J. F. Ade Ajayi: his life and career ed. by Michael Omolewa and Akinjide Osuntokun (review)

A festschrift for Professor Emeritus J. F. Ade Ajayi is the least that could be done to honour a man who refined the tools of analysis for African history in the face of its denial in the 1950s. Ade Ajayi was not just a historian but a celebrated educationist and administrator who, together with colleagues including Kenneth Dike, Saburi Biobaku, Bethwell Ogot and Roland Oliver, advanced the study of African history, contributed his quota to the development of the universities of Ibadan and Lagos, drove forward curricular development in African universities, and became a leading figure of historical scholarship internationally. Many historians and academics across the world owe him a debt and this festschrift is well deserved.

The book, J. F. Ade Ajayi: his life and career, is divided into thirteen sections and thirty-two chapters. The contributors shed light on the multiple facets of the J. F. Ade Ajayi phenomenon in Nigerian, African and global historical scholarship. Reading the chapters, it soon becomes clear that the rather biographical title of the book is only remotely connected to the totality of Ajayi's academic scholarship and stature in the international arena. The book goes far beyond this by establishing the reach and breadth of scholarly argument and debate inspired by Ajayi.

The chapter on Ajayi's post-secondary school years by Festus Ogunlade aptly reveals that he benefited greatly from support by Jack Simmons of University College, Leicester. Ajayi's period of tutelage under Simmons no doubt paid off when he moved to King's College, University of London, where he completed his PhD under G. S. Graham, and also at University College, Ibadan, where he later became one of the brains behind the Ibadan School of History. The section on Ajayi's scholarship, with seven engaging chapters, is an eloquent testimony to the international academic stature of Ajayi the man. Jide Osuntokun's reflection on Kenneth Dike's Trade and Politics in the Niger Delta and Saburi Biobaku's The Egba and their Neighbours captures a watershed in African historiography. Dike and Biobaku were the first to demonstrate the academic value of oral evidence in African historical reconstruction and in the process began to make the case for the validity of precolonial African history as a viable field of study.

Thanks to Ajayi's leadership, the Ibadan School of History, domiciled in the Department of History at the University of Ibadan, became the dominant school on the continent in the study of Nigerian and African history in the 1950s and 1960s. Its overt nationalism was geared towards forging a Nigerian identity through publicizing the glories of precolonial Nigerian and African society. Much use was made of oral traditions and oral history in historical reconstruction. The school adopted a potent multidisciplinary approach to gathering information. Ajayi's seminal work Christian Missions in Nigeria (1841–1891): the making of a new elite inaugurated the Ibadan history series published by the Longman Group. The school led by Ajayi succeeded in fostering the understanding that the colonial phase of African history was a mere episode in the historical development of the continent rather than the central theme of African history. The establishment of the Institute of African Studies at the University of Ibadan, which brought together experts from other disciplines such as archaeology and linguistics, further supported interdisciplinary approaches to African historical scholarship.

Toyin Falola contributes an insightful chapter on re-thinking the humanities in Africa, which goes a long way to re-examine the importance of A. E. Afigbo's seminal work 'The poverty of African historiography'. A complementary chapter by Hakeem Tijani demonstrates the erudition of the pedagogy of Ade Ajayi.

Although the overlapping nature of some of the issues raised does not detract from the quality of the book, some of the factual errors (see, for example, p. 160, 286 and 338) could have been avoided. But this does not detract...