situation, Abraham and the other prophets had more than one wife. In the African context, it's essentially a sociological and economic issue. I will not marry a second wife; that does not mean I will condemn those who do it. This is a polygamous society.
That's one way, for instance, of looking at it. What I mean is that you bring your own cultural background into play as a viewpoint on an issue, and then you make your own judgment in the light of what you might call the conflict between two ethical systems, two moral systems. That conflict of law was happening throughout the colonial period, and colonial period introduced it. And Christianity was a major influence in introducing that division between the African and Western culture; that dualism of culture. It's an ongoing problem; we'll resolve it little by little. We must discuss it; we must look at it.
I used monogamy because it is no longer the custom. Anybody who has got Western education would usually prefer a monogamous life.
From Negritude thought to the modern, the African man has come to encounter the problem of alienation. But both the literate and illiterate are now trapped in continuing alienation from their culture. Why is it difficult for African societies to have a seamless integration of both old and modern cultures or even uphold their own?
The thrust of my inaugural lecture was precisely whether it was possible to integrate the two. I set one example there about children in the cities not knowing how to make pots from clay and so on. Well, because our forefather made pots of clay and ate from clay pots doesn't mean that we should continue to eat from clay pots. It's a trivial example but it applies to a whole range of issues. Let me even expand it: Because our forefathers used to trek, does that mean we should not use cars, telephones and so on. The cell phone is a major revolution; the digital revolution is a major revolution. Is it that because we have different means of traditional communication – talking drums, etc – does that mean we shouldn't use computers, internet, etc?
This is the kind of proposition that I'm trying to deal with. In other words, what I mean is this, borrowing from the West need not cause us any anguish. There are problems inherent in the technological civilization itself that we have to deal with. The Japanese are dealing with the quest of Nuclear contamination now and the impact of technology on the environment. These are issues we have to deal with.
We must accept that this is now a different kind of civilization with its own structure, mode of operation and instrumentalities. When you start from that point, then you can see the economic problems, the social problems; these are issues that we have to deal with. Let me also say another thing: I've come very often from Ilorin through Ogbomosho to Ibadan. Those villages on the way are destitute; the people are poor. Their houses are falling down. Those villagers must be rescued from poverty. We must do something about it and not imagine that they are living a happy life in those villages, in those conditions of poverty.
What I'm trying to say is that it is very easy to glamourise the traditional cultures and forget the inconvenience, the hardships even. We must begin very quickly to address those issues and ameliorate, alleviate their lives. Modern agriculture can help but you must be careful how you apply fertilers to prevent hazards. Technology has its problems, too. But we cannot do without it; that is what I'm trying to say. There is no way out. The only way to deal with it, take it and make our own impact on it, contribute to it, and resolve some of these contradictions. That doesn't mean that we won't play our own music; that doesn't mean that we won't speak our own languages; that doesn't mean we will not have our own philosophies, which can contribute to the wisdom of other people.
The tragedy that has befallen African languages would seem to be the height of the alienation issue, and it seems Africa has sold out on itself…
The phrase you used there, 'sold out' is loaded. There's the impression: colonial education, the colonial incursion and so on. In our context, English is introduced, and we created Nigeria, and a certain power of English language to the extent that even children of the elites do not speak the local languages, they do not speak English either. I'm against that! I'm for the use of English in very well-defined contexts; and I'm for the training of our children in indigenous languages so that they can relate to their fellow country people in the languages.
I'm also acutely aware of the power and beauty of our languages. I do not wish our languages to disappear. On the other hand, we need European languages; we need English. There's also the problem of finding a common language for the country for administrative purposes, for education and the uses of a modern civilization. It is the English language that we need for that. But we can develop our own languages, too. But we're not like Israel that revived the Hebrew, which is now unified.
If we try to impose one language over everybody, we're going to have trouble. So, it's a messy situation, yes; but we can work it out in such a way that maybe we find a solution so we teach African languages, and a European language. I will even add that teach the indigenous language of the area, then English and French. I think every African, who is educated should speak three languages – the indigenous, the English and the French; I think that is the minimum.
I don't think that the use of English is inimical to our development. Think of the millions of Chinese people that are rapidly learning English, and we're getting it here almost for free. No; let's not get sentimental here; language is a tool. It has its own value as well, especially in literature, in literary uses; we have very great literature. The oral tradition is very powerful tradition, and we need absolutely to preserve it.
What I'm advocating is that we keep our own languages; we cherish them, we develop and we also keep English and cherish it. That's why I'm worried about children of our elite that do not speak local languages. When you speak to them, they speak English back at you, and many of them speak bad English. This is the tragedy of the situation.
I grew up in Yoruba, and I went to school to learn English. I think it has not disabled anything in me.
 
