Anthropology Colloquium
This talk examines the Oyo Empire (ca. 1600–1836) through the lens of domesticity, household organization, and the politics of dependency. Multi-sited excavations in the metropolis (Oyo-Ile) and the colony of Ede-Ile suggest the Oyo Empire was constituted through layered domestic practices and that governance was deeply household-centered. Beyond solely formal political institutions, everyday practices—cooking, crafting, animal management, gendered labor, and household relations—underpinned governance in one of West Africa’s largest states. The talk will show how innovations in domestic technologies transformed domestic labor, reconfigured the empire’s political economy, and expanded its participation in the merchant capital revolution of the early modern period.
Co-sponsored by Department of History, African Cultural Studies, African Studies Program