By Bode Durojaiye
Colonial America generally describes the period of American history between the Pilgrims’ arrival in the New World and the victory of the colonists oer England in the American Revolution (1607–1776).
Colonial America is a fascinating chronicle full of both adventures and that interweaved difficult but necessary life lessons into the American experience.
At its foundation, it is the story of immigrants who gathered at the far side of the Atlantic and risked their lives for religious freedom and a belief in a new society.
Oyotunji, African Village is the first intentional community based on the culture of the Yoruba and Dahomey tribes of West Africa. It was founded, (1970) in the Americas.
In 2016, after over forty-five years of sustaining the only Kingdom based on traditional Yoruba sociology and value, the village brings to the Low-country and greater global community the depth of culture, beautiful art, grandeur of customs and resilient history of the New World Yoruba.
Oyotunji village in South Carolina, USA, is not part of the United States, according to the late King (Oba) Ofuntola Oseijeman Adelabu Adefunmi I, who founded it in 1970, and moved it to its present site near Sheldon because its old neighbours complained about the tourists.
Oyotunji, African Village is the first intentional community based on the culture of the Yoruba and Dahomey tribes of Africa.
The community was founded by a black America named Walter Eugene King, who was born on October 5, 1928 in Detroit, Michigan, USA.
Oyotunji’s first king was His Royal Majesty, the late Oba Adejuyigbe Adefunmi II who began his destiny on earth on December 21, 1976.
Born as the 14th child of 22 children to His Royal Highness, late Oba Efuntola Adefunmi I, and the third child of five born to Iya Esu Ogo Oyewole, Adejuyigbe Adefunmi II was raised in the Kingdom of Oyotunji African Village and began drumming at the age of seven, according to findings.
He was rooted in the traditional lifestyle of Oyotunji African Village settlement in North America and witnessed thousands of Africans in America that came to his father’s Kingdom in search of broadening their cultural awareness.
However, on April 30, 2017, the late ruler of Oyotunji village in South Carolina, USA, and his entourage paid what they referred to as ‘ancestral homage’’ to the late Alaafin of Oyo, Oba [Dr.] Lamidi Olayiwola Adeyemi 111, in his ancient palace in Oyo town.
A civic reception was organized by the late Alaafin for the visitors who were elated and could not hold back their joy for what they called ” identification with their roots”.
In his address at the occasion, Oba Adeyemi 111, expressed dismay at the extent to which the Yoruba have sold out their own culture and have adopted foreign gods as the object of their spiritual religion.
He said, ‘’as a people, our culture, politics and religious experience have been extremely unfulfilled. The Yorubas are now falling in the same condition through which the African Americans had allowed themselves to be seduced by preachers of a foreign gospel.
“We know that the universalist inspiration which has come to the Yoruba through Christianity and Islam has reduced their concern or allegiance to their own god and by extension to their own nationality. The Yoruba will be very much reduced in their political, cultural and spiritual development by their seduction into these alien religions.
“Concerted efforts must be intensified at increasing inspiration to become national or to recognise nationhood. So with that, we see the Yoruba in the diaspora, as it is popularly called, to be the Yoruba that will greatly guide and influence the Yoruba in the ancient homeland, who for the most part are tending to move away from a sense of preservation of their own culture and tradition, particularly religion”.
The late Paramount Ruler observed that it is time Yoruba at home and in Diaspora start partnering for synergy.
‘’Without doubt, we can find strength in unity . This has become imperative so that whenever our brothers and sisters in Diaspora come home, they won’t be complainers about how things are not working, but rather, they would see themselves as partners and partakers in the overall development for a better future of their home land”.
Partnership, Oba Adeyemi noted ,is a voluntary collaborative agreement between two or more parties in which all participants agree to work together to achieve a common purpose’.
Partnerships, he explained, share interest, concerns and create visions for the future.
According to him , “In this technology-driven age, when the whole world has virtually dissolved into a global village, meaningfully partnering is a foundation for success. This is because such collaboration enables continuous improvement which is created when it doesn’t seem possible to solve a problem or address the situation by just one group – due to magnitude, lack of knowledge or vague nature of the issue at stake; or when the cost of solving a problem or addressing an issue gets too costly for one group to tackle’’.
In an enterprise therefore, the late Royal Father pointed out that the best partnerships are those (either formal or informal) that have an organization or a structure with shared vision, mission and goals, involving people for maximum utilization of emerging and existing technologies.
“This regard, the kind of partnering one envisaged between the Yoruba at home and in Diaspora is the type that will provide necessary developmental planks such as intellectual, technological, communication and marketing plans for the homeland that is urgent for modern transformation. This is with a view that such an alliance will produce results that will benefit all group and process members’’.
Oba Adeyemi also commended the Oyotunji people for their resistance of the United States Government’s step to prevent the inscription of tribal marks on their faces, as identities of their ancestral roots.
Speaking with journalists, late Oba Adejuyigbe Adefunmi 11, said at the time of their interest in going into African past, the Yoruba tradition was the only one available, adding that It was not even available in the United States as they have have to travel to Maxtansas in Cuba.
