Ifa Divinatory Apprenticeship Methodology for Revitalising and Decolonizing Memory Bank Among the Yoruba of South Western Nigeria

Abstract

Ifa divinatory systems, though an oral tradition, is the memory bank of the Yoruba of south western Nigeria as well as their knowledge dissemination systems. As decolonised future is imagined, this study argues that given the emerging global place of Ifa? as oral tradition, it is capable of forging historical memory and nurturing resistance to the Eurocentric memory studies. To this end, this study unearths and unties the question of apprenticeship methodology and how this is deployed to enhance decolonised knowledge production patterns in Ifa? School of knowing. What are the apprenticeship processes? How do these apprenticeship learning processes continue to vent and reinvent, frame and reframe, think and rethink, construct and reconstruct such that it is not consumed by western memory frameworks?  How is the apprenticeship methodology sustained in spite of the overwhelming influence of western education? Transcending the boundaries of western episteme and to push that Ifa? divinatory apprenticeship methodology is a system of scientific practice.

Received: 13 March 2024 / Accepted: 24 April 2024 / Published: 5 May 2024