Jeff Unaegbu | University of Nigeria, Nsukka (original) (raw)

Unaegbu, Jeff is a PhD scholar (African Studies) in the Institute of African Studies, University of Nigeria, Nsukka, with research interests in social change, paremiography, paremiology and cinematography. He obtained a Bachelor’s degree in Mass Communication (2006) and served in the National Youth Service Corps programme at Otuoke in Bayelsa State of Nigeria in 2007. He was employed as a Cinematographer in the Institute of African Studies, UNN in May 2008. Unaegbu rose through the ranks to Principal Cinematographer and Head of the Cine Unit, Institute of African Studies in October 2017. He obtained a Master’s degree in African Studies (2018), before commencing his PhD in June 2019. He is the founder of Fellows of Inspiration, Research and Memory (Nigeria). A prolific writer, seasoned editor and trained Mass Communicator, Unaegbu has authored 19 books and published numerous articles and produced twenty video documentaries. His poem, A Grand Sonnet to My God, won first prize (Religious Category) in the World Campus Poetry Club, UNN (2004). His story, Prey, was shortlisted in the African Writing Prize in Flash Fiction and published in the African Writing Online Magazine, Nigeria, April 2011. Another story, Bye-Bye, was long-listed for the 2018 Diana Woods Memorial Award in Creative Non-Fiction (Antioch University, Los Angeles); “Looking for Trouble” is in Sharkpack Poetry Review (Fathom Books, Holliston, Massachusetts, USA) in April 2018; “Deep Down My Heart”, a poem, was published in Sentinel Nigeria Magazine, sixth edition, 24 May 2011, and “The Fulani Damsel” was published in Litro Magazine (Leading Literary and Creative Arts magazine in the United Kingdom) with a print Back of the Bus Edition, number 170, page 25 to page 28 (June 27, 2018). He is an African Studies Association of the United Kingdom Travel Fellowship Recipient (ASAUK Writing Workshop for African Scholars), Osun State University, September 2011. He has been conferred with the Faculty of Arts Students Association (FASA) Most Versatile Student Award, UNN (2005) and the First Exceptional Personality Award by FIRM in collaboration with Goldleaf78 Global Resources on June 6, 2018. In appreciation of his achievements, his bio-data was entered into the Wikipedia Online Encyclopaedia in the year 2010.
Supervisors: Prof. Emeritus Alex Animalu and Prof. P-J Ezeh

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Papers by Jeff Unaegbu

Journal of Black Studies

This paper examined the recent immortalization project of Hon. Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe at Enugu. Histo... more This paper examined the recent immortalization project of Hon. Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe at Enugu. Historicizing his achievements and legacies, the paper studied the roles he played in ensuring that independent Africa is attained and why he continues to be remembered even after his death. The research method is qualitative and descriptive. Secondary data such as newspapers, books, journals and online materials are used to enrich the work. The result shows that the inauguration of the Nnamdi Azikiwe Centre and other previous projects that immortalized him were as a result of his outstanding and selfless services to Africa and Nigeria in particular. The paper discovered that the new Nnamdi Azikiwe Centre was his renovated residential lodge which richly embodies his political history and career years, thoughts, ideology, and philosophy. The findings of this research will help government officials, historians, tourists, and students in making decisions on good governance, consulting material i...

Ikenga International Journal of Institute of African Studies. , 2013

This paper explores the origins and history of minstrelsy through to Igbo minstrelsy in the world... more This paper explores the origins and history of minstrelsy through to Igbo minstrelsy in the world. Then it settles down to ferret out the nature of Igbo minstrelsy today, given that the advent of western music and the effects of colonization have turned it around to no ends. The purpose of getting at the heart of its nature is to provide salvific paradigms for its resurrection from the doldrums of oblivion. With the heavy western popular music of Nigeria today, the study becomes very expedient as a drive towards preserving an aspect of Igbo culture which brings to the fore the art of pathfinding, social criticism and valve for public opinion, especially against leaders who are not attuned to taking advice from those they govern. The method of data collection is secondary documentary evidence, with a view to bringing out articles which have investigated through field research the minstrelsy of the past, knowing that such investigations today would be marred by confabulations and social changes. Recommendations are given for the restoration of Igbo minstrelsy to its popular position, and then a conditional forecast is made in the last sentence of the conclusion.