According to him, “it was through Cuban-Americans that we were guided into consultation and contact with a group of descendants of Egungunme tradition. Later, we learnt that we had made the best, perhaps the finest choice because Yoruba was universally spread out and had germinated in South America all the way up at that time to Cuba.
“We learnt further that there are large numbers of African-American people who were descendants of the Yoruba tradition and culture and through books written by researchers even in South Carolina and also into the former Louisiana territory owned by France in previous generations that there had been a huge importation of Yoruba and Dahomian people. It meant that here already was a latent reservoir of descendants of the Yoruba people’’.
On his name?
Oba Adefunmi stated that they had reclaimed our name, Adefunmi, before they later became familiar with Yoruba history through Oro Idile when it was discovered that there was a chieftancy located at the ancient Oyo, named Adefunmi.
On what his childhood was like?
‘’Our childhood was typical of that of second and third generation descendants of a slave Yoruba. We were born into freedom but our grandmother often remarked of her birth during the slave era here in the U.S.A. Our childhood was one of extreme poverty, of being moved from one location to another as our family sought ways and means to earn its living and to support itself in the city of Detroit, Michigan. It was also at Detroit that our parents had met and were married. We were raised in a Christian environment.
‘’We attended high school in the U.S., all these under our slave name of Walter King. During the period of our education, we started commercial art at Cast Technical High School in Detroit. Our father died when I was 14years old in Detroit. Our mother had relocated to the suburb of Detroit but was compelled to return to the inner city after the death of our father.
Our family members, for the most part were welfare recipients and we as African-Americans were subject to various discriminatory practice prevailing in Detroit at that time. I was born in 1928, the year before the great economic depression in the U.S. which was not relieved until the installation of President Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1930.
On the real turning point in his life that really brought him full circle to embrace African Culture?
Late Oba Adefunmi retorted thus, ‘’the most significant event that took place was reading a text called My Africa written by the Igbo writer, Mbonu Ojike, who had written a chapter on religion that excited us and illuminated our knowledge and mind when he argued that whether man created.
God or God created is an unsettled argument. He also pointed out the failings and falsity of Christianity and Islam in the life of the people in Nigeria. He also commented very profoundly on the discriminating attitude and practice of the white American community.
‘’The chapter on religion was so illuminating and penetrating that
immediately after studying and meditating on it, we renounced our Christian faith, the slave tradition of Christianity and we began to search for a more African form of religion. We were also impressed by the writings of J.A. Rogers, a popular Africanist in the 20’s, 30’s and 40’s whose articles appeared regularly in Michigan Chronicle and Pittsburg Courier. These articles also opened up our mind and encouraged us to search for our African heritage at 14 years of age.
On how he would call his favorite pastime?
It has always been art works. Our ancestors have bequeathed to us skill and talent in the arts. We always elaborated on that and wherever we went; we participated with other artists. At Detroit, we engaged in very creative
pursuit for the most part to show that art was influenced by the racial attitude and condition of the African American people, arts painting , sculpture and more recently, we have extended our artistic talents and skills to writings. These have always been our main diversion from the ordinary world of an African America.
On the advice he would give to African Americans trying to find their own root?
African Americans attempting to find their own roots will be better served by adopting the Yoruba tradition which for over 30 years, we have been able to introduce into the U.S. We see the African Americans have a profound desire to re-identify with their ancestors and with an ancestral tradition.
We know that among vast numbers of African American intellectuals, there is a lack of fulfillment in their development and advancement in the Yoruba-American economic world. They found also that Christianity is unfulfilling and that Islam is misleading. So in consequence, African Americans are better served by a knowledge of the custom and tradition of their Yoruba ancestry.
On advise for the younger Yoruba generation?
Younger Yoruba generation will be able to advance to the extent that they increase the knowledge or institution among African Americans, who will serve the need for knowledge improvement through television and resurrection and introduction of stories and background images the established a sense of celebration of their African ancestry.
On how can a contemporary Yoruba personality support Oyotunji ?
Our main necessity or requirement or needs for Africans or native Yoruba can best be served by supplying us with increased knowledge with teachers of language and history, in other words, Yoruba preachers preaching Yoruba tradition, religion, ideals of marriage as well as spiritual behavior. If the coming generations of African Americans are able to receive these types of training and exposure, then there is every indication that this will become a lasting impression and institution which can be enlarged upon by African Americans. The more aggressively the Yoruba culture is advertised and subscribed to among them, the better for us all. Lastly, there is the need for support of our cultural programs.
We certainly appreciate the Egbe Isokan Yoruba for their institution of Yoruba cultural month at Washington, D.C. If we can extend this particular celebration to other locations with African American presence, Nigerians would have made the most of the sojourn and contact with African American community meaningful.
It is proof of a base and low mind for one to wish to think with the masses or majority, merely because the majority is the majority. Truth does not change because it is, or is not, believed by a majority of the people.
Bode Durojaiye, the Director of Media and Publicity to the Alaafin of Oyo
