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My father’s people call me Alhaja It’s the same name they called my grandmother who died when I was four.

When she returned
from Mecca, she earned the society’s credentials for a Muslim woman who
has been on pilgrimage to the joint capital with Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
A man would be called Alhaji.

Grandma returned
from Mecca with a golden tooth and wore a golden skull cap made of wire
mesh on her head, before she tied her gele on it, before she headed for
the market where she was a woman leader. She carried me by strapping me
on her back. Well, I could walk, but she preferred that I didn’t. This
is what I always remember of her. It is the other things that they say
about me and her, that I don’t. And for this reason, I desired to know
how I earned her name. And this is because, for a long time, it did not
occur to me that my grandma could have a name other than Alhaja. It did
not matter that her mate – her best friend and my step grandmother –
was also called Alhaja, which we differentiated it with a prefix Elepo,
as she, sold palm-oil.

Now, as a grown-up,
I have come to understand that every Yoruba Muslim family has its own
Alhaja, and where there is more than one person of such appellations,
relatives distinguish them by locations – Alhaja Surulere or Alhaja
Ibadan; or even by size – Alhaja Small or Alhaja big.

I earned a name
from grandma – and I did not have to be a Muslim or take a trip to
Mecca to get that. For typically, as a Yoruba, should I have needed to
get respect for coming back as her, I might have borne names like
Iyabo, Yewande – a reincarnated mother – should I have waited until her
death to be born. Yet, I am treated as a reincarnate. Things like extra
chicken where the others get one, lots of gift, and a blossoming
relationship between Father, who sees me beyond his daughter. I was his
mother. So I can always walk up to him and talk of the others’ domestic
shortcomings. I was a mouthpiece for anyone in my home that could not
approach my disciplinarian father.

A change occurred.
One of my aunts visited my parents, whom I still live with, and patted
me on the back – again. Then her hand fondled my chin – embarrassing me
into self-consciousness now that I am a matured woman. She rendered a
brief panegyric – originally my grandma’s – and lots of prayers on
advancement, prosperity and opportunities. Then she said as she left,
‘Alhaja, my mother, take care of your father.’ Ok. There’s a problem
here. (I didn’t tell her that bit). Her parting propped up a decision
in me. I decided to remember or assume how my name change occurred. It
would perhaps make a definition of my duties as a batoned grandmother
easier.

Again, my decision
is borne of the fact that I feel like someone who has borne another’s
name for too long, and not even with benefits of sharing the
responsibilities that should come with it. Should there be need for
any. And so I impressed it upon myself to assume a mental
responsibility of being a big aunt, mother or cousin to my paternal
relatives, allowing my quiet to inhabit the grandeur of that space of
deference which I am accorded.

Nothing mattered
for a while, until recently, when a friend, flipping through my photo
album, remarked about how much I look like my late grandmother. Again I
picked up a photograph of the woman and pictured the nose, flamboyant
at the extremes, yet it would not pass as the typical African nose. It
was too small. Her lips, full as mine, would not curve towards the
chin; hers was spread into a smile – perpetual. Her eyes, even in the
black and white photograph, were intense and questioning. What colour
were her eyes. Mine are deep brown, under the lights, and they are like
sundials with chocolate spread. I looked deeper. The picture wouldn’t
tell.

My grandmother’s
love grew out of the stories I heard concerning my fondness for her.
Fondly, mother would express how she died, ‘a good death’ – in her
sleep. ‘She went to the market and slept.’ Her death did not amount to
much performance. She lived, and then died.

Father, an only
child to his mother, would sometimes look at me with a smile afloat on
his face. Finally, if in a too-light mood, he would tell me how I would
sit, sleep, and eat with her when I was younger. ‘No one could take
your hijab from you,’ he said. ‘You really loved her.’ ‘I did?’ ‘And
every weekend we knew we had to take you to stay over at her place.’
‘At grandpa’s house, abi?’ I smiled at that. The house in question was
my grandfather’s. I grew up knowing the place as the ‘Sallah house’ (Id
el kabir). Many years after, grandma died, my father still celebrated
Sallah on her behalf, calling the mosque to say prayers on her behalf
and afterwards there was so much fried meat for the children to eat.
Yet, I could not remember this Alhaja whom I looked so much like.