ational Transformation through Entrepreneurial Education. Nsukka: Institute of Education, , 2013

Many Nigerians are peremptorily indisposed to the capacity building prospects of music to the var... more Many Nigerians are peremptorily indisposed to the capacity building prospects of music to the various Nigerian ethnic groups. The researchers undertook to measure the concrete entrepreneurial education and gains embedded in music as relating to relevance in the multi-ethnicity of Nigeria. The reasons for perceived irreverence to music were specifically isolated and reviewed. In trying to isolate these reasons, the researchers relied on documentary evidence. We found, amongst others, that audience positive response to local patriotism in music is a factor that influences opinions concerning music and music lovers and players. In pointing out the capacity building capabilities of music entrepreneurship education in the light of our findings, we noted that, to excel, performers need to combine music with other ventures so that what financial gain they derive from music would be channeled to other prospects and rechanneled back to music as oil to keep the vibes alive. Furthermore, skill diversification would help to shatter prejudices fueled by stereotypes associated with lone professions. It was also noted that music entrepreneurship education in Nigeria need to be channeled towards researching popular music and tapping the economic potentials inherent in audience responses to it, which uneducated musicians are reaping from today with abandon.

Chinua Achebe and the Convolutions of Immortality: Re-assessing the Writer in Relation to New Realities., 2017

This study aims at bringing to the open evidences of deep social catharsis in Achebe’s account of... more This study aims at bringing to the open evidences of deep social catharsis in Achebe’s account of the Nigerian Civil War in his last book, There was a Country: A Personal History of Biafra. Achebe showed these evidences in accordance with Emile Durkheim’s Theory of Social Sharing. The various emotional arousals which ensured the retention of memories are shown to be mostly subconscious such that ordinary personal interactions during the war are graphically painted by the author in his push to release these emotions and achieve relief. The import of the retention is understood if it is appreciated that the memories had remained vivid after forty-two years since the end of the Nigerian Civil War. Using poetry in opening sections of the book, a convenient mode for the author’s sublime outpouring of emotions is achieved. Understandable symbols are brought to the open. Emotional communion is evident in the author’s interspersion of the names and short profiles of people of social influence in large sections of his account of the civil war. The publication of the book drew reactions which led to external social sharing, both negative and positive. Some of the reviews of the book from other scholars show a connection to the author’s emotions, leading to external emotional communion and, hence, complete social catharsis.

Germany: LAP Lambert Academic Publishing , 2017

Are Christian women more religious than Christian men today? Are career women less religious than... more Are Christian women more religious than Christian men today? Are career women less religious than housewives within the Christian religion? This study seeks to answer these and other questions through exploring gender differences in commitment to Christianity through select documentary evidences in the capital city of Abuja, Nigeria. Theories of gender differences in religious commitment are explored. Contemporary factors influencing these gender differences are analyzed. Gender differences are examined through indices of Christian commitment. Findings reflect the rate of influence of identified contemporary factors on gender differences in commitment to Christianity.

WAJMAE: West African Journal of Musical Arts Education, (WAJMAE), 2014

Since 1961 when music education began in the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, for the benefit of Ni... more Since 1961 when music education began in the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, for the benefit of Nigerians and the rest of the world, there have been moves to fuse Igbo music into Western platforms. This study investigates these moves with a view to distilling lessons for the continuation of intercultural approaches to music education in Nigeria. It was discovered through documentary evidence that missionary churches contributed overwhelmingly to choral music by influencing educators and practitioners to compose Igbo music idioms for modern concert stage. It was also discovered that many pioneers focused on arranging folk tunes to western equipment and musical performances. Notational systems for Igbo musical instruments have also been devised. It is advised that the earlier outlook of fusing old and new be imbibed more ardently by music educators and popular musicians, and that music education focuses on the development of Igbo musical instrument technology by guiding traditional musicians in a grade and certification system which is a western platform for systematization. It is hoped that this synthesization process will help systematize the present popular African music practices especially by the young Nigerian artistes and music educators to seriously preserve African musical history for posterity.

