Prof. ADEBOYE A.O.

TITLE: PROFESSOR

NAME: OLUFUNKE ASAKE ADEBOYE

POSITION: Professor

EDUCATION/TRAINING

PERSONAL STATEMENT

I am a senior scholar with over thirty years in academic research and teaching. My research broadly covers Social and Gender History in Africa, African Historiography, Pentecostalism in West Africa and 19^th and 20^th century Yoruba society on which I have published extensively. My current research is on African Historiography and it explores how traditional and modern political actors continue to use history as a tool for negotiating political identity, privilege and dominance in some parts of Yorubaland. My aim is to deploy the study of history as a tool to detangle previously intractable issues in contemporary society.

POSITIONS, SCIENTIFIC APPOINTMENTS, AND HONOURS

• Vice President, International Commission for the History and Theory of Historiography (ICHTH), a Commission of the International Congress for Historical Sciences (2022 – 2026).
• Fellow, Nigerian Academy of Letters (FNAL). Fellowship conferred at the 25^thAnnual Convocation of the Nigerian Academy of Letters held at the University of Lagos in August 2023.
• Dean, Faculty of Arts, August 2019 to July 2023 (Two terms).
• 2013 Gerti Hesseling Prize (awarded by AEGIS- Africa Europe Group for Interdisciplinary Studies) for the Best Contribution to a European African Studies Journalby an African Scholar. [Winning Essay: “A Church in a Cinema Hall? Pentecostal Appropriation of Public Space in Nigeria”, Journal of Religion in Africa, 42:2 (2012), 1-27].
• Member, Editorial and Advisory Board, African Historical Review(Published by Routledge and the University of South Africa), Journal of Religion in Africa (Published by Brill Publishers, Leiden), Religion and Society: Advances in Research (Published by Berghahn Books, London and New York), Religion and Development (Published by Faculty of Theology, Humboldt University, Berlin), Anthem Studies (Book Series) in Religion, Space and Design (Published by Anthem Publishers, London, New York).
• Expert Reviewerfor African Studies Review (USA), Africa Today (USA), Africa: Journal of the International African Institute (UK), Journal of Religion in Africa (Netherlands), Critical Research on Religion (USA), Religions (USA), Journal of History and Diplomatic Studies (Nigeria), and Lagos Historical Review (Nigeria), African Historical Review (South Africa), Unilag Journal of Humanities (Nigeria), Lagos Notes and Records (Nigeria).
• Executive Editor, Lagos Historical Review(2008-2016) available at https://www.ajol.info/index.php/lhr ; Editor-in-Chief, Lagos Notes and Records (2019-2023) available at https://lnr.unilag.edu.ng/ 
• Recent Keynotes: (1) “Women and Nation-Building in Post-Colonial Africa”, Keynote Lecture delivered at an International Conference on Women and the History of State Building in Africa, held at the University of Vienna, Austria, 6-7 June, 2024. (2) “Where is History Going in Africa?” Keynote Address delivered at the 23^rdInternational Congress of Historical Sciences, University of Adam Mickiewicz, Poznan, Poland, August 21, 2022.
• Post-Doctoral Fellowships: Commonwealth Academic Staff Fellowship, University of Cambridge, UK, 2009/2010; Five College African Scholars Fellowship, University of Massachusetts/Amherst College, USA, 2006; Cadbury Fellowship, Centre of West African Studies, University of Birmingham, UK, 2004.
• National Service: Member, Scientific Committee set up by the Federal Government of Nigeria in 2013 to prepare the “Country Report” on 100 Years of the Nigerian Woman to mark the Centenary Anniversary of the Nigeria in 2014; Member, Presidential Advisory Committee on National Dialogue set up by President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan, 2013/2014, Nigeria.

SELECTED MOST RECENT PUBLICATIONS/ CONTRIBUTIONS TO KNOWLEDGE.

• Adeboye, O.and Awe, B. (eds.) Nigerian Women in Politics: Essays in Honour of Nina Emma Mba (Lagos: Ben and Nina Mba Foundation, 2022). [This publication appraises the current practice of women’s studies and gender history and highlights continuities and changes. It showcases new actors/agents, stable and mutating political systems, challenges faced by women and how they are surmounted, and calls for a reordering of the status quo.]
• Adeboye, O. “Where is History Going in Africa/”, Storia della Storiografia, (Turin, Italy) 82:2(2022), 11-27. [This article traces the journey of African history through its popular and academic trajectories, unearthing the roots of modern African historiography. It discusses the multiple dimensions of the crisis faced by the discipline in the last quarter of the twentieth century and also addresses the contemporary state of history in selected parts of the continent.  It concludes by identifying what the future holds for the discipline in Africa].
• Adogame, A., Adeboye, O. and Williams, C. (eds.) Fighting in God’s Name: Religion and Conflict in Local-Global Perspectives(Lanham MD: Lexington Books,2020). [This edited collection provides a critical, interdisciplinary examination of the relationship between religion, conflict, violence, and tolerance from a local-global perspective. It reflects and advances interest in the empirical and theoretical development of religion, conflict and peace studies].
• Adeboye, O. “A Starving Man Cannot Shout Halleluyah: African Pentecostal Churches and the Challenge if Promoting Sustainable Development”, in Philipp Ohlmann, Wilhelm Grab and Marie-Luise Frost (eds.), African Initiated Christianity and the Decolonization of Development: Sustainable Development in Pentecostal and Independent Churches(New York: Routledge, 2020), 115-135. [This chapter examines the contribution of African Pentecostal churches to the promotion of sustainable development, using the Redeemed Christian Church of God (RCCG), an indigenous Nigerian church, as case study. It underscores the significance of viable structures and policies and adoption of global best practices as the bedrock of sustainable development].
• Adeboye, O. “Framing Female Leadership on Stage and Screen in Yorubaland: Efunsetan Aniwura Revisited”, Gender & History, Vol. 30, No. 3, (October 2018), 666-681 (Wiley-Blackwell). [This article explores the subject of character framing in a Yoruba historical film, Efunsetan Aniwura. It argues that the version of the past disseminated by the film was that of local, educated patriarchal authorities who had a deep-seated distrust of female leadership. Hence, the heroine was represented in a very negative manner, which subsequently affected her posterity negatively. The intervention of feminist scholars challenging emerging gender misrepresentations is also underscored in the publication].

COLLABORATORS/ NETWORKS

• Afe Adogame, Princeton Theological Seminary, USA.
• Philipp Ohlmann, Humboldt University, Germany.
• Krzysztof Nawratek, University of Sheffield, United Kingdom.
• Sara Panata, French National Centre for Scientific Research, Bourdeaux, France.
• Sharon Omotosho, Institute of African Studies, University of Ibadan.