‘What did I do when
she died?’ ‘Well you cried.’ ‘Just cried?’ ‘Yes. Or what else would you
have done?’ Crying was alright, but there was a part of me that trusted
that I could have done something else.

So I became again,
that four-year-old, whose beloved is lowered into the earth, holding
the edge of her mother’s dress. Crying? Just crying, could not be
alright, if I really loved her and became her. Then, I wondered if it
was a divine plan at the time to understudy her before she died. It
didn’t work out. I am a writer. I didn’t turn out a trader.

Perhaps in death,
people will wonder aloud, how death took away a kind-hearted and
helpful human. Until then, I explored the realities, which showed me
that understudying her did not work out.

Perhaps before
then, I was there besides her when she died, pulling her rigid body to
wake for prayers, at dawn? The mosque calling for prayers and the rush
of a tenement building – scrambling, screaming and stifled shouting.
But what did I do after that? My mind could not pull through, I let it
pass.

Father said I was
at home with them when she died. That someone brought the message to
them and I was in the living room with everyone else.

So I imagined a
great scream from my mother once some-somebody came to deliver the
message. Her cry halted the teasing from my two elder brothers. We all
stilled, unsure of what happened. Perhaps, at the time, I was hungry.
My brothers understood that something was wrong with grandma, but I
didn’t. So I waited for everyone to calm down and I acted normally, but
the people around me didn’t. They petted me, cuddled me, offered me
help….

Perhaps the next
morning, mother would not leave the kitchen. Her younger and elder
sister – both known as big mummy to me, stayed with her. Then my aunts,
uncles and some other people whom I had never met came to see my
father. Not one along kokoro, biscuits and go-go sweets, like grandma
always did when she came for a visit. They patted me on the back and
sat close to my father. Fondled my chin, one after the other. Then a
family meeting began – loud, whispers, cries and again talks.

Between, their talks. Food was served. It was not a party, but a lot of people around.

Perhaps a part of
me, said: ‘something is amiss. Grandma is not a part of the meeting. So
I walked outside, and hoped to see grandma, who would arrive with the
usual delicacies.

I remained outside, until, the visitors came out one after the
other, patting my head and smiling kindly – than normal to me. One
after the other, they gave me her name, ‘Alhaja…’

Elizabeth Taylor who died in Los Angeles on Wednesday, March 23 at the age of 79, was the last great star of the Hollywood studio system. The citation of her age may have seemed like an inaccuracy at first; she had been famous for so long – seven decades, longer than many lifetimes – that many assumed she was older.

She rose to superstardom in an age when stars of the silver screen were goddesses, and never had a woman seemed more willfully godlike than Taylor. She married eight times, in an alternative career of serial walks up the aisle that involved a cast of seven husbands (she tied the knot with Richard Burton twice). Astonishing, yes, but if you were the most beautiful woman in the world, wouldn’t you live several lifetimes at once?

As news of her death broke, Vanity Fair magazine introduced a photo-study of the great Liz with these words: “No one before or since has been more captivatingly beautiful.” These were not just words inspired by the mushy sentimentality that prevails in the immediate aftermath of a death. Many years ago, this writer viewed ‘The Love Goddesses’, a 1965 documentary about the iconic impact of all the significant female movie stars spun by the Hollywood system. From the birth of cinema, they are shown decade by decade: from Lilian Gish to Louise Brooks, from Greta Garbo to Mae West, Ava Gardner to Marilyn Monroe. When we come to the fifties and a black and white love scene is played from ‘A Place in the Sun’, the narrator says of the face on the screen, “Elizabeth Taylor, probably the most beautiful love goddess of them all.”

Taylor’s famed beauty – violet eyes, smouldering raven hair, perfectly symmetrical features and a beauty spot dropped on one cheek like her maker’s signature – mesmerised all that laid eyes on her. Now in the age of augmentations, injections and implants that allow Hollywood stars to remake themselves according to their plastic dreams, it is a marvel that every feature on Taylor was God-given. Even women were awed by her, as British actress Diana Rigg said last week, “Elizabeth Taylor was the most beautiful woman I have ever clapped eyes on.”

