Features of Yoruba Oral Poetry by O. Olatunji
From Wikipedia
Gbogbo ohun ti a bá kọ ní èdè Gẹ̀ẹ́sì ni a gbọ́dọ̀ kọ Yorùbá rẹ̀.
(This article is written in English. It needs to be translated to Yoruba.)
Features of Yoruba Oral Poetry by Olatunde O. Olatunji published by the University Press Limited, Ibadan, Nigeria in 1984. ISBN: 978 1544805 (NIGERIA)
The book is primarily an analytic study of the feature class of Yoruba oral poetry. The author describes the literary and stylistic or linguistic devices which are shared by all Yoruba oral poetic forms before isolating which of these features can be said to characterize the class of poetic forms under discussion. What distinguishes one poetic form from the other is, by and large, the degree to which some features dominate the form. And because work on Yoruba written poetry has demonstrated that these features are basic to all Yoruba poetry, they can safely be posited as features of Yoruba poetry. This book should contribute in no small measure to Yoruba poetic criticism and the definition of definition of African oral poetics.
The study is in three parts. Part One consists of an introductory chapter which deals with the scope of the study, the methodology adopted, and the problems of classification and lineation.
Part Two is a treatment of the features which are found in all the oral poetic types. It consists of Chapters Two and Three. Chapter Two deals with the features—word-play, rhythm, non-casual language and figurative language—are discussed in Chapter Three.
Part Three deals with those features that characterize each of the poetic types. A feature is held to be characteristic of a type if its incidence is higher in that poetic type than in others, or if the feature is used for special effects in the poetic type. Oriki is discussed in Chapter Four, Ese Ifa in Chapter Five, Ofo in Chapter Six, and Owe and Alo-Apamo in Chapter Seven.