Prof. Abimbola Omotayo Adesoji
Short-Term Fellow
April–June 2026
Bio
Abimbola O. Adesoji teaches History at Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Nigeria. He was Georg Forster Fellow of the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation at Goethe University, Frankfurt, Germany from 2009 to 2010, 2013, 2017 and 2021. He was Acting Head, Department of History, Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Ngeria, 2011-2013, 2015-2017, and Full Head, 2024-2025. He is a member of the Nigeria Academy of Letters.
He is the author of Youth, Security and Community Development in Nigerian Conflict and Post-Conflict Eras (Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2025). His recent essays engage meanings and contradictions in the Yorùbá value system, the adaptability of NGOs in Nigeria’s changing political space, and the trajectory of historical scholarship and training at Ife, with contributions to edited volumes from Segundo Selo (Salvador) and Berghahn Books, as well as to History in Africa: A Journal of Debates, Methods and Source Analysis. He serves as Editor-in-Chief of the Ife Journal of History at Obafemi Awolowo University and as a member of the editorial board of Sage Open (Humanities).
Research
Traditional and Contemporary Yoruba History, Socio-Political History of Nigeria
Regions
Yorubaland, Nigeria
Languages
Yoruba, English
Books
Youth, Security and Community Development in Nigerian Conflict and Post-Conflict Eras, Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2025.
Articles
“Historical Scholarship and Training at Ife: Contemporary Progress, Historical Legacies and Positive Future, 1962-2022,” (co-authored with Saheed Amusa), History in Africa: A Journal of Debates, Methods and Source Analysis, Vol. 50 (2023), 327-351.
“Negotiating Tightropes: A Historical Appraisal of NGOs and their Adaptability in Nigeria’s Changing Political Space,” in Melina C. Kalfeis and Kathrin Knodel (eds.), NGOs and Lifeworlds in Africa: Transdisciplinary Perspectives, New York: Berghahn Books, 2021, 203-225.
“Beyond Thoughts and Words: Meanings, Contradictions and Contexts in Yoruba Value System,” in Felix Ayoh Omidire, Jare Oladosu, Gbenga Fasiku and Victor Alumona (eds.), Philosophy and Culture: Interrogating the Nexus, Salvador, Brazil: Segundo Selo, 2020, 125-158.
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