Caleb Oladipo To Speak April 19 At Baylor

Dr. Caleb Oladipo, assistant professor of Church and State Studies, will speak at 4 p.m. Thursday, April 19, in room 116 of the Draper Academic Building as part of The Council for International Education's Global Issues Lecture Series.

Oladipo's lecture, "Is Time Real or is it an Illusion? An African Prospective," will discuss the way Africans view time.

"From an African prospective, time is related to specific human events not chronology," said Oladipo. "For example, if a meeting was to be scheduled early in the morning, the meeting time would be set at sunrise and not at 6 a.m. Depending on either party's idea of what sunrise is, that's when the two would see each other.

"In 1999 I went to the University of Zululand to study the concept of time. I was told by a man there that I came all the way from the United States to study time where there are wristwatches. In Zululand we have all the time," said Oladipo. This statement meant that human relationships are associated with time. It is not chronological.

"In the West, we are enslaved to time so we forget to enjoy life. As a result, we die of stress related diseases. In Africa, we have all the time in the world."

Oladipo said that Africans are more interested in the natural order of life and how time is associated with life itself.

For more information, contact Dr. Christopher Marsh, assistant professor of political science, at 710-6058.