2025 Jan Vansina Lecture
Speaker: Toyin Falola
Time: 12:00 pm- 1:00 pm CST
Venue: 206 Ingraham Hall
(This in-person event was livestreamed) Click here to watch recording
Talk Description
Jan Vansina was one of the founding fathers of the academic historiography of Africa when he established that oral traditions were a valid historical source from a position of relative power after he realized the hegemony of written text. With the multidisciplinary method that combines linguistics, archeology, and anthropology, he provided several original contributions to the knowledge of African precolonial societies in general and Central African ones in particular. His work led not only to a historical method revolution but also to the controversies over the reliability of oral sources and the necessity for a place-specific conceptual framework. As a result of Vansina’s impact on the African Studies field, today’s works in oral history, digital humanities, and historical reconstruction have and continue to have a long and significant reach in the field. The criticisms made have been healthy challenges that continue to move the frontier of knowledge. His impact will continue to live on as we continue to expand on his techniques. The voices of Africa must continue to play a prominent part in any production of a true-to-form history of the continent. As we turn away from his central methodological tenets, we demean African Studies and African history. As we turn primarily to the colonial and the postcolonial, we have now totally abandoned the precolonial, the longest and most enduring period in African history.
Speaker’s Bio
Toyin Falola, Ph.D., is Professor of History, the Jacob and Frances Sanger Mossiker Chair in the Humanities, and University Distinguished Teaching Professor at the University of Texas at Austin. A recipient of 28 honorary doctorates, an annual conference has been named after him: TOFAC (Toyin Falola Annual Conference on Africa and the African Diaspora). The Association of Third World Studies has named its annual best book after him as the Toyin Falola Prize for the best book on Africa. He has contributed to various academic associations, once serving as the President of the African Studies Association. He has a forthcoming book, Malaika and the Seven Heavens, the third installment of his memoir.
The event is free and open to the public.