Nigeria

F

Way of Life

Nigerian society varies greatly between urban and rural areas, across ethnic and religious borders, and with levels of education. Still, most Nigerians share a strong attachment to family and especially to children, to clearly differentiated roles for men and women, to a hierarchical social structure, and to the dominance of religion in shaping community values.

Nigerian society functions in a highly patriarchal fashion, with men exerting broad control over the lives of women, who are typically less educated and have limited access to health and social services. Women work far longer hours than men. They perform virtually all housework and child care, as well as (for most women) many hours of income-earning work, especially farming. The exceptions are in some southern states, where women are more active in trade and exert considerable political influence. In northern Muslim communities, especially cities, women are confined to home according to purdah (the seclusion of women from public view). Many women in purdah participate in a hidden trade in craft articles, prepared foodstuffs, and other goods, using children as couriers.

Polygyny is widely practiced among Muslims, among adherents of traditional religions, and among Christians who belong to independent African churches. Among northern Muslims and in many more traditional societies, most girls enter family-arranged marriages near the age of puberty. The daughters of more educated populations, particularly in the south, tend to marry when they are in their late teens or early twenties. Men usually marry at a later age, especially if they come from poorer families that are unable to afford the high cost of weddings and bride-price (payment given to the bride’s family by or on behalf of the future husband).

Social life has traditionally revolved around ceremonies: weddings, infants’ naming ceremonies, and public performances associated with cultural and religious holidays. Young adult males living in cities enjoy going to cinemas, dance clubs, and bars for recreation. Some Muslim women, for example among the Hausa, have their own social institutions revolving around the bori, a cult of spirit possession. Bori ceremonies provide women with a forum for interaction that is relatively free of male control, and offer explanations and remedies that help women cope with problems such as the death of their children.

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Clothing in Nigeria symbolizes religious affiliation, wealth, and social standing. Northern Muslim men wear long, loose-fitting garments such as the caftan, together with colorful embroidered hats or (among traditional officials) turbans. Most Yoruba men also wear elaborate gowns and hats, somewhat different in style. Many Nigerians in the south wear casual Western-style dress. Women wear wraparound garments or dresses, typically made from very colorful materials, and beautiful head-ties that may be fashioned into elaborate patterns.

Diets vary regionally and between city and country. Grain-based dishes such as tuwo da miya, a thick sorghum porridge eaten with a spicy, vegetable-based sauce, dominate the northern diet. Dishes made from root crops, such as pounded yam and gari (a granular product made from cassava), are more prevalent in the south. Northerners eat more meat, either in sauces or as kebabs known as tsire. Yogurt and soured milk produced by Fulani pastoralists form an important part of rural northern diets. Modernization and poverty have made cheaper food staples such as cassava, maize (corn), rice, white bread, and pasta increasingly important in both rural and urban areas. Muslims generally do not approve of drinking alcohol, especially northern Muslims, who tend to prefer tea and soft drinks. In the rest of the country, it is common to drink commercially brewed beer or traditional drinks such as beer made from sorghum or millet, and palm wine. Kola nuts are used widely as a stimulant, especially in the north.

Nigerians, particularly youth, are avid sports fans and participants, and by far the most loved game is soccer, known as football. Nigeria’s national football team, the Super Eagles, won the gold medal at the 1996 Olympic Games. Several Nigerian footballers have achieved prominence playing professionally in Europe, and all major cities are represented in Nigeria’s highly competitive national football league. Nigerians have also excelled internationally at track and field, particularly in shorter-distance races, and in boxing. Other popular sports are field hockey, basketball, and table tennis.

G

Social Issues

Wealth and power are distributed very unevenly in Nigerian society. The great majority of Nigerians, preoccupied with daily struggles to earn a living, have few material possessions and little chance of improving their lot. Meanwhile, chiefs, rich merchants, politicians, and high-ranking civil servants often accumulate and flaunt massive wealth, which to a degree is expected and accepted in Nigerian society. Most of these elite maintain power through networks of patronage: They secure and distribute labor, and receive political support in return. The system allows for some redistribution of income because patrons often pay for things such as school fees and marriage costs for relatives, community development, and charity work.

Economic inequality has a severe effect on health, especially for children. One-fifth of Nigerian children die before the age of five, primarily from treatable diseases such as malaria, measles, whooping cough, diarrhea, and pneumonia. Less than one-half of infants are immunized against measles, and malnutrition affects more than 40 percent of children under the age of five. Adults are equally affected, although with less deadly consequences. Only 20 percent of rural Nigerians and 52 percent of urban Nigerians have access to safe water. One-third have no access to health care simply because they live too far from clinics or other treatment centers. Many others cannot afford the fees charged by clinics.

While average incomes are higher and death rates lower in cities, urban poverty is as pervasive as rural poverty. Secure, well-paying jobs are scarce, even for those with considerable education. Food is typically expensive. Housing, too, is costly despite its rudimentary quality, prompting the poor to build basic houses in shantytowns. Sewage disposal systems in most cities are also basic or primitive, and polluted streams, wells, roadside drains, and other bodies of water increase the risk of infectious disease. Industry, automobiles, and the burning of fuelwood further pollute air and water.

