Kola Tubosun
Kọ́lá Túbọ̀sún is a Nigerian linguist, writer, and film-maker best known for his work in African digital humanities. A Fulbright Fellow and Chevening Scholar, Túbọ̀sún has led efforts to integrate African languages into global technology, including the introduction of Nigerian English to Google’s voice recognition systems. He is the publisher of the literary platform OlongoAfrica and the director of the documentary Ebrohimie Road: A Museum of Memory. In 2016, he became the first African to receive the Premio Ostana "Special Prize" for his advocacy in indigenous language rights. He is currently the Africa editor of the Best Literary Translations anthology, published by Deep Vellum.
Biography
Túbọ̀sún was born in Ibadan, Nigeria. He holds a Bachelor of Arts from the University of Ibadan and a Master's degree in Linguistics from Southern Illinois University Edwardsville. He was a Fulbright Scholar in 2009, teaching Yoruba at Southern Illinois University Edwardsville. In 2019, he was awarded a Chevening Research Fellowship at the British Library in London, where he worked with the library's 19th-century African language printed collection.Language technology and advocacy
Túbọ̀sún is a pioneer in the intersection of African linguistics and technology advocating for the "digital sovereignty" of African languages. In 2015, he founded YorubaName.com, a multimedia dictionary and lexicography project, which created the first accessible digital archive of Yoruba names.The project created the first accessible digital archive of Yoruba names and their meanings, later expanding to include a free Yoruba keyboard software for Mac and Windows to facilitate digital communication in indigenous languages.
Túbọ̀sún’s work with Google Nigeria was instrumental in the localization of the Google Assistant, leading to the 2019 launch of the Nigerian English voice accent—a landmark recognition of the dialect by a major tech company. He also led the successful campaign to include Yoruba as a supported language on Twitter and served as a consultant for the Oxford English Dictionary, contributing to the historical inclusion of Nigerian English entries in 2019.
Literary and cultural preservation
As a cultural archivist, Túbọ̀sún focuses on preserving African intellectual history through film, translation, and publishing.In 2018, Túbọ̀sún was awarded the Miles Morland Writing Scholarship to write a biography of Nobel Laureate Wole Soyinka. This research part-influenced in his debut feature documentary, Ebrohimie Road: A Museum of Memory. The film chronicles Soyinka’s life in the University of Ibadan bungalow where the writer was arrested in 1967. The documentary has been acquired for the African Studies collections of major institutions, including Harvard University, Yale University, Columbia University, University of Pennsylvania, and University of Chicago.
Túbọ̀sún is the publisher and editor-in-chief of OlongoAfrica, a platform for creative writing and journalism. In 2023, Tubosun led the 'Black Orpheus Revisited' project, a digital archival initiative funded by the Open Society Foundations to digitize and preserve the complete run of the influential literary journal Black Orpheus journal. The project, which draws from his personal collection of the magazines, was featured in The World of Interiors in September 2025.
He previously edited Aké Review and served as the Africa Editor for the inaugural Best Literary Translations anthology. He is a prolific translator, having translated works by Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o, Haruki Murakami, Chimamanda Adichie, Wole Soyinka, James Baldwin, and others into Yoruba. His second poetry collection, Ìgbà Èwe, features original Yoruba translations of poetry by American philosopher Emily Grosholz.
In September 2019, Tubosun co-founded The Brick House Cooperative, with eight other publications with the aim of presenting independent viewpoints from all around the world. He became the founding editor-in-chief and publisher of OlongoAfrica, a literary-journalistic platform for new creative writing from Africa. He's also a travel writer.
Selected works
BooksEdwardsville by Heart – Poetry/TravelogueÌgbà Èwe – Poetry Best Literary Translations 2024 Èṣù at the LibraryFilmographyEbrohimie Road: A Museum of Memory – Director/ProducerMinistry of Ungentlemanly Warfare -- Linguistic consultantElesin Oba: The King's Horseman -- Translator and Consultant
- Aisha Dialect Consultant
- Best Literary Translations anthology 2024-dateEdo North: Field Studies of the Languages and Lands of the Northern Edo. Essays in Honour of Professor Ben O. Elugbe. Zenith Book House.
- NTLitMag: 29 Issues