A Place in the Sun

The Love Goddesses’ clip was a fitting introduction to my proper viewing of ‘A Place in the Sun’ years later. In the movie, Montgomery Clift is a working class young man who falls for the irresistible society belle played by Taylor. She is the perfect vision of beauty and class; and driven by his desire for her and a need to escape his social reality, Clift’s character kills his pregnant girlfriend, played by Shelley Winters (cast in the ordinary woman’s role, as happened to her in ‘Doctor Zhivago’ a few years later). A lingering close-up love scene (back then, ‘love scene’ was more suggestive than anything, usually involving no more than a kiss) is preceded by Clift telling Taylor how much he wished he could express his love for her. “Tell Mama, tell Mama all,” she says, eyes glittering like the diamonds that would later become entwined with her legend, and an enduring sex symbol was born.

Hyper-real fame

I am of the generation that saw the Larry Fortensky marriage happen. Taylor contracted her eighth and final marriage to the former builder in 1991, after meeting him at the Betty Ford Clinic. He was 20 years her junior and, while the union may have shown that she did not only go for men who could shower her with diamonds, it also demonstrated the hyper-real soap opera quality of her fame by this time. Her hair through the 90s was of the high volume that had held sway in the shoulder-padded heyday of ‘Dynasty’ and ‘Dallas’ the decade before, and it was all too easy to confuse her with the characters in those soap operas. She launched her own range of million dollar grossing perfumes – White Diamonds and Passion, among others – long before celebrity fragrances became de rigueur among the rich and famous. She was one of two older women who became muses to the late Michael Jackson (Diana Ross was the other). Taylor’s friendship with the Peter Pan of pop survived his child molestation trial (she was one of his most outspoken supporters) and lasted till their deaths (she was buried in the same cemetery as the singer on March 24). It was an unlikely friendship, but Jackson and Taylor had one thing in common: they had both achieved stardom from very young and, some would argue, never lost their inner child.

Potent screen star

In the blur of marriages, diamonds and rehab, it was easy for the press to overlook what a potent screen star Taylor had once been. “When was the last time you saw an Elizabeth Taylor film?” the British media were wont to ask in derisive tones in the 80s and 90s; and only those with longer movie memories could have demurred.

Her prime began in the fifties, notably with films like ‘Father of the Bride’ (1950). In ‘A Place in the Sun’ the following year, she was cast alongside the brilliant method actor, Montgomery Clift; and so began her film trysts with three iconic homosexuals of cinema. The other two were Rock Hudson and the short-lived James Dean, both of whom shared the screen with her in ‘Giant’ (1956). Hudson’s highly publicised death from AIDS in 1985 prompted Taylor to become a life-long activist and humanitarian for the disease. She founded the Elizabeth Taylor AIDS Foundation, tirelessly raising money to support sufferers and HIV research.

Born Elizabeth Rosemond Taylor in London on February 27, 1932, her dual American-UK nationality meant she could be made a Dame Commander of the British Empire (2000). The investiture by her namesake, the Queen of England, took place on the same day as Julie Andrews was honoured.

As a child, Taylor had been trained in ballet and once danced for the British royal family. But it was after her return to the US with her parents that her film career started, notably with the hit film ‘National Velvet’ (1944). The actress won the first of two Oscars for playing a high class call girl in 1968’s ‘Butterfield 8′ (her second was for ‘Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?’). She also got good notices for ‘Cat On A Hot Tin Roof’ (1958) in which she appeared with Paul Newman.

Cleopatra in love

During the filming of the 1963 epic, ‘Cleopatra’ in Rome, Elizabeth Taylor’s romantic and cinematic lives collided in spectacular fashion. Playing Antony opposite the actress’s Egyptian queen was the fiery Welsh actor, Richard Burton who would become her fifth and sixth husband. Taylor had already been married four times. The husbands: hotel heir Nicky Hilton; Michael Wilding (with whom she had two sons); producer Mike Todd for whom she converted to Judaism but who tragically died in an air crash; and crooner Eddie Fisher, who she divorced to marry Richard Burton.

