Olakunbi Olasope


Olakunbi Ojuolape Olasope is a Professor in the Department of Classics at the University of Ibadan in Nigeria. She is an expert on Roman social history, Greek and Roman theatre, and Yoruba classical performance culture. Olasope is known in particular for her work on the reception of classical drama in West Africa, especially the work of the Nigerian dramatist Femi Olofisan.

Education

Olasope studied Classics at the University of Ibadan, completing her BA in 1991 and MA in 1994. Her doctoral thesis, The Ideal of Univira in Traditional Marriage Systems in Ancient Rome and Yorubaland, was awarded in 2005. In 2002, she was a visiting scholar at the Department of Classics of the University of Texas at Austin.

Career

Olasope began teaching at the University of Ibadan as an Assistant Lecturer in 1997. She was promoted to Lecturer II in 1999, Lecturer I in 2004, Senior Lecturer in 2007 and became a Reader in 2011. She became a Full Professor of Classics in 2016. She has previously held the position of Head of the Department of Classics. In 2005/2006, she held a University of Ibadan Senate Research Grant. She was a British Academy Visiting Fellow at Oriel College, Oxford in 2007. She has also been a visiting scholar at the University of Reading. Olasope is an institutional member of the Classical Reception Studies Network for the University of Ibadan. In 2018-19 Olasope is a visiting scholar at the University of Ghana, Legon.
Olasope has published extensively on Roman social history and comparative studies of Roman and Yoruba social history. Principally Olasope's work focuses on the position of women in Roman and Yoruba society, and those societies' views of women's virtue. Additionally, Olasope's comparative work on Roman and Nigerian material culture resulted in her 2009 monograph Roman Jewelleries, Benin Beads for Class Structures: Significance of Adornment in Ancient Cultures.
, 2019
Olasope is primarily known for her work on modern West African drama which draws on classical themes and precedents. She is a significant contributor to work on the Nigerian playwright Femi Osofisan, on whom she co-convened a major international conference in 2016. Olasope also edited a volume of interviews with Osofisan, described by one reviewer as containing some 'very valuable' interviews and playing an important role in making Osofisan's works more widely available. Olasope has written a series of articles on Osofisan's work, focusing on the use of plays by Sophocles and Euripides in modern Nigerian drama and literature, particularly focusing on The Trojan Women and Women of Owu. Olasope's work on Osofisan and classical reception is widely recognised in Nigerian media sources.
Olasope has worked to promote the study of Classics in West Africa through the promotion of Classics in secondary schools in Ibadan, Nigeria, but more significantly with the Classical Association of Ghana by co-organising the Association's founding conference on 'Classics and Global Humanities in Ghana'. At this conference the keynote speaker Barbara Goff noted the challenges the departments in Ghana have faced in establishing themselves as centres of research and teaching in the classics and that the very existence of the conference underlines how classics has become a more global discipline over the past few years. Olasope's work promoting the study of classics and its relevance in West Africa has been featured in the Nigerian and Ghanaian media.

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