Seventh Tejumola Olaniyan Lecture
A screening of the film took place the day before, on April 21.
Speaker: Awam Amkpa
Time: 12:00 pm- 1:00 pm CST
Venue: 206 Ingraham Hall
Talk Description
This is the 7th Tejumola Olaniyan Memorial Lecture hosted by the African Studies Program (since 2024) as part of its Africa at Noon series. The speaker, Awam Amkpa, is the Vice Provost for the Arts, Dean of Arts and Humanities, and Professor of Drama, Social and Cultural Analysis at New York University Abu Dhabi (NYUAD). The lecture examined the scholarship of the late Professor Tejumola Olaniyan and the making of The Man Died (2024), which the speaker directed and for which they won Best Director at the 2025 Africa Magic Viewers’ Choice Awards (AMVCA). Based on Nobel Laureate Wole Soyinka’s harrowing prison memoir, the film chronicles his detention without trial under a brutal military regime determined to silence his voice. The lecture brings attention to the overlooked role of the literary icon in his attempt to broker peace during the Nigerian Civil War (1967–1970), also known as the Biafran War, and the ethnocentric politics that continue to undermine the unity of the Nigerian nation.
Speaker’s Bio
Awam Amkpa is the Vice Provost for the Arts; Dean of Arts and Humanities; Professor of Drama, Social and Cultural Analysis at the New York University Abu Dhabi (NYUAD). He is also affliated with NYU. He receieved a BA Obafemi Awolowo University (Ile-Ife), an MA Ahmadu Bello University (Zaria), and a PhD Bristol University. His research areas include modernisms in film and theater, postcolonial film and theater, Black Atlantic films and theater, visual arts. Awam is the author of Theatre and Postcolonial Desires (Routledge, 2003). He is director of film documentaries and curator of photographic exhibitions and film festivals. Amkpa has written several articles on representations in Africa and its diasporas, representations, and modernisms in theater, postcolonial theater, and Black Atlantic films. For his recent film, The Man Died (2024), he won the presitigous Africa Magic Viewers’ Choice Awards (AMVCA) for Best Director (2025).
This event is sponsored by the Tejumola Olaniyan Foundation (TOF).
The event is free and open to the public.