Many talk now of how Brad Pitt left Jennifer Aniston to run off with ‘the temptress’ Angelina Jolie – but a little history will show that Taylor and Burton had been even more flagrant. Eddie Fisher had been Mike Todd’s best friend, and, after the latter’s death, rushed to comfort his widow – Taylor – and fell for her. Fisher was married to Debbie Reynolds and they had two children (including Carrie, future Princess Leia in the Star Wars films), but went off to marry Taylor, in a major scandal.

The affair with Burton caused an even bigger scandal that drew the ire of the The Vatican, since the two lovebirds were carrying on their romance openly in Rome while married to other people. Burton and Taylor left their respective partners and married in 1963, in the most enduring union of the actress’s life. The public’s fascination with the pair reached fever pitch. They embarked on a jet-set lifestyle punctuated by the fabled diamonds he gave her. Princess Margaret, according to popular lore, admired the famous Burton-Taylor diamond on the actress’s finger and remarked about how “vulgar” it was, but it was clear she wouldn’t have minded having it for herself.

The film that brought Burton and Taylor together, ‘Cleopatra’, is infamous for its astronomical cost, nearly bankrupting the studio, Twentieth Century Fox, despite being the highest grossing film of 1963. Watching ‘Cleopatra’ today, it is not at all a bad film; and stands as a testament to the tempestuous love between Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton, while showing her at her most beautiful. The couple divorced in 1974 only to remarry in Botswana the following year, then going their separate ways for the final time in 1976.

Movie phenomenon

A few days before his death in 1984, the now remarried Burton wrote a letter to his Elizabeth from his home in Switzerland. It arrived at her Bel Air, Los Angeles home after she returned from his memorial service and is the only letter Taylor kept secret till the end of her own life. Other letters were released in the book, ‘Furious love: Elizabeth Taylor, Richard Burton and the Marriage of the Century’ (2010). It was an all-consuming love, as Burton wrote to her: “I am forever punished by the gods for being given the fire and trying to put it out. The fire, of course, is you.” He articulated her essence thus: “You are probably the best actress in the world, which, combined with your extraordinary beauty, makes you unique.”

Oft quoted in the last few days has been Victor Canby’s statement about the film star, published in The New York Times in 1986: “More than anyone else I can think of, Elizabeth Taylor represents the complete movie phenomenon – what movies are as art and an industry, and what they have meant to those of us who have grown up watching them in the dark.”

A fitting tribute, but perhaps the last word should go to her great love, Richard Burton, who said, “That girl has true glamour. If I retired tomorrow, I’d be forgotten in five years, but she would go on forever.” And in a sense, she did.

Elizabeth Rosemond Taylor, born February 27, 1932; died March 23, 2011.

A three-day seminar themed ‘Reading and Producing Nollywood: An International Symposium’ opened on March 23 at the University of Lagos. Filmmakers, Academics, students and people with interest in the Nigerian movie industry witnessed the event.

The seminar was put together by the trio of Duro Oni, Dean of the Faculty of Arts, UNILAG; Onookome Okome, lecturer at the University of Alberta, Canada; and Bic Leu, a Fulbright Fellow researching the Nigerian indigenous film industry.

According to Leu, the symposium which started off as Okome’s idea, was aimed at examining the Nigerian movie industry and looking at filmmaking forms, from storytelling to scriptwriting and distribution.

A number of speakers were expected to deliver papers and discuss select topics during the symposium. These included: academics Jonathan Haynes, Carmela Garritano and Ahmed Yerima, Barclays Ayakoroma, of the National Institute for Cultural Orientation, filmmaker Busola Holloway and many others.

Haynes, a professor of African Film, Video and Literature at Long Island University, US, who has done a lot of research on the Nigerian movie industry gave the keynote address, titled, ‘Reading Nollywood as a Popular Art: Class Character and the Campus Film’. “The study of Nollywood is growing radically”, he noted. “Nollywood now deserves to be taken seriously. People dismiss it; foreigners and Nigerians, particularly academics.” He added that “there should be frames of reference [for] describing it”.

According to Haynes, who had co-written an essay with Okome titled ‘Evolving Popular Media’, he found a framework for describing Nollywood and it was based on academic Karin Barber’s position that popular art in Africa is different from that of other regions of the world. “African popular art comes from the people who consume it. Barber talks about this art being of, for, and by the people,” Haynes declared.

