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Túndé Kèlání and the Art of Being Yorùbá

ABSTRACT Túndé Kèlání is a Yorùbá filmmaker whose auteurial vision deploys Yorùbá cultural dynamics towards the understanding of not only Yorùbá people’s beingness, but also of their place in the plural existence of the Nigerian state. This article takes seriously Túndé Kèlání’s philosophical sensibility, grounded in the Yorùbá worldview, as a means by which Kelani relates with the world. The article argues that, although Túndé Kèlání’s cultural philosophy serves as the basis for his cinematic vision and his search for cultural authenticity, his neotraditionalism fails to sufficiently interrogate the Yorùbá concept of àsà and its implication for what it means to be Yorùbá in the world today. This significantly undermines the capacity of his auteurial vision to project cinematic possibilities that nevertheless extend what it means to be Yorùbá in the world.