Domesticity of Governance and Politics of Dependency in the Oyo Empire, 1600-1836

Beyond formal political institutions, Ogundiran will highlight everyday practices—cooking, crafting, animal management, gendered labor, and household relations—that underpinned governance in one of West Africa’s largest states. The talk will show how innovations in domestic technologies transformed domestic labor, reconfigured the empire’s political economy, and expanded its participation in the merchant capital revolution of the early modern period.

Co-sponsored by African Studies.