Speaking in Tongues: A Sociolinguistic-Stylistic Explication of the Language Style of Ẹsẹ̀-Ifa: The Yorùbá Ifá Literary corpus

Abstract

The Ifá literary corpus (Ẹsẹ̀-Ifá) is a specialized Yorùbá traditional oral poetic genre; religious in essence and cultic in practice. The religious or spiritual essence of Ẹsẹ̀-Ifá (the Ifá Verses) lies in its association with the worship of Ifá or Ọ̀rúnmìlà, the Yorùbá god of wisdom. Ẹsẹ̀-Ifá, therefore, represents the voice of the wisdom deity through which the Yorùbá relate with the Almighty God.¹

In Yorùbá studies, Ẹsẹ̀-Ifá has attracted a tremendous scholarly attention such that today, a vast literature on it exists. A mention of just a few of the scholars whose works have been deeply insightful in this regard is pertinent. They include, Bascom (1967), Abímbọ́lá (1976) and Ọlátúnjí (1984), among others. However, despite the vast literature on it, a study of Ẹsẹ̀-Ifá can never be exhaustive because of its enigmatic nature. In this paper therefore, an attempt is made at a sociolinguistic-stylistic analysis of the language style of Ẹsẹ̀-Ifá, with a view to identifying the various socio-linguistic, stylistic and rhetorical devices that make the language of Ẹsẹ̀-Ifá likened to or described as speaking in tongues. It should also be possible, in the paper, to bring to the fore the stylistic and communicative essence of the Ifá language as a specialized language of religious/cultic and literary expressions within the Yorùbá socio-cultural and religious contexts. The paper is theoretically hinged on defamiliarization, one of the basic concepts crucial to the Formalist enterprise. However, because of the nature of Ẹsẹ̀-Ifá, Formalism is complemented by socio-linguistic and stylistic methods.