He used campus films as the basis of his argument. “American films are not interested in campuses as a situation like Nollywood is”, he noted.

Plenary session

During the plenary session moderated by Garritano from the University of St. Thomas, US, Anulika Agina, Benmigho Awala and Cornelius Onyekaba delivered papers on related topics.

Agina of the Pan-African University, Lagos, discussed ‘Narrative Structure and Storytelling in Nollywood’. Her paper focused on the importance of the three-act structure in storytelling and scriptwriting. “We don’t pay attention to structure. Most films have an intrinsic three-act structure and this is what makes the form work, even though the audience is not conscious of it,” she said.

According to Agina, in a number of Nollywood movies, the first act of a story extends events to reach a climax – even though climax is really a third-act thing. She also canvassed the filmmaking maxim, ‘Show, Don’t Tell’. “In our films, a lot of what we know about the story comes through words. You should see more than you hear,” Agina said. “Ideally, dialogue should be used only when image and sound cannot move a story on. We need script development and editing. Storytellers need to learn how to use sub-plots to develop a story,” she added.

Film is a weapon

Cornelius Onyekaba delivered a passionate paper on ‘Re-telling History and Changing Perceptions Through Movies: A Study of Jeta Amata’s ‘Amazing Grace’.

“Film is a weapon. It is not just entertainment”, he declared, going further to decry the attitude of some producers who are only interested in getting back the money they put into a production. “Filmmaking is more than this,” Onyekaba said.

“Nations have used film to shape their economies,” said the lecturer at the Department of Creative Arts, UNILAG. He noted that there was a time the Chinese shut themselves out in order to recreate themselves as a nation. “Today, China is one of the booming economies of the world,” he said.

Commending ‘Amazing Grace’ (2006) as a study of how the black man’s voice can used to tell the black man’s story, Onyekaba argued that the Nigerian filmmaker is a sculptor and should see himself as such. “Nollywood should assert itself,”, he urged.

Benmigho Awala from the School of Media at the Pan African University delivered a paper on ‘Representation of Political Corruption in Nigerian Home Video Films: A Study of Some Selected Video Films’. He showed how some of the films discussed in the paper, including Tunde Kelani’s Yoruba movie, ‘Agogo Eewo’ (2002), x-rayed the political situation in Nigeria. He examined how a filmmaker like Kelani offers solutions to dealing with corruption by projecting in his films traditional folkloric themes. The seminar ended on Friday, March 25.

It is two days to her 70th birthday and Abiodun Duro Ladipo, better known by her famous stage roles as Oya or Moremi, is getting set for the big day. To share in Oya’s joy is her mother with whom she is working on a fly whisk in the living room.

“Mama, please go inside. We are about to have an interview and he will have to record,” she tells her still sprightly mother, who obliges.

We are in the Ladipo’s residence at Bode Wasinmi, near the Broadcasting Corporation of Oyo State, Bashorun, Ibadan. Oya and her late husband, famed dramatist Duro Ladipo, moved into the house in 1974, four years before his death in 1978, and she has remained there since.

Unique man

The saying, whoever wants to make an old woman smile should ask about her husband, holds true for Moremi. The indigene of Epe in Ijero local government area of Ekiti State, smiles and says, “Why are you people always interested in how we met?” when asked how she met the great artist.

She had no interest whatsoever in acting back then because, “people believed it is a lazy person that will wake up in the morning and start dancing.” Her parents were also against it.

“However, I loved singing. I moved to Osogbo to stay with my aunt when I wanted to write entrance examination into the School of Nursing. I noticed Duro trying to form a troupe at Mbari Mbayo in Popo area of Osogbo. I used to go there to while away time because once my aunt and her husband went to work, I was left alone at home.

“I had never seen a man as tall as that before. When I noticed he was taking more than a passing interest in my talent, I told him I am not here to dance or act and that I won’t stay long. He was deeply involved in cultural plays which didn’t allow any form of fashion but whenever I wanted to go, I would put on bangles and trendy shoes to discourage him. He never sent me away or lost his temper. That was how the issue of marriage arose. However, he didn’t find it easy to marry me.”

