Solomon Babalola

Solomon Adeboye Babalola (born, December 17, 1926, Ipetumodu, Osun State, Nigeria – December 15, 2008) was a Nigerian academic, poet and scholar.

Career

Babalola attended Achimota College in Ghana. After obtaining his bachelor's degree in 1946, he taught at Igbobi College. In 1948, he received a second scholarship for his bachelor's degree at Queens' College, Cambridge, earning his degree in 1952. He came back to Igbobi College to continue teaching and he rose to become the first African principal of the school, despite being the youngest staff member. He was awarded a doctoral scholarship in Yoruba literature. 1n 1962, he was appointed as a lecturer at the Institute of African Studies of Obafemi Awolowo University. He also earned a doctoral degree at the University of London. In 1963, he was professor of African Languages at the University of Lagos. In 1966, he published The Content and Form of Yoruba Ijala, published by the Oxford University Press. The work introduced Yoruba folk tales, poetic forms and an annotated anthology of Ijala (hunter's songs) poems, translated into English. It won the Amaury Talbot Prize for the best contribution to the people of West Africa's literature that year. The work also opened up for international research on African languages, under Babalola's management at the University of Lagos. The university's School of African and Asian Studies was founded in 1967, with Babalola one of three lecturers, and focused on Nigerian languages such as Yoruba, Igbo, Edo and Hausa.

Babalola's scholarly works have been prominent in preserving a great deal of African oral traditions.