Old Wine in New Bottle

Abstract

It is a fact that human culture is dynamic. This dynamism is often occasioned by the flow of human movement juxtaposed with environmental circumstances. In the process of social changes it is very difficult for any culture to retain its pristine character. In view of this conclusion, this article will explore how Yoruba culture has been able to demonstrate its resilience and dynamism in the aftermath of its encounter with Christianity, introduced by Western missionaries. The activities of the missionaries, in one way or another, undermined the culture of the Yoruba people. The article will also highlight how Yoruba culture has been able to re-engineer and renegotiate its character in the process of its dialogue with Christianity. It will further show that in spite of the attempt by Christianity to stifle Yoruba culture it has become resurgent in a new form, as manifested in Aladura Christianity. Therefore, the factors that helped elements of Yoruba culture to survive in the contemporary expression of Christianity in Nigeria become the central focus of this article. In-depth interviews and participant observations were utilized to gather data for the article. The data collected was subjected to a detailed descriptive analysis, which in turn gave rise to the overarching conclusions in the essay.

Cite this work

No public copy is stored for this record, so only the metadata is cited.

Stored only when both papers are in the corpus — 5 citations exist upstream.

Papers that cite the same references — the relational fallback while embeddings are still backfilling.