Ikoro: Journal of Institute of African Studies. , 2014

This study aims at showcasing and exploring the similarities and dissimilarities between the pre-... more This study aims at showcasing and exploring the similarities and dissimilarities between the pre-contact religion of the Igbo and the pre-contact religion of the Dogon. There is the introduction to the concept of religion, especially as seen in cultural anthropology as a social institution. Then there is a familiarization section about the Igbo people and the Dogon people. The first section ends with the definition of terms as key to establishing the senses in which some words are used in this study. The next section presents an in-depth comparative analysis of the religions of the Dogon and the Igbo, viewing them from their similarities and their dissimilarities. It is distilled that there are possibilities that newer lights on the religions of the ancient Igbo and Dogon would be shed. And wherever these new parcels of knowledge are obtained, they would be revolutionary to some perspectives and yet, open to critical analysis in other perspectives.

Ikenga International Journal of Institute of African Studies. , 2013

Some studies assert with evidence that the concept of a supreme God is foreign to Igbo pre-missio... more Some studies assert with evidence that the concept of a supreme God is foreign to Igbo pre-missionary contact religious thoughts. They mostly point to western influences on such a “supremacy” concept in both the minds of the early observers of the Igbo and in the Igbo themselves who had been either proselytized or swayed by the proselytization of Christianity, consciously or not. Other scholars confirm the presence of a supreme God in Igbo religious thoughts. Using Georg Hegel’s Dialectic and Uzodinma Nwala’s Radical Interpenetration as theoretical framework, this work presents both views, collecting data through documentary evidence of ethnographic reports and closely examining the perspectives of ethnographic reports in pursuit of any undeniable proof of the existence and extent of structure and popularity of the concept of supreme deification in Igbo thoughts. The evolution of Igbo traditional religious systems catalyzed by migrant knowledge and the adoption and syncretization of the appurtenances of outside cultures were investigated. The researchers came to the deduction that for the pre-Aro adult Igbo, the definition of supreme Deity is different from western thinking today in that a supreme Deity is particularistic or universal in a decentralized form for a given Igbo clan and from the viewpoint of that clan, the deity is the highest among gods in the world (where “world” meant a smaller sphere than is seen today). Before Aro, then, many politically acephalous Igbo clans attributed supremacy to Ani, the Earth deity. Ani was popularized by the pre-missionary contact Nri (500BC -1500AD) who came from the east (Igala-Jukun-Hamito-Semitic cultures) with Chukwu (as a concept, not name), but later saw the importance of controlling the autochthonous Igbo through yam as far as agriculture was concerned. Thus, religious focus was shifted to Ani, leaving Chukwu in an otiose position. Later the Aro (1690AD-1902AD) adopted the name “Chukwu” for Ibinukpabi. At the height of the Aro acculturation in most of Igbo land, Chukwu came to be widely known again and general cultural processes of adopting Him as supreme in a decentralized form was in progress before the British interrupted. The appearance of a supreme deity in the Igbo religious thought is closely tied to a need for its existence.

Ikoro: Journal of Contemporary African Studies. , 2018

This study examines the Igbo village square and the contemporary phenomena of online social netwo... more This study examines the Igbo village square and the contemporary phenomena of online social networking, using FaceBook, an online social network site, to draw out similarities, weaknesses and opportunities. Like the village square, FaceBook provides interaction among peers and transmission of culture, norms, politics, economic and religious values. The study is hinged on the Social Network Theory (SNT). The Survey research design is utilized. The tools of data collection are covert participant observation, Internet Interview Schedule (using chatting) and Internet questionnaire, using Email. This is to ensure a wide and valid scope of study of FaceBook. Findings are garnered through purposive sampling technique, especially for the benefit of Igbo culture-conscious website programmers and community page creators on social network sites. It is revealed that, despite weaknesses, Facebook can be utilized for a new Igbo Square Tradition online site.

