Baba Rowland Abiodun, author of the groundbreaking treatise, YORUBA ART AND LANGUAGE: SEEKING THE AFRICAN IN AFRICAN ART, enlightening the audience at the University of Texas, Austin.
Gọn̄gọ́ sọ ní ọjọ́ ná à. It was an earth-shaking moment, as he took us through the meaning of art and aesthetic as a humanizing tool in the cosmogony of autochtonous African ways of creating and sharing values.
Ọwọ́ as Hand and Eye
I showed Iya Oyo the drawing of her portrait I made one day. She said, “Ọ̣wọ́ rẹ gún,” (Your hands are straight), as she admired the portrait.
Baba Oyo responded with, “Ojú rẹ̀ gún” (His eyes are straight).
I was baffled. “What is straight, my eye or my hand?” I asked them.
I arrived the United States in September 1992. When I stepped on US soil at the JFK airport I had exactly $98 in my pocket. Yet by February 1995, I successfully defended my doctoral dissertation at one of the best universities in the United States. I never enjoyed a penny of scholarship money. I was not entitled to, nor did I receive student loan. I worked my way through college.
Sunday Morning Conversation With Yahoo Boy.
He is using the account of Moyo Owotomo:
Yahoo Boy: Good morning
Me: Good morning. It’s been forever. How are you doing?
Yahoo Boy: All thanks to God
How is everything with You
I have a business i have been benefitting from and i would like to introduce to you before I forget
Me: Ok, great.
I have been home for a month now.
And I’m learning to live with the opportunities of living at home.
Here are some of these opportunities:
1. The fèrègèdè seller. Do you see her picture here?
The last time I ate fèrègèdè was when I was in the primary school, and a feregede seller came to our school during lunch time. Fèrègèdè is a special type of dark beans. You cook it for hours, and the fèrègèdè seller must start cooking in the evening and leave the beans on the wooden stove
Isn’t it so wonderful to be back home in Nigeria, to spend time on the very land in which you grew up, to measure what has remained the same, evaluate the changes, and survey the landscape with an eye irrevocably altered through gazing at other countries and interacting with foreign landscapes?
Josephine was embarrassed when I informed her that her white uniform was soaked with blood at the back.
She immediately opened the door and jumped into the bus. As she entered the bus, she realized that the seat from which she got up was already soaked in blood also. She became confused. She didn’t know whether to sit on the bloody seat, but as she hesitated, I gently led her down to the seat. Just as her uniform, the seat was already stained. No further damage could be done. What was most important at that point was her health.