Beier intervenes

German scholar, Ulli Beier, would eventually play a role in persuading the adamant girl who initially wanted to be a nurse to marry Duro Ladipo.

“When [Beier] saw me, he told my husband, “Duro, if Asake goes away, you can’t make it.” They went behind my back to meet my parents, but my mother refused. My aunt also forbade me from going to rehearse with his troupe. She would give me a lot of household chores so that I won’t be able to go for rehearsals. Duro… shifted rehearsals to suit me.

“He could read my mood without having to tell him anything and I concluded that this is a trustworthy fellow. He had many gifts but when he continued pestering me to marry him, I asked why me? He was way older than me. I asked if he didn’t have a wife before and he said he had but that she wasn’t around. I told him she must have run away because he is a bad man.

“If my husband wants to tell you something important, he will take you to a memorable place. He told me his life history and I started crying by the time he finished. I told him not to worry, that I will assist him. That was how I agreed to marry him, but it wasn’t easy. My parents were adamant initially, but Ulli and my husband were also unrelenting. I later went to convince them because my father had promised that he won’t force me to marry any man.”

The marriage lasted until Ladipo’s death, 14 years later. And though he has been dead 33 years, Moremi didn’t remarry. She explains why.

“I had resolved from a young age that I won’t marry two husbands and that I won’t have children for two men. In fact, there is no man that can be like Duro because other men will be thinking I’m a supernatural woman and they will be acting that way. I decided to remain a widow so that no man will compound my problem.”

Fulfilled and unfulfilled dreams

Moremi still maintains contact with Beier, the ‘Alarina’ (matchmaker) between her and the late Duro. He was also instrumental in helping her achieve one of her long held dreams for her husband’s graveyard in Popo, close to Oja Oba in Osogbo, becoming a tourist site

“Ulli came here some years ago. He said he didn’t like where Duro was buried when we were talking, but I told him I didn’t know what to do. He said he will discuss with (the then Osun State governor), Olagunsoye Oyinlola, and that was how the place was adopted.

“I am grateful that UNESCO has taken over the place as a tourist site. They are just going to start the renovation because they took it over last year. I am happy because I had always desired for the place to be renovated and now it is happening.”

Though she is happy about her husband’s graveyard, Oya will be happiest if the same happens to the family residence at Bode Wasinmi, which “could do with some repairs.”

Pointing, she informed, “That part of the house fell because I didn’t have enough money to maintain the whole house. I have great plans for this house, how it can also become a tourist centre. People come here and say they want to see the house but I don’t feel there is anything to see yet. I wish I could get people to support me.”

One of the highlights of Oya’s 70th birthday was the premiere of ‘Moremi’, one of her husband’s plays she has turned into a video film. Why ‘Moremi’ of all the works?

“‘Moremi’ was the easiest for me to adopt during the 30th anniversary of his death. It’s a popular women’s story and we have to let women know that they have a role to play in Nigeria, because Moremi rescued Ife. I want women to participate more actively in all spheres of life, they shouldn’t rely on men. I am happy it is premiering now because it is a call to women to get involved in affairs in the country.”

Ultimately, her dream is to turn all the works, including ‘Ajagun Nla’, ‘Beyiose’ and ‘Aro Meta’ amongst others into video films – but there are challenges.

“They are expensive plays, not parlour plays. I spent millions on ‘Moremi’ because it involved three communities. If I had millions, I will start recording them all because I want people to see the plays. I had to reproduce ‘Oba Koso’ seven years after Duro’s death because people were coming up with different interpretations.”

Sango‘ll fight back

‘Oba Koso’, one of Duro Ladipo’s most popular plays, has been interpreted differently by other filmmakers. There is Obafemi Lasode’s ‘Sango’ and ‘Ose Sango’ by A-Productions, but Oya is not bothered.

“When Lasode wanted to make his ‘Sango’, I wrote in the papers that they shouldn’t trespass. There are many deities in Yoruba land that you can portray, not one that someone has laboured over. They told me it’s not his property; that it is Yoruba history. I didn’t say anything, only that they are lazy and thieves.