Ikenga: International Journal of Institute of African Studies, 2019

The origin of the lgbos is a subject that has enjoyed different kinds of historical and ethnograp... more The origin of the lgbos is a subject that has enjoyed different kinds of historical and ethnographic analyses. lt is a subject that has excited people of all walks of life, and generated a considerable amount of thesis and anti-thesis, speculations, analytical constructs, and academic pugilism. This situation, it appears, was what led an Mbaise elder, as cited by Elizabeth Isichei in The History of the lgbo People, to state, in a voice laden with seriousness and apparent finality that “we did not come from anywhere, and anyone that tells you that we came from somewhere is a liar. Write it down”. However, scholars were not deterred by this conclusion and works have continued to interrogate the matter and manner of Igbo origin from all kinds of sources. One of the latest entrants to this sea of research on lgbo origin is a new book written by B.O.N. Eluwa, and given the title: Ado-na-Idu: History of lgbo Origin.

Wole Soyinka and the Poetics of Commitment. Enugu: CNC Publications. , 2018

At the beginning of the Nigerian Civil War, Professor Wole Soyinka was arrested by the Nigerian G... more At the beginning of the Nigerian Civil War, Professor Wole Soyinka was arrested by the Nigerian Government and imprisoned. In 1969, he was released. His book, The Man Died, is mostly a portrayal of his thoughts and actions while in prison. The level of political activism which he pursued against the Gowon government while incarcerated made the administration uncomfortable. He went on a hunger strike for week after week, determined to protest against the injustices he found in the society propagated by the government and also for the conditions in which he found himself in prison. This article x-rays his thoughts and actions as demonstrated in the book as a means of analyzing his mindset and belief system against subjugation. His, is an exemplar of a man who will not keep silent in the face of tyranny.

Chinua Achebe and the Convolutions of Immortality: Re-assessing the Writer in Relation to New Realities. , 2017

In the Chancellor's Lecture at Amherst on 18 February 1975, titled An Image of Africa: Racism in ... more In the Chancellor's Lecture at Amherst on 18 February 1975, titled An Image of Africa: Racism in Conrad's "Heart of Darkness", Chinua Achebe saw Joseph Conrad as “a thoroughgoing racist”, Achebe asserts that Conrad's famous novel (published in 1902) dehumanizes Africans, rendering Africa as “a metaphysical battlefield devoid of all recognizable humanity, into which the wandering European enters at his peril”. This caused controversy, right from the venue of the lecture, where some western professors refused to support Achebe’s views. The researchers analyze the lecture, bringing out its strengths and weaknesses and making an independent synthetic view of it. In our view, Conrad’s book is seen as a work which brings out the beauty of the African natural settings and the evil behavior of intruding Europeans searching for ivory. Nevertheless, Conrad’s book is also seen as hastily pandering to the erroneous zeitgeist of the time it was written (given that some African culture had beauty in them) and Achebe’s response is seen as a bit severe and non-diversified (giving that not much of Africa had western civilization at the time of the appearance of Conrad’s novel and not all of African culture had beauty in them). This critique is contextualized by making references to aspects of Western negativities and backwardness within the novel or around 1902 and aspects of African beauty and backwardness within the novel or around 1902 also. Therefore, both Conrad’s Novella and Achebe’s Essay have their flaws and strengths.

Journal of Black Studies

This paper examined the recent immortalization project of Hon. Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe at Enugu. Histo... more This paper examined the recent immortalization project of Hon. Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe at Enugu. Historicizing his achievements and legacies, the paper studied the roles he played in ensuring that independent Africa is attained and why he continues to be remembered even after his death. The research method is qualitative and descriptive. Secondary data such as newspapers, books, journals and online materials are used to enrich the work. The result shows that the inauguration of the Nnamdi Azikiwe Centre and other previous projects that immortalized him were as a result of his outstanding and selfless services to Africa and Nigeria in particular. The paper discovered that the new Nnamdi Azikiwe Centre was his renovated residential lodge which richly embodies his political history and career years, thoughts, ideology, and philosophy. The findings of this research will help government officials, historians, tourists, and students in making decisions on good governance, consulting material i...