Crime in Nigeria rose in the mid-1990s as a result of unemployment, economic decline, and social inequality, which are abetted by inefficient and corrupt police and customs forces. More than half of all offenses are thefts, burglaries, and break-ins, although armed robberies are also prominent. Nigeria is a major conduit for drugs moving from Asia and Latin America to markets in Europe and North America. Large-scale Nigerian fraud rings have targeted business people in other parts of the world. The business people are invited to help transfer large sums of money out of Nigeria, with the promise of a share of the transferred money. Advance fees are requested to expedite this transfer, but the advanced money routinely disappears. Although there have been periodic campaigns to root out corrupt politicians and attack crime, they have had little lasting effect.

Nigeria has been wracked by periodic violent clashes between ethnic and religious groups since the 1990s. The reasons behind these clashes have varied from local political disputes to conflicts between fundamentalist Muslims and Christians or moderate Muslims. In many cases, local civic or religious leaders have manipulated these conflicts for political gain.

IV

Arts

Nigerian culture reflects African, Islamic, and European influences. In northern Nigeria, Islam has shaped architecture and calligraphy. As Islam traditionally forbids the representation of people and animals, art forms such as ceremonial carvings are virtually absent in the north. In the south, indigenous peoples produced their own art long before Europeans arrived. Portuguese figures first appeared in Benin bronzes dating to the 16th century. Since the dawn of the colonial era, Western influences have challenged, threatened, and in certain ways enriched Nigerian culture.

A

Literature

Nigeria’s modern literature grows out of a tradition of storytelling and historical remembrance that has existed in Nigeria for millennia. Oral literature ranges from the proverbs and dilemma tales of the common people to elaborate stories memorized and performed by professional praise-singers attached to royal courts. In states where Islam prevailed, significant written literatures evolved. The founder of the Sokoto caliphate, Usuman dan Fodio, wrote nearly 100 texts in Arabic in the late 18th and early 19th centuries. His prose and poetry examined issues such as good government and social relations from an Islamic moralist perspective. The legacy of this Islamic tradition is a widely read modern literature comprised of religious and secular works, including the Hausa-language poetry and stories of Alhaji Abubakar Imam.

In 1986 Nigerian Wole Soyinka was awarded the Nobel Prize in literature. Soyinka is a prolific author of poetry, novels, essays, and plays that blend African themes with Western forms. His uncompromising critiques of tyranny, corruption, and the abuse of human rights have often angered Nigeria’s military rulers. One of his most powerful books, The Man Died (1972), was written while Soyinka was imprisoned during the civil war of 1967 to 1970. Chinua Achebe, whose novels include A Man of the People (1966) and No Longer at Ease (1960), is another Nigerian writer whose work commands a wide international audience. Other important novelists include Cyprian Ekwensi, Nkem Nwanko, Elechi Amadi, Flora Nwapa, and Clement Ogunwa, who write mostly in English. John Pepper Clark, Gabriel Okara, Christopher Okigbo, and Ken Saro-Wiwa are well-known poets.

B

Art and Architecture

Nigeria’s rich and diverse artistic heritage goes back more than 2,000 years. The earliest noteworthy pieces are finely produced terra-cotta sculptures produced by the Nok culture in the vicinity of the Jos Plateau between 500 bc and ad 200. These, together with bronze heads from Ife dating from the 13th century and bronze plaques, bronze statues, and ivory carvings from Benin from the 11th century and later, are generally considered Nigeria’s most important artistic legacy. Many such pieces, however, reside in Western museums, where they were taken during the time of colonial conquest. The Nigerian government has demanded the return of looted art, particularly from Benin, with little success.

Also important to Nigeria’s artistic heritage are wooden masks and fetishes (objects of worship or ceremony). Some of the finest examples are from cultures such as the Ijo, Ibibio, and Igala from southeastern Nigeria. Authentic examples of this art command high prices from collectors in the West, accounting for the frequent theft of ceremonial objects from shrines and museums in Nigeria. Modern artists typically draw on both African and Western influences. Members of the Oshogbo School, founded by Ulli Beier in the early 1960s, have explored Yoruba spirituality in several media. Leading Oshogbo artists include painter and musician Taiwo Olaniyi, also known as Twins Seven Seven; painter and writer Amos Tutuola; and sculptors Asiru Olatunde, Adebisi Akanji, and Susanne Wenger Alarpe. The development of modern Nigerian art has also been strongly influenced by students of the Zaria and Nsukka schools, dating respectively from the late 1950s and early 1970s. The Zaria school first explored the possibilities of synthesizing themes and techniques derived from both traditional and modern sources. The Nsukka school produces work that is known for its strong social and political content.

Traditional architecture ranges from the North African-inspired mud houses of the Hausa to the sprawling Yoruba compounds that accommodate several branches of an extended family. Such dwellings are often decorated: Hausa houses commonly have bas-relief geometric designs, while Yoruba palaces feature elaborately carved doors and veranda posts. Older homes in Lagos have a distinctive two-story design, known as the Brazilian style because it was introduced by slaves repatriated from Latin America in the 19th century. The new capital city of Abuja, designed by members of the architecture school at Ahmadu Bello University, is the most outstanding example of contemporary Nigerian urban planning and architecture. The city’s governmental complex, cultural facilities, and main business district are grouped in a city center characterized by modern, futuristic buildings and wide boulevards, and residential districts extend outward from the core.

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