“Those that made ‘Ose Sango’ said they were only treating the object. Ose (axe) is Sango’s symbol; you can’t divorce Ose from Sango. I know Sango won’t sleep in heaven. Whoever finds his trouble, he will fight back. Sango can defend himself; I don’t have to fight on his behalf.”

Revisiting the stage

Though video films are the rave in Nigeria now, Mama is not ready to abandon the stage. She says, “Stage plays shouldn’t be allowed to die. Abroad, it is the in-thing. Whites prefer interacting with the cast and crew after seeing a play. The bad economy and insecurity have turned Nigerians away from stage plays. By God’s grace, I will endeavour to work in both mediums.”

Oya’s desire at 70, she discloses, is to turn all her husband’s works into movies to preserve them. “They contain a lot of morals and I want children to also benefit from them. There are lessons in the plays that we will all find useful,” she reiterates. It has not been plain sailing and Mama reveals how she has been coping.

“I have received grace and persevered. I have not spoilt myself with men since my husband’s demise; they would have used and dumped me. But it wasn’t easy. I kept falling sick repeatedly at a time and went to see the doctor. He asked if I won’t be offended by his suggestion and I told him to go ahead. He said I should go look for a man who will make me happy… because what’s wrong with me is not an illness. That I am young and that it is nature, that I can’t cheat nature.

“He explained that he is not asking me to go remarry but I should look for a man with whom I will at least exchange words and joke with. I started laughing and asked him where I will find such a man. I kept persevering and God has assisted me till today.”

Like the Yoruba and Igbo, the Hausa are hardworking and adventurous traders. Apart from trading within various Hausa villages, towns, and provinces, the Hausa also trade with merchants from other parts of Nigeria, Ghana, Niger, and North Africa. Some of them have had to settle with their families outside Northern Nigeria in the course of their business pursuits. Their main items of trade are cattle, kolanuts, tomatoes, potatoes, onions, guinea corn, groundnuts, traditional medicines, and leatherworks. Kano is the commercial nerve centre of the Hausa people. Metropolitan in nature, it still clings tenaciously to various elements of traditional life as can be seen in the prominence of Hausa language, architecture, and dressing in the city.

There is no way one can analyse gender relations among the Hausa without considering the role of Islam. This is because over half the Hausa population is Muslim. Islam introduced and sustained new ways and avenues for the discrimination of women. It popularised polygamy; it allows a man to marry as many as four wives and to keep as many concubines as he can afford. The clause attached to marrying four wives at the maximum is hardly considered: a man can only marry four wives if he can treat them equitably, without having or showing a preferential disposition to any of the wives.

This is not to say that the pre-Islamic Hausa society did not discriminate against women. It did. There are some negative socio-cultural beliefs, attitudes, and practices, which started in pre-Islamic times among the Hausa. Examples are female circumcision and child marriages.

In spite of the political and cultural penetration of northern Nigeria by the British colonialists, the Muslim Hausa have been able to retain a major proportion of their culture and tradition even in contemporary times. Islam as a unifying religion and Hausa as a common language have contributed significantly to this. This perhaps explains why the empowerment of women by gender-sensitive people and organisations remains slow and difficult. Muslim women activists (like Zainab Kabir) have used the Quran and other notable published Islamic authorities to counter the negative image of women in Hausaland. They encourage women to actively participate in work, even in those areas that are regarded as being for men only.

Countering the common injunction (readily used by men and women to justify their attitudes towards women) of Surah Al-Baquarah 2:228 that a woman’s authority is subservient to that of a man, they insist on women and men as being protectors of each other, as found in Surah At-Tawbah 9:71. Isa Wali (1956) has also used verses from the Quran to support the thesis that women and men are created as equals (see the Quran, 11:228; 53: 44-46; 92: 1-3).

Hausa Women in Proverbial Lore

Pre-Islamic Hausa women were largely dedicated to storytelling activities. It was their domain. Every night, within the confines of their homes, or under the dark sky, they re-told age-old stories. Proverbs held a very important place. They encapsulated the people’s history and philosophy of life. This was more so because the people could not read and write. Their history and beliefs were stored and coded in some special people’s mental capacities. They are then transmitted orally within various literary genres, proverbs inclusive.