Ikenga International Journal of Institute of African Studies. , 2013

This paper explores the origins and history of minstrelsy through to Igbo minstrelsy in the world... more This paper explores the origins and history of minstrelsy through to Igbo minstrelsy in the world. Then it settles down to ferret out the nature of Igbo minstrelsy today, given that the advent of western music and the effects of colonization have turned it around to no ends. The purpose of getting at the heart of its nature is to provide salvific paradigms for its resurrection from the doldrums of oblivion. With the heavy western popular music of Nigeria today, the study becomes very expedient as a drive towards preserving an aspect of Igbo culture which brings to the fore the art of pathfinding, social criticism and valve for public opinion, especially against leaders who are not attuned to taking advice from those they govern. The method of data collection is secondary documentary evidence, with a view to bringing out articles which have investigated through field research the minstrelsy of the past, knowing that such investigations today would be marred by confabulations and social changes. Recommendations are given for the restoration of Igbo minstrelsy to its popular position, and then a conditional forecast is made in the last sentence of the conclusion.

ational Transformation through Entrepreneurial Education. Nsukka: Institute of Education, , 2013

Many Nigerians are peremptorily indisposed to the capacity building prospects of music to the var... more Many Nigerians are peremptorily indisposed to the capacity building prospects of music to the various Nigerian ethnic groups. The researchers undertook to measure the concrete entrepreneurial education and gains embedded in music as relating to relevance in the multi-ethnicity of Nigeria. The reasons for perceived irreverence to music were specifically isolated and reviewed. In trying to isolate these reasons, the researchers relied on documentary evidence. We found, amongst others, that audience positive response to local patriotism in music is a factor that influences opinions concerning music and music lovers and players. In pointing out the capacity building capabilities of music entrepreneurship education in the light of our findings, we noted that, to excel, performers need to combine music with other ventures so that what financial gain they derive from music would be channeled to other prospects and rechanneled back to music as oil to keep the vibes alive. Furthermore, skill diversification would help to shatter prejudices fueled by stereotypes associated with lone professions. It was also noted that music entrepreneurship education in Nigeria need to be channeled towards researching popular music and tapping the economic potentials inherent in audience responses to it, which uneducated musicians are reaping from today with abandon.

Chinua Achebe and the Convolutions of Immortality: Re-assessing the Writer in Relation to New Realities., 2017

This study aims at bringing to the open evidences of deep social catharsis in Achebe’s account of... more This study aims at bringing to the open evidences of deep social catharsis in Achebe’s account of the Nigerian Civil War in his last book, There was a Country: A Personal History of Biafra. Achebe showed these evidences in accordance with Emile Durkheim’s Theory of Social Sharing. The various emotional arousals which ensured the retention of memories are shown to be mostly subconscious such that ordinary personal interactions during the war are graphically painted by the author in his push to release these emotions and achieve relief. The import of the retention is understood if it is appreciated that the memories had remained vivid after forty-two years since the end of the Nigerian Civil War. Using poetry in opening sections of the book, a convenient mode for the author’s sublime outpouring of emotions is achieved. Understandable symbols are brought to the open. Emotional communion is evident in the author’s interspersion of the names and short profiles of people of social influence in large sections of his account of the civil war. The publication of the book drew reactions which led to external social sharing, both negative and positive. Some of the reviews of the book from other scholars show a connection to the author’s emotions, leading to external emotional communion and, hence, complete social catharsis.

Germany: LAP Lambert Academic Publishing , 2017

Are Christian women more religious than Christian men today? Are career women less religious than... more Are Christian women more religious than Christian men today? Are career women less religious than housewives within the Christian religion? This study seeks to answer these and other questions through exploring gender differences in commitment to Christianity through select documentary evidences in the capital city of Abuja, Nigeria. Theories of gender differences in religious commitment are explored. Contemporary factors influencing these gender differences are analyzed. Gender differences are examined through indices of Christian commitment. Findings reflect the rate of influence of identified contemporary factors on gender differences in commitment to Christianity.

