AN APPRAISAL OF ÈKÌTÌ ẸPA-TYPE MASQURADE FESTIVAL AS YORÙBÁ INDIGENOUS COMMUNION AND SOCIAL INTEGRATOR

Abstract

Yorùbá festival is a performative communion dimension of cultural praxis that concretizes bonds of social integration in Yorùbá communities. This study reviews the role of Ẹpa type masquerade in social integration and indigenous communion of Èkìtì people overline aiming to  supplement  the dearth of scholarly work on Ẹpa-type masquerade festival, that has festival unity and friendship through cultural identity among the Èkìtì Yorùbá of Southern west Nigeria using hybrid anthropologies research method, which includes oral interview, participant, observation, photography, video and tape recording to document and elucidate data. The study discusses Ẹpa type masquerade festival aesthetics and social integration. The findings of the study reveal that Ẹpa type festival is traditionally rooted in Èkìtì culture motivated by political, religious and social integration. The festival demonstrates how indigenous communion can promote and foster peace cooperation and stability among ethnic groups promoting social integration and unity among the diverse ethnic group in Nigeria.