YOU were at the heart of the start of a critical tradition in African literature. Could you give us insight into how it was at the time, the mood and how you got involved?
Well, when I finished here (UCI), I went to France, and had to study French and study the French-written literature and I also read African-American literature at the time. I knew I was going to come back to Ibadan to teach. And, when I was invited to write one or two things, and I began to write. One of the first articles I wrote was on the tragic conflict in Achebe's Things Fall Apart. That's how I started; and I kept being invited to come and write, give a talk and so on. Sometimes, I was able to write up my talks; sometimes I wasn't. I have manuscripts half abandoned; those ones that were complete, I published. And, they developed gradually.
I have never really published a complete book itself; that started with my Ph.D thesis. Although I got a good grade in my thesis, I wasn't happy because I did it as Sociology not really as Literature, and it didn't seem to me to have cohered. But I've published two chapters from it already. So, most of my work has been in form of essays; some are short, some are long but with lots of book reviews. I put them together as volume of essays.
Then things developed; I was appointed to Ghana to teach and then Ibadan, and it's been like that ever since. It's been a wonderful life; I've enjoyed, shall we say, the work. I can't think of any other occupation that I could have taken up other than teaching, lecturing, the intellectual, academic life. I can't think of any that I could have been good at.
Amongst some of the best known and earliest Nigerian writers – Soyinka, Achebe, Clark, Okigbo – which of them did you find easy or difficult to deal with at the time?
What was clear when I read Clark, Achebe, Soyinka, was that I'was at ease. The references are familiar, even when those references were European. I mean, J.P. Clark and I were peers here (then University College, Ibadan - UCI) together doing English; and as I read his text, all references, inferences from the English literature and then, of course, references from traditional culture, they were very clear to me. There was no question about that.
But let me make a point here: We keep saying Soyinka, Clark, Achebe over and over again. We need to get passed them to the younger writers. In the area of poetry, there is Niyi Osundare (now, a Distinguished Professor of English at The University of New Orleans), for example. Mention was made that when I started as a publisher at New Horns house, there was Harry Garuba's poetry collection Shadows and Dreams; it was the very first volume I published. My intention at that time was to concentrate on bringing out the younger writers. Also, part of my ambition was to translate from the French into English. And, I did quite a number of things, which were translations from the French into English. Unfortunately, I couldn't continue that business because I left the country, and I couldn't keep it going from abroad.
However, I'm still very anxious to make known the younger writers. Now that I have come back, I'm going to be reading them. I'll possibly be writing reviews in the newspapers, possibly in The Guardian. For example, there is this young woman, Lola Shoneyin; I've got her book The Secret Lives of Baba Segi's Wives. I look forward to reading her. There is also Sefi Atta, Chimamanda Adichie; I've read them. There are lots of young poets. So, I want to read them systematically and write essays about them. Ben Okri, too, for instance; I taught Ben Okri's The famished Road at Harvard University over a three-year period. These are ways these young writers can be treated; of course Okri is no longer a young writer in that sense.
And, of course, Nigeria literature is growing. There is a sort of renaissance now. What is being published now is not as much as one would like but it's picking up, and this is very encouraging indeed. So, I think that what you might call a Nigerian culture will be promoted, will rise in strength; it will arise.
One thing I'd like to do at Kwara State University, where I'm a college dean, is to make the place a major centre of intellectual activities using Ibadan as a model. Well, there are several models abroad – Harvard, Yale, Oxford – they have wonderful facilities, a tradition, hundreds of years of university tradition. But we're starting.
You have so much to do from the catalogue of things you'll be interested in. It would seem as if you'll never retire, would you?
I'll continue to work. The last thing I'll see happen to me is when I'm no longer able to read, to write and so on. I want to be able to continue to work. Of course, at 75 you begin to feel the burden of age. The knees, ankle, the back are painful, but I'm still walking around. I still must be able to work.
 
SOME years back conditions in Nigerian universities forced some of you out. Now, you're back again into the same environment full circle. What could have changed? What is the motivation?
Well, what changed is that I felt I'd done enough over there. But I began to have a sense of 'I don't really ultimately belong over there'. And you know, there are problems as an African, as a black person. I don't want to abuse the American university; they've been very welcoming to us, and they've been very fair. But there's still a strong element, fairly discernable element of racism in the American system, which you encounter in small ways, in big ways, all the time, which made me uncomfortable.
In the bigger universities, it's as if it's a privilege they are doing you. And, sometimes the students doubt whether in fact you're capable; they have not read you; they haven't taken the trouble. I was teaching Aime Cesaire, one of them — a girl — she wanted me to give her the literal meaning of every line in the poem. That's not how to teach literature. A poems works by images, and I was explaining those images. And she kept asking what the lines meant as if it was prose. I couldn't do that.
This girl then said, in the assessment of professors that students do at the end of the year, and she wrote, I knew that it was her (they do it anonymously), that although Irele is a very brilliant man, he can't explain anything to us. She wanted a literal explanation of Aime Cesaire; I'm not going to do that. I did an edition of Cesaire's poems, a commentary. She didn't bother to even read that commentary. They expect you to be their servant; it's incredible. I'm going back to teach in the summer, and one of them who wants to enroll in my course has sent me two emails already asking me what they are expected to do, how many pages do you want us to read, how many books do you want us to read?
This is the kind of approach that I hate, that I'm very uncomfortable with in the American system, where the student is given this feeling that the professor is a servant to them. In the American system, the student is a client because they pay fees, and you have to satisfy them. It's very bad for learning. But let me not exaggerate; I've had some great students, particularly graduate students where you have one-on-one relation. I have some great experience. Although it's not been one-way but there is that aspect where you're not fully comfortable, and I felt let me go back home!

 

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