Professor Gbenga Fashiku

Dean,
Faculty of Arts

Professor of Philosophy, Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Nigeria

Fasiku, Gbenga (Ph.D) is a professor of philosophy in the Department of Philosophy, and presently the Dean, Faculty of Arts, Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Nigeria. He is a specialist in Metaphysics, Philosophy of Mind, and African Philosophy. His doctoral research interrogates the hard problem of consciousness in the Philosophy of Mind, which launched him into interdisciplinary discourses in Philosophy, Neuroscience and Mental Health, where he has developed new concepts and theories to contribute to debates on how the neurochemicals and organs in the body shape human conscious experiences.

As an accomplished scholar with over 40 publications in reputable scholarly outlets in and outside Nigeria, Prof. Fasiku contributions to advancement of knowledge are in two folds. The first is the contribution to and advancement of debates, positions, issues in core areas of philosophy such as Metaphysics, Ethics, Epistemology and Philosophy of Mind. His work in this regard has helped in providing philosophical foundations through which other issues on the nature of reality, society and humanity are addressed. In the second fold. Professor Fasiku relied on the positions defended in the core areas of research to engage and contribute to contemporary debates in other areas of philosophy such as African Philosophy, Religion, Social and Political Philosophy. Professor Fasiku held a visiting research appointment at the University of Lagos in 2018. His research has been supported by prestigious institutions including the and the American Council of Learned Societies (ACLS), African-German Network of Excellence in Science (AGNES), and the Nigerian Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TETFund).

Beyond his research and teaching, Professor Fasiku is deeply committed to capacity-building in the humanities. He has mentored numerous early-career scholars, and continues to play an active role in academic development initiatives in the humanities through several academic initiatives which has yielded scholarly publications.

Professor Fasiku served as the Head of Department of Philosophy from 2016 to 2018, and as the Director of the Institute of Cultural Studies from 2022-2025, both at Obafemi Awolowo University. While serving as Head of Philosophy, he promoted scholarship and administrative excellence. As Director of the Institute of Cultural Studies, Prof. Fasiku charted new paths in promoting lively exchange of ideas in advancing African cultural values and virtues through research, performances, seminars, colloquia, conferences and publications. The Institute has as its mandate, the preservation of African cultural heritage and the study of problems of adaptation and integration of African cultural values to the experience and daily life of Africans and African descendants in the contemporary world. As Director, Professor Fasiku brought innovations that drive unprecedented advancement of scholarly engagement of cultural issues from all perspectives. Under his leadership, the aspiration of making the Institute a degree awarding academic organ was realised. The Institute now runs Postgraduate Diploma, Master, Master of Philosophy, and Doctor of Philosophy degrees in Cultural Studies.

Professor Gbenga Fasiku assumed the position of the Dean, Faculty of Arts on August 1, 2025. Since assumption, he has initiated the resuscitation of programmes and academic engagements that project the faculty as one of the best among others in the University. His purposive leadership is repositioning the faculty to reclaim its rightful place as the first among equals..

Dr. O.O Oyebode 

Vice-Dean
Faculty of Arts

Reader

Oluwabunmi Opeyemi Oyebode (PhD) is a Reader in the Department of English, Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Nigeria. She was a Fulbright Fellow at the University of Texas at Austin, USA (2007/2008) and a Guest Researcher at the University of Southern Denmark, Odense, Denmark (2015/2016). She was also a recipient of the prestigious African Humanities Program Postdoctoral Fellowship (AHP) (2021/2022).

Her research interests include (Multimodal) Discourse Analysis (in which she co-authored two academic books in Multimodal Discourse Studies in Nigeria), New Media Communication and Applied/Cultural Linguistics. The major arguments in her research are that all semiotic resources deployed for representation are socially and culturally motivated for meanings; and visuals, like language, are strategically deployed as rhetorical tropes/discourse constructs in texts to project specific ideological stances as social milieu that resonate with the target audience.

Thus, her academic engagement has focused on critical dimensions in the multimodal analyses of visual elements in texts. Oluwabunmi Oyebode has published articles in reputable journals that include, Discourse & Communication, Discourse & Society, Discourse Studies, Discourse and Interaction, Journal of Pan African Studies, Metaphor & Symbol, Visual Communication, and Communication & Public. She is the Vice-Dean, Faculty of Arts, Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife.