News/Events

Poetry Lke Proverb

Our divided voice…

 

Don't ask me to join the protest 

ask me if I have food in my belly

ask me if I have limbs left 

to go to the square

I do not have the liver 

to digest this emptiness

 

will you provide snacks

as the fires crack

will you give me water

to  kill my rage 

how many billboards and placards

will become meat in my pot

 

and after the teargas, 

smoke, bullets and blood

will the food come to table

will the refineries work 

like the magic of Saudi Arabia

after the detonation

of songs, sweats and catcalls

will the guarantee of promises 

arrive fully, not like palliatives

will my broken bones mend

how many protests will quench

how many seasons of hunger 

 

But who will tell the hunters of our fate to stop...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I hear the whimpers of patriots

I am going to the junction

where the people meet

south east north and west

I will join the protest

armed with a highway of dreams 

 

I will be counted, 

a finger in the eye of tyranny

I will be the protest 

against the artificial famine

against the leaking purse

and the waste

 

You will not find me at home

watching Netflix, gwo, gwo, gwo, gwo

or the sorority of rot

I will not watch the revolution on TV

I will not be a remnant of silence

I will be the nurse in the rally

breaking barriers of tribes and faiths

standing, wobbling and stampeding

in brotherhood of new songs

If I lose a breath to the brutal baton

or my bleeding does not stop

may my blood feed the land

 

But who will tell the hunters of our fate to stop...

 

Remi Raji

24.07.24

Performing Postproverbials: Transformations and Modernities in African Studies 

DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH, UNIVERSITY OF IBADAN, NIGERIA

in conjunction with

PACE RESEARCH NETWORK

CONFERENCE THEME

Performing Postproverbials: Transformations and Modernities in African Studies 

 

New Deadline for Abstract Submission: February 28, 2019

Date: June 19 – 22, 2019

Venue: University of Ibadan, Ibadan, Nigeria

The Organizing Committee, Department of English, University of Ibadan, in conjunction with the PACE Research Network, hereby invites submissions of abstracts for participation in an international conference on the oral poetics, discourse and interpretations of postproverbials as cultural materials which are produced in various media and disciplines across the African continent.

Postproverbials are oppositions, sometimes, parallel subversions to given traditional proverbs. They exist through acts of rupture and suture, or precisely by means of the dual acts of disassemblage and reassemblage. As speech acts, they are performed deliberately or inadvertently, in linguistic events, politics, popular culture, economics, architecture, literary forms, media and other disciplines.

We are interested in other interventions on the artistic and verbal phenomenon with the implications of its production for language, culture, psychology and identity among others. Areas for paper and poster presentations are not limited to the following sub-themes:

Sub-themes

  • Proverbial Continuities and Discontinuities
  • Postproverbiality in African Languages
  • Concepts, Contexts and Categories of Proverb Transformations
  • Orality, New Orality and Postproverbial Work
  • Postproverbials and Notions of Agency 
  • Fieldwork in Postproverbial Studies
  • Postproverbiality, Cultural Identity and Hybridity
  • Deconstructive Strategies in Postproverbials
  • Postproverbials, Syncreticism in Religious Studies
  • Postmodernism and Postproverbials in Postcolonial Africa
  • Postproverbials and Popular Culture
  • Postproverbials and the City
  • Postproverbiality in Gender Discourse 
  • Translation Studies in Postproverbiality
  • Postproverbiality and Performance
  • Productions of Postproverbials in Music
  • Postproverbials in African Movies
  • Postproverbials and Anti-Proverbs
  • Postproverbials and Rhetoric
  • Postproverbials and Discourse Analysis
  • Postproverbials and Stylistics
  • Postproverbials and Pragmatics
  • Postproverbials and Speech Act Theory
  • Values and Functions of Postproverbiality
  • How to Do Things with Postproverbials

Participation and submission of abstracts

This conference is open to scholars and graduate students in the fields of anthropology, linguistics, literature, sociology, communication and media, cultural studies, performance, political science and other related disciplines. For paper presentations, panels, roundtables and posters, participants should send abstracts (not more than 250 words), indicating names, institutions/organisations, email addresses and telephone numbers.

Please mail abstracts to postproverbial@gmail.com, on or before February 28, 2019.

Registration fee

Scholars based outside Africa: $120

Africa-based scholars: $50/N25,000

Students: $15/N5,000

Registration fee covers provision of conference materials, tea breaks and lunch, and admission into evening of cultural performance. Please note that registration fee does not cover accommodation.

For all paper presenters, notification for payment of registration fee will be made on confirmation of acceptance of abstract. Late registration fee of $10/N5,000 will be charged after the close of deadline for payment.

For other participants and attendees, on-site payment of registration fee is possible.

A pre-conference workshop on grant writing and fellowship opportunities is planned to hold on June 18, 2019. Further information on the workshop will be provided in due course.

Schedule of Activities

Deadline of Abstract Submission                      February 28, 2019

Final Notice of Acceptance of Abstracts          March 10, 2019

Deadline for Payment for Registration                April 19, 2019

Pre-conference Workshop                                 June 18, 2019

Conference (arrival-departure)                        June 19-22, 2019

Post-conference (paper submission)                    July 31, 2019

Accommodation

A list of hotels for on-campus accommodation during the conference includes UI Hotels, UI Alumni Centre, Adebayo Akande Hall, Otunba Olatunde Runsewe, and the Senior Staff Club Guest House, UI. (Local rate for lodging ranges from N7,000 to N20,000 per night).  

Keynote Speakers: 

Prof. Pius Adesanmi

Department of English Language and Literature & 

the Institute of African Studies

Carleton University, Ottawa, Canada

 

Prof. (Mrs) Asabe Kabir Usman 

Department of Modern European Languages & Linguistics

Usmanu Danfodiyo University

Sokoto, Nigeria

 

Prof. J.O.J. Nwachukwu-Agbada 

Department of English 

Abia State University

Uturu, Abia State 

 

Local Organising Committee

Prof. Ayo Kehinde

Prof. Akin Odebunmi

Prof. Tayo Lamidi

Prof. Toyin Jegede

Dr. Doyin Aguoru

Dr. Charles Akinsete

Dr. Bunmi Oyemade

Akin Tella

Steve Boluwaduro

Jennifer Umezinwa

 

For further enquiries, please contact: postproverbial@gmail.com

Convener:                                                                                           Host:

Prof. Aderemi Raji-Oyelade                                                                Prof. Ayo Ogunsiji

Department of English                                                                         Head, Department of English

University of Ibadan                                                                            University of Ibadan     

Ibadan, Nigeria.                                                                                   Ibadan, Nigeria.

            

Chief Host:

Prof. Abel Idowu Olayinka, FAS, FNMGS

Vice Chancellor

University of Ibadan

Ibadan, Nigeria.

*PACE, an acronym for Postproverbials in African Cultural Expressions, is a project supported by the Alexander von Humboldt Alumni Award for Networking Initiatives.