A Psalm/Song for Osain

Abstract:

In his 2021 article, “The Sacred and the Profane: Wisdom and the Practice of Healing in Orisa Medicine,” Dr. Kola Abimbola argues that, although Orisha devotion is normatively conceptualized as a religion or spiritual practice, it is more appropriate to understand it as a medical (or healing) tradition. Yet, within academic and popular discourse on Orisha Devotion - in its many manifestations - there’s a lack of consideration for Osain. As the Yoruba divinity of herbalism, Osain encapsulates the terms on which humans can, should, and do engage with plant-life and nature more broadly. In one way or another, that engagement largely involves healing or medicine. This paper extends Abimbola’s thesis by analyzing Lukumi contexts and practices in which Osain is invoked and/or deployed, based on observant participation and ethnographic research.

Even though each orisha is associated with particular plants, all plants belong to Osain, and thus, the world does too. He was in Cuba before the Yoruba people were enslaved there. Buoyed by the aforementioned practices, descriptions from the continental and diasporic literary corpuses gesture toward Osain’s pantheistic nature or omnipresence. The details about this orisha are encoded in narratives and songs. By juxtaposing the varied characterizations of Osain (Yoruba/Isese and Afro-Cuban/Lukumi) and his arrival in Cuba, this paper also oers a testament or an explanation as to why Osain is so vital to contemporary Orisha devotion and the discourse surrounding it. Together, the extension of Abimbola’s thesis and the testament to/explanation of Osain encourage the critical re-evaluation of personications or embodiments of herbalism and healing in other Africana “religions.”

Bio:

Chad Kehinde Graham is an emerging scholar-practitioner of Africana Studies and Africana Religions, as well as a student of Afro-Cuban Orisha Music. He holds a BA from Howard University, an MA in Religion from Temple University, and is completing his MA in Africana Studies at the University of Delaware. His thesis explores the role of the environment in the the reconstitution of Yoruba sacred music - and thus the broader spiritual tradition - in Cuba. His other research interests include Material Culture Studies, Environmental Studies, and Historiography. Chad has received grants or fellowships from the National Humanities Center, the Center for Material Culture Studies, and the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts. Outside of his intellectual work, Chad is an instructional coach, working with college and high school students interested in becoming teachers.