UI Appoints Dan Izevbaye as an Emeritus Professor

The President, Nigerian Academy of Letters, Professor Francis Egbokhare, FNAL, on behalf of Fellows and Members of NAL, felicitates with Professor Daniel Sunday Izevbaye, FNAL on his well-deserved appointment as an Emeritus Professor of the University of Ibadan.  The appointment was approved today by the Senate of the University. His appointment as an Emeritus Professor of the University is premised on some objective and empirical criteria, including his sterling character, academic productivity, ability to generate funds for the University, and active teaching until retirement.

We are proud to say that this is a mark of honour and distinction for a dedicated Fellow of the Academy who is laudably committed to humanistic studies.

Professor Emeritus Dan Izevbaye is a globally acknowledged talent in the field of historical and textual analysis of pre-and post-colonial African Literature. He is a quintessential Scholar-Critic and, unarguably, one of Africa’s best literary scholars. The contributions of Professor Emeritus Dan Izevbaye to the criticism of modern African literature cannot be gainsaid. His name has resonated deafeningly in the study of African literature for roughly six decades now.

He is a product of the Department of English, University of Ibadan, from where he graduated in 1965 as the only First Class Honours student in his star-studded class. He won the Faculty Prize for that year. He also obtained his Doctorate degree from the University in 1968. With that formidable foundation, he has earned for himself an iconic reputation in the field of criticism of African literature. He was Professor in the Department of English, University of Ibadan, from 1980 to his retirement in 2002. He served as the Provost of the defunct College of Arts, the Social Sciences and Law of the University from 1990 to 1994.