WAJMAE: West African Journal of Musical Arts Education, (WAJMAE), 2014

Since 1961 when music education began in the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, for the benefit of Ni... more Since 1961 when music education began in the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, for the benefit of Nigerians and the rest of the world, there have been moves to fuse Igbo music into Western platforms. This study investigates these moves with a view to distilling lessons for the continuation of intercultural approaches to music education in Nigeria. It was discovered through documentary evidence that missionary churches contributed overwhelmingly to choral music by influencing educators and practitioners to compose Igbo music idioms for modern concert stage. It was also discovered that many pioneers focused on arranging folk tunes to western equipment and musical performances. Notational systems for Igbo musical instruments have also been devised. It is advised that the earlier outlook of fusing old and new be imbibed more ardently by music educators and popular musicians, and that music education focuses on the development of Igbo musical instrument technology by guiding traditional musicians in a grade and certification system which is a western platform for systematization. It is hoped that this synthesization process will help systematize the present popular African music practices especially by the young Nigerian artistes and music educators to seriously preserve African musical history for posterity.

Ikoro: Journal of Institute of African Studies. , 2014

This study aims at showcasing and exploring the similarities and dissimilarities between the pre-... more This study aims at showcasing and exploring the similarities and dissimilarities between the pre-contact religion of the Igbo and the pre-contact religion of the Dogon. There is the introduction to the concept of religion, especially as seen in cultural anthropology as a social institution. Then there is a familiarization section about the Igbo people and the Dogon people. The first section ends with the definition of terms as key to establishing the senses in which some words are used in this study. The next section presents an in-depth comparative analysis of the religions of the Dogon and the Igbo, viewing them from their similarities and their dissimilarities. It is distilled that there are possibilities that newer lights on the religions of the ancient Igbo and Dogon would be shed. And wherever these new parcels of knowledge are obtained, they would be revolutionary to some perspectives and yet, open to critical analysis in other perspectives.

Ikenga International Journal of Institute of African Studies. , 2013

Some studies assert with evidence that the concept of a supreme God is foreign to Igbo pre-missio... more Some studies assert with evidence that the concept of a supreme God is foreign to Igbo pre-missionary contact religious thoughts. They mostly point to western influences on such a “supremacy” concept in both the minds of the early observers of the Igbo and in the Igbo themselves who had been either proselytized or swayed by the proselytization of Christianity, consciously or not. Other scholars confirm the presence of a supreme God in Igbo religious thoughts. Using Georg Hegel’s Dialectic and Uzodinma Nwala’s Radical Interpenetration as theoretical framework, this work presents both views, collecting data through documentary evidence of ethnographic reports and closely examining the perspectives of ethnographic reports in pursuit of any undeniable proof of the existence and extent of structure and popularity of the concept of supreme deification in Igbo thoughts. The evolution of Igbo traditional religious systems catalyzed by migrant knowledge and the adoption and syncretization of the appurtenances of outside cultures were investigated. The researchers came to the deduction that for the pre-Aro adult Igbo, the definition of supreme Deity is different from western thinking today in that a supreme Deity is particularistic or universal in a decentralized form for a given Igbo clan and from the viewpoint of that clan, the deity is the highest among gods in the world (where “world” meant a smaller sphere than is seen today). Before Aro, then, many politically acephalous Igbo clans attributed supremacy to Ani, the Earth deity. Ani was popularized by the pre-missionary contact Nri (500BC -1500AD) who came from the east (Igala-Jukun-Hamito-Semitic cultures) with Chukwu (as a concept, not name), but later saw the importance of controlling the autochthonous Igbo through yam as far as agriculture was concerned. Thus, religious focus was shifted to Ani, leaving Chukwu in an otiose position. Later the Aro (1690AD-1902AD) adopted the name “Chukwu” for Ibinukpabi. At the height of the Aro acculturation in most of Igbo land, Chukwu came to be widely known again and general cultural processes of adopting Him as supreme in a decentralized form was in progress before the British interrupted. The appearance of a supreme deity in the Igbo religious thought is closely tied to a need for its existence.

