Portal:Nigeria/Selected biography/39

Kenneth Onwuka Dike // (17 December 1917 – 26 October 1983) was a Nigerian educationist, historian and the first Nigerian Vice-Chancellor of the nation's premier college, the University of Ibadan.

During the Nigerian civil war, he moved to Harvard University. He was a founder of the Ibadan School that dominated the writing of the History of Nigeria until the 1970s.

Dike was a pioneer in the movement towards utilising oral traditions in a multi-disciplinary approach in African historiography. He is credited with "having played the leading role in creating a generation of African historians who could interpret their own history without being influenced by Eurocentric approaches." He has been called the "godfather of African history".