Folake Onayemi

Folake Onayemi attended the University of Ibadan for her BA in Classics (1986), followed by an MA (1990), MPhil (1997), and PhD (2001); she was the first woman to be awarded a PhD in Classics in Nigeria, with a thesis entitled Fear of Women's Beauty in Classical and African/Yoruba Literature.[1][2] During her PhD, she spent time as a visiting scholar at Brown University, Rhode Island.[1] [2]

Onayemi was appointed as an Assistant Lecturer in the Department of Classics of the University of Ibadan in 1994, becoming the first woman to hold this position in the Department, and was successively promoted through the two grades of Lecturer (Lecturer II in 1996, Lecturer I in 1999), to Senior Lecturer in 2002, and Reader in 2005; in 2008, her promotion to Professor made her the first woman Professor of Classics in the University of Ibadan and the first black woman to be Professor of Classics in sub-saharan Africa.[2][3] Her inaugural lecture, delivered on 23 June 2016, was entitled "Paradigms of Life from Ancient Greek Literature", and explored the continuing relevance of works by Homer, Sophocles, and Plutarch to life in contemporary Nigeria.[4][5][6]

Onayemi has also been a visiting professor at the Department of Classics, University of Texas at Austin, (2001); visiting scholar in the Department of Classics, University of Ghana (2009-2010, 2013-14); held a Nigerian Academy of Letters Bayo Kuku Postdoctoral Fellowship (2004), a John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation Fellowship (2005), and an Alexander S. Onassis Foundation Fellowship (2006-7).[1][2] She is an advisor to the American Council of Learned Societies’ Humanities Programme, and the Nigerian Representative at the International Federation of the Societies of Classical Studies (FIEC); she also edits the departmental journal Nigeria and the Classics.[2]

Onayemi's research is chiefly in the field of comparative studies of Greco-Roman and Nigerian or African literature and culture, a field to which she and her colleagues at Ibadan (including Prof. Olakunbi Olasope) have made a highly significant contribution.[7] She focuses in particular on the roles of women and their representation in literature and drama, on which she has published two books[8][9] and numerous articles,[10][11] [12][13][14][15] but has also published comparative studies of Greek and Yoruba religion,[16][17] and articles on the role of Classics as a discipline in contemporary Nigerian and African culture and society.[18][19] She is also the author, with Kofi Ackah, of A Guide to Ancient Greek Literary History (2011), a textbook intended to introduce African students of Classics to a wide range of ancient Greek literary texts and their historical contexts.[20][21]

Onayemi appeared on an episode of the BBC World Service's 'The Forum', entitled 'The Iliad: Beauty, Brutes and Battles', discussing the Iliad's origins, themes, and continuing relevance to people across the world, on 7 Dec 2016; the programme was presented by Bettany Hughes, and the other participants included Edith Hall.[22] In March 2019, she delivered a keynote lecture entitled 'Yoruba Adaptations of Classical Literature' at an international conference on 'Classical Antiquity and Local Identities: from Newfoundland to Nigeria and Ghana', held at Memorial University.[23][24] Onayemi will deliver a keynote lecture at the 'Global Classics and Africa: Past, Present, and Future' conference at the University of Ghana, Legon, in October 2020.[25]

• University of Ibadan website Archived 23 May 2019 at the Wayback Machine
• Biography of Folake Onayemi Archived 23 May 2019 at the Wayback Machine
• Google Books
• Google Scholar
• Youtube - highlights of inaugural lecture
• Text of inaugural lecture