"Iwa Exists Past the Grave"

This week’s lecture, given by Segun Gbadegesin, was titled “Omuluabi: Self Actualization and Communal Responsibility”. In the beginning of his talk, Dr. Gebadagesin discussed the Seminar’s overarching question that we are required to answer at the end of the semester. It wasn’t until he began to make emphasis on the “advancement and transformation of academic knowledge” part of the question that I began to really pay attention. He made the very interesting point that academic knowledge involves the “orthodoxy”: the idea that “African’s have no history” or that “there is no such thing as black philosophy”. The transformation of this academic knowledge is to challenge the orthodoxy; to research and discover new information that may dispute or bring new light to this orthodoxy.

Dr. Gbadegesin then went on to define and connect the words “knowledge” (“the acquisition of factual information without insight into their supporting reasons”), “wisdom” (“a master of personal relations who is skilled in turning his/her humanly oriented knowledge to serve the process of human relations”), “intellectual”, and “philosopher” (“one whose hear is informed about these thing which would be otherwise ignored”). Hearing these four words, used fairly often in conversation, be defined helped me really understand the significance of each of them; each word is connected to each other in a way that I never realized. Dr. Gbadegesin went on to say that philosophy and basic learning all started in classical Africa – an echo of one of Dr. Carr’s main points made in last week’s lecture.

I think the one point that really stood out to me about this entire lecture was when Dr. Gbadegesin discussed the meaning of “Omoluabi” which is “a child begotten of the chief (or source) of Iwa”, the word “Iwa” being of most importance. “Iwa” is directly defined as a person’s “existence” or their “character”. I learned that in Yoruba culture, people believe that when one loses their Iwa (existence), they are nothing; when someone loses their Iwa (character), they have lost themselves completely. According to a Nigerian poem he mentioned, even when physical beauty and honor grow dull, Iwa will always exist past the grave. Dr. Gbadegesin continued to explain that your Iwa is important when it comes to self-responsibility and communal responsibility. Responsibility to the self and the community is dependent on how strong one’s Iwa is; if your character and/or existence is strong, you will be able to serve yourself and your community with your education and knowledge.

“Omoluabi” and “Iwa” are just small parts of what will help us answer the big question of this Seminar course. I think and hope that learning more about my Iwa, and therefore my self and communal responsibility, will help us as Howard students develop a clear solution to the question of how the transformation of knowledge will solve the current human condition.