Professor Biodun Jeyifo, eminent scholar, literary critic and former ASUU president, dies at 80 from renal failure
Professor Biodun Jeyifo, the renowned scholar, literary critic, public intellectual, Marxist thinker and committed trade unionist, is dead.
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The globally respected intellectual, widely known as BJ, died on Wednesday of renal failure, one month and five days after celebrating his 80th birthday in Lagos.
Born in Ibadan, Nigeria, Jeyifo earned a first-class degree in English from the University of Ibadan in 1970.
He obtained his master’s degree from the same institution in 1973 before completing his doctorate at New York University in 1975.
He also received a Doctor of Letters (DLitt) honoris causa from Obafemi Awolowo University — formerly the University of Ife — where he taught for many years. Reflecting on his time at Ife, Jeyifo once noted that it was there he became “the kind of teacher and person I had always tried to become.”
Jeyifo went on to hold senior academic positions at Cornell University and Harvard University, where he served as Professor Emeritus of African and African American Studies and Comparative Literature until his passing.
His scholarship spanned a wide range of disciplines, reflecting his lifelong commitment to knowledge as a tool for social transformation. His areas of expertise included:
- African and Caribbean Anglophone literatures
- Theatrical theory and dramatic literature
- Comparative African and Afro-American critical thought
- Marxist literary and cultural theory
- Colonial and postcolonial studies
- Twentieth-century revolutionary social philosophy and literature
Authority on Wole Soyinka
Professor Jeyifo is widely regarded as the world’s foremost scholarly authority on Wole Soyinka.
His landmark book, “Wole Soyinka: Politics, Poetics and Postcolonialism” (Cambridge University Press, 2004), is considered the most comprehensive and sophisticated single-author study of any writer in African postcolonial scholarship.
Among his other notable works are:
The Truthful Lie: Essays in the Sociology of African Drama (1985)
Things Fall Apart, Things Fall Together (2010)
Against the Predators’ Republic (2016)
Apostrophes: To Friendship, Socialism and Democracy (2021)
Trade Union and Public Engagement
Beyond academia, Jeyifo played a pioneering role in Nigeria’s university system as the first National President of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU).
He remained an influential voice in public discourse through journalism, essays, and critical interventions on democracy, socialism, and social justice.
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Professor Biodun Jeyifo’s passing marks the end of an era in African literary scholarship and progressive intellectual thought. He leaves behind a towering legacy in academia, activism, and critical theory.