Ikoro: Journal of Contemporary African Studies. , 2018

This study examines the Igbo village square and the contemporary phenomena of online social netwo... more This study examines the Igbo village square and the contemporary phenomena of online social networking, using FaceBook, an online social network site, to draw out similarities, weaknesses and opportunities. Like the village square, FaceBook provides interaction among peers and transmission of culture, norms, politics, economic and religious values. The study is hinged on the Social Network Theory (SNT). The Survey research design is utilized. The tools of data collection are covert participant observation, Internet Interview Schedule (using chatting) and Internet questionnaire, using Email. This is to ensure a wide and valid scope of study of FaceBook. Findings are garnered through purposive sampling technique, especially for the benefit of Igbo culture-conscious website programmers and community page creators on social network sites. It is revealed that, despite weaknesses, Facebook can be utilized for a new Igbo Square Tradition online site.

Ikenga: International Journal of Institute of African Studies, 2019

The origin of the lgbos is a subject that has enjoyed different kinds of historical and ethnograp... more The origin of the lgbos is a subject that has enjoyed different kinds of historical and ethnographic analyses. lt is a subject that has excited people of all walks of life, and generated a considerable amount of thesis and anti-thesis, speculations, analytical constructs, and academic pugilism. This situation, it appears, was what led an Mbaise elder, as cited by Elizabeth Isichei in The History of the lgbo People, to state, in a voice laden with seriousness and apparent finality that “we did not come from anywhere, and anyone that tells you that we came from somewhere is a liar. Write it down”. However, scholars were not deterred by this conclusion and works have continued to interrogate the matter and manner of Igbo origin from all kinds of sources. One of the latest entrants to this sea of research on lgbo origin is a new book written by B.O.N. Eluwa, and given the title: Ado-na-Idu: History of lgbo Origin.

Wole Soyinka and the Poetics of Commitment. Enugu: CNC Publications. , 2018

At the beginning of the Nigerian Civil War, Professor Wole Soyinka was arrested by the Nigerian G... more At the beginning of the Nigerian Civil War, Professor Wole Soyinka was arrested by the Nigerian Government and imprisoned. In 1969, he was released. His book, The Man Died, is mostly a portrayal of his thoughts and actions while in prison. The level of political activism which he pursued against the Gowon government while incarcerated made the administration uncomfortable. He went on a hunger strike for week after week, determined to protest against the injustices he found in the society propagated by the government and also for the conditions in which he found himself in prison. This article x-rays his thoughts and actions as demonstrated in the book as a means of analyzing his mindset and belief system against subjugation. His, is an exemplar of a man who will not keep silent in the face of tyranny.

Chinua Achebe and the Convolutions of Immortality: Re-assessing the Writer in Relation to New Realities. , 2017

In the Chancellor's Lecture at Amherst on 18 February 1975, titled An Image of Africa: Racism in ... more In the Chancellor's Lecture at Amherst on 18 February 1975, titled An Image of Africa: Racism in Conrad's "Heart of Darkness", Chinua Achebe saw Joseph Conrad as “a thoroughgoing racist”, Achebe asserts that Conrad's famous novel (published in 1902) dehumanizes Africans, rendering Africa as “a metaphysical battlefield devoid of all recognizable humanity, into which the wandering European enters at his peril”. This caused controversy, right from the venue of the lecture, where some western professors refused to support Achebe’s views. The researchers analyze the lecture, bringing out its strengths and weaknesses and making an independent synthetic view of it. In our view, Conrad’s book is seen as a work which brings out the beauty of the African natural settings and the evil behavior of intruding Europeans searching for ivory. Nevertheless, Conrad’s book is also seen as hastily pandering to the erroneous zeitgeist of the time it was written (given that some African culture had beauty in them) and Achebe’s response is seen as a bit severe and non-diversified (giving that not much of Africa had western civilization at the time of the appearance of Conrad’s novel and not all of African culture had beauty in them). This critique is contextualized by making references to aspects of Western negativities and backwardness within the novel or around 1902 and aspects of African beauty and backwardness within the novel or around 1902 also. Therefore, both Conrad’s Novella and Achebe’s Essay have their flaws and strengths.