The Transition of John David Yeadon Peel (1941-2015) -By Toyin Falola

Erin ti wó, kò le dìde.
Erin ti wó, kò le dìde.
Àjànàkú sùn bí òkè;
Erin ti wó kò le dìde.

The elephant fell, unable to stand on its feet.
The elephant fell, unable to stand on its feet.
The humongous mammal is down;
The elephant fell, unable to stand on its feet.

On November 3rd 2015, sociologist John David Yeadon Peel’s illustrious career came to an end. As John lost his battle against cancer, it marked the end of an era. Now, the discipline of sociology will miss the service of a pioneer who single handedly gave a new dimension to the studies of Yoruba culture and religion. For those of us who have been influenced and inspired for years by his profound insight, John’s demise creates a vacuum of unparalleled scale. However, John left with us an oeuvre that stands as a vast repository of knowledge waiting to be rediscovered in the future. His mastery of many disciplines is impressive, from the very core of sociology and anthropology to that of history and literature. His knowledge of group behaviour and social institutions is profound. His patience and ability to collect empirical data are phenomenal. His writings are never geared towards policy or advocacy—he does not belong to that tradition—but rather to a large set of coordinated knowledge on the fragmentation of society into its sociological fragments of social change, and the disturbing but crucial issues of social disorder and social order. I think he first proceeded with that of a new order organised by the Aladura movement of the colonial and postcolonial era before moving backward in time to the disorder of the nineteenth century, and how the social processes of the chaotic period enable us to understand one sub-ethnic community, the Ijesa.

Peel’s intellectual legacy is assured. He will for ever remain a core member of the pantheon of sociological theorists who provide new and refine older theories to understand identity and agency, to explain complicated social processes, to link micro events to the macro systems, and to fully analyse the relevance of daily practices as they explain larger issues of social mobility and social stratification.

As we commemorate J. D. Y. Peel’s magnificent presence in the academia we must go back to the early 1960s when he was still a young PhD scholar at the London School of Economics. It was during this time that he entered Western Africa and began serious engagements with the Yoruba ways of being and belonging. His gaze was on the independent churches among the Yoruba community in South-West Nigeria. In 1966, based on his extensive fieldwork, he completed his dissertation titled “A Sociological Study of Two Independent Churches among the Yoruba”. Thereafter, he grew in the academia very rapidly with a prolific publishing record. As part of his academic engagements, Peel taught at numerous prestigious institutions across the globe. To name the major ones, he taught at Nottingham University and London School of Economics (1966-1973), University of Ife, Nigeria (1973-1975), Liverpool University (1975-1989), University of Chicago (1982-1983), and School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London (since 1989). At SOAS, London he also served as the Dean of Undergraduate Studies (1990–94) and as a member of the Governing Body (since 1996). Peel was a former President of the African Studies Association, UK (1996-98), and the Chair of the Social Anthropology and Human Geography Section of the British Academy (1997-2000).

During his illustrious teaching and research career, Peel emerged as an extremely influential scholar in the field of sociology of religion. His early published work explored the ideas of syncretism and religious change in Yorubaland. In 1968, he published his PhD dissertation in the form of a book titled as Aladura: A Religious Movement Among the Yoruba. Aladura is a classic work of historical sociology on Western Africa in which Peel used a wide range of vernacular historical sources, especially the private papers and the endless small publications of local intellectual guilds, as well as the oral traditions on Yoruba religious order. Aladura also included fascinating aspects of social history concerning the interrelations of the first generation of Christians and young elites in Yorubaland with the ideological contours of the Anglican Church. Peel carefully crafted a brilliant analysis of the discourse on religious transformation among the Ijebu and Egba families. In many ways, Aladura also ushered in an epistemological shift in the way sociologists had so far understood Yoruba religious traditions. No wonder that Tom McCaskie, once a colleague of Peel, suggested that he lifted “the Yoruba past to a dimension of comparative seriousness that no one else has managed.” Indeed, there can be little doubt about the veracity of that statement.

Interestingly, as a young adult, Peel was a student of classics. His early training had a profound impact on his intellectual life. His attention towards close reading of texts allowed him the room to explore new horizons of scholarship. Peel’s second monograph, Herbert Spencer: The Evolution of a Sociologist, published in 1971, was a prime example of his sensitivity as a reader and creativity as a thinker and writer. In this remarkable piece of scholarship, Peel offered an alternative reading of Herbert Spencer’s whole sociological corpus; a reading grounded in biographical and cultural context, informed by a profound knowledge of later social theory, and moulded by historical and critical sensibility of rare refinement. In this interesting turn in the assessment of Spencer’s work, Peel argued that Spencer’s evolutionary sociology was the projection onto all human history of the experience of English industrialisation as perceived from the provincial radical viewpoint, and that much of its specific substance can be related to the rhetoric of provincial radical anti-politics. Herbert Spencer is Peel’s gift to those scholars interested in the history of the social sciences, as well as for sociologists concerned about the future of their inquiry.

He launched his career with a study on the Yoruba. He closes it with a book that he was unable to see in print, Christianity, Islam and Orisa Religion: Three Traditions in Comparison and Interaction, to be released by the University of California Press. I was privileged to write the blurb for this fine book, as well as read his final essay, “Religion and the future of Nigeria: Lessons from the Yoruba case” to appear in the maiden edition of Yoruba Studies Review.

With the publication of Herbert Spencer, Peel emerged as an important scholar for the global north. But his deeper attachment with the Yoruba ways of being kept bringing him back to Nigeria, time and again. In 1983, he published his monograph, Ijeshas and Nigerians: The Incorporation of a Yoruba Kingdom, 1890-1970s. Ijeshas and Nigerians offers an excellent account of the pre-colonial social and political structures of the Yoruba Kingdom, as well as the history of Ilesa in connection with the formation of modern Nigeria. In many ways, this text shows the intensity of Peel’s engagement with both Yoruba past and present. His use of both historical archives and anthropological accounts offers a unique way to see the historical continues and ruptures as the Ijesas were integrated into the larger Nigerian social and political sphere. In fact, Ijeshas and Nigerians is a good example for the future scholars interested in historical sociology.

He launched his career with a study on the Yoruba. He closes it with a book that he was unable to see in print, Christianity, Islam and Orisa Religion: Three Traditions in Comparison and Interaction, to be released by the University of California Press. I was privileged to write the blurb for this fine book, as well as read his final essay, “Religion and the future of Nigeria: Lessons from the Yoruba case” to appear in the maiden edition of Yoruba Studies Review.

Peel’s intellectual legacy is assured. He will for ever remain a core member of the pantheon of sociological theorists who provide new and refine older theories to understand identity and agency, to explain complicated social processes, to link micro events to the macro systems, and to fully analyse the relevance of daily practices as they explain larger issues of social mobility and social stratification.

Sleep well, great mind, in the company of the òrìsà. Let me keep singing for you to calm you down into a great rest:

Ará ìgbàun dà oò?
Ará ìgbàun dà?
Ìbá ṣe pé à ìí ku ni o,
Ará ìgbàun dà?

Where are those who lived before us?
Where are those who lived before us?
If people do not die,
Where are those who lived before us?

Toyin Falola, The University of Texas at Austin.