Megashrines: Modernity and the Reconfiguration of Òrìṣà worship -- Research seminar with Dr Olúwábùnmi Bernard

Dr Olúwábùnmi Bernard will present her research under the title “Megashrines: Modernity and the Reconfiguration of Òrìṣà worship”

The Leeds University Centre for African Studies and the Centre for Religion and Public Life are hosting a joint research seminar, open to all interested students and staff. In this seminar, Dr Olúwábùnmi Bernard will present her research under the title “Megashrines: Modernity and the Reconfiguration of Òrìṣà worship”.

Presentation

The introduction of Christianity to indigenous Yorùbá in the mid-nineteenth century strategically adopted aspects of Yorùbá culture, including the Òrìṣà (deity) worship (Yorùbá Indigenous Religion) and spiritualities to make it acceptable and appealing to the people. The penetration of Christianity in the Yorùbá society resulted in a lot of disruptions that diminished the influence of Òrìṣà worship and demonized its practices. In order to survive the onslaught of its structures and practices as a result of the advent of Christianity, Òrìṣà worship lent itself to modernity in the form of “Ilé-Ìjúbà” which I refer to as Megashrines. I suggest the term “megashrine” to describe the meeting houses where Òrìṣà worshippers congregate weekly. Against this backdrop, this presentation discusses the case study of the Òrìṣà worship experiences vis-à-vis Charismatic Christianity in postcolonial Nigeria. I will present a historical overview of megashrines to demonstrate how Òrìṣà worship and spiritualities intersect, interact, connect, and borrow from Christianity, especially Pentecostalism, as it strives to maintain, sustain, revitalize, and preserve the relevance of its religious ideologies in postcolonial Nigeria.

Speaker

Dr Olúwábùnmi Bernard holds a Ph.D. in Yorùbá Language and Literature from Obafemi Awolowo University, Nigeria where she taught Yorùbá literature and culture in undergraduate and graduate studies programmes for ten years. She is currently a postdoctoral research fellow at Ghent University, Belgium, working as part of an ERC-funded project on Yorùbá Print Culture. She previously held prestigious fellowships, including the University of Michigan African Presidential Scholars Program (UMAPS), the A.G. Leventis Fellowship at SOAS University of London, the Leventis Fellowship at the Centre of African Studies, University of Cambridge, African Humanities Program (AHP) postdoctoral fellowship sponsored by American Council of Learned Societies (ACLS), and the Netherlands Institute of Advanced Study (NIAS) individual fellowship.

Her research interests include Yorùbá language, Yorùbá oral and written literature, gender and sexuality, postcolonial, and environmental studies. She has authored papers in these areas. Her monograph  “The Gods are Wise: Environmental Sustainability in Yorùbá Sacred Orature” is currently under review by Oxford University Press.

Her presentation at Leeds is part of her current book project on indigenous Yorùbá religion in modern Nigeria.