The cultural heritage, ethics, mores, beliefs, traditions and wisdom of the Hausa are all embedded in their proverbs. The attainment of Islam as a state religion did not in any significant way diminish the status of proverbs in Hausaland. Islam only changed the general animistic belief system found in proverbs by shifting the focus to Allah. The laws governing inter-personal relationships as found in proverbs remained the same. Islam confirmed, to a large extent, the virtues of equity and fairness needed in one’s dealings with others, as taught in Hausa proverbs. Islam broadened the horizons of Hausa proverbs by making use of them as titles of books, newspaper headings and articles, and in works of fiction. The highly moralistic works of fiction by Muslim authors, writers, and poets relied heavily on the adoption of proverbs for easier transmission.

Hausa gender proverbs, though relatively few in number compared to those of the Yoruba and Igbo, reflect the hierarchical position of women, and the attitudes and beliefs that shape their existence. Some of these proverbs, loosely translated, are:

i. A man should not eat from the same plate, tray, or pan with a woman, as she uses this as an avenue to drain the man of all his strength.

ii. Having sex with a mad woman, undetected, will make the man very rich.

iii. A woman who is grinding corn must sing while she is at it, or else she will become mad.

iv. A woman who climbs a ladder will become mad.

v. A married woman who utters her mother-in-law’s name is inviting the visit of an earthquake.

The first saying confirms what has been extensively stated in literature: men believe that women are spiritually powerful; they fear this power, detest themselves for giving in to their fear, and take measures to curtail this fear by spinning negative superstitions, proverbs, folktales, etc. about women.

The second proverb depicts an act that unscrupulous men have been carrying out for generations on mentally ill women. By this very act, men re-inscribe the master (male) – servant (female) relationship which sometimes involves the rape of the possession by the possessor.

The third belief reaffirms the “suffering and smiling” syndrome women are expected to put on whenever they are carrying out household chores. Since nature has endowed women with the timeless ability to give birth to and nurture children, men expect them to carry out all work revolving around these cheerfully. Any woman who falls short of this expectation is regarded as rebellious.

Hierarchical structures

It has been said before that the Hausa society is hierarchical in nature. Many of their proverbs serve as reminders to youth, who are believed to be generally restless and always in a hurry, to be contented with their place on the social ladder, as failure to do this would bring undesirable consequences:

Akwiya ta yi wayo da yankekken kunne.

(The goat acquires wisdom from burnt ears).

Abin da babba ya gani yana kasa, yaro ko ya hau rimi ba zai gan shi ba.

(What an adult sees from the ground, a boy cannot see even if he climbs a silk-cotton tree).

However, the fourth proverb boldly states that the female sex is not even on the ladder (hierarchy) yet; her place is still on the ground on which the ladder rests.

The fifth proverb confirms one of the major statements of this study: that patriarchy as a social system deliberately creates an environment which encourages women to nurture superstitions, dislike and acrimony against other women.

The following Hausa proverbs throw more light on the negativity ascribed to women in northern Nigeria:

-Babban abu shi ne, mace ta riga nijinta bawali.

(It is a serious thing for a wife to urinate before her husband does).

-Dole a zo, daki ya fada wa gurguwa da dan masu gida.

(Come quickly, the roof has collapsed on a crippled woman and the owner’s son).

These two proverbs are often used to describe desperate and grave scenarios. Though highly sexist in nature, they can be applied to explain situations that are not sexist in the least. But this does not in any way rectify or decrease the impact of the negative impressions these proverbs leave on the subconscious.

-Tuo na iyali, nama na – gida.

(The ‘tuo’ – a staple food made from grain – is for the household; the meat – a much appreciated delicacy – is for the master of the house).

The master of the household is traditionally entitled to the best part of any meal, while the the women and children have to be contented with whatever is left for them. Though some Hausa proverbs do not use the word “woman” in a direct sense, popular notions about the proverbs and contexts of usage always point at women.

The co-wives’ ethos

The distrust, envy, dislike, fear, and hatred co-wives entertain toward one another are also reflected in Hausa proverbs. There is always a basis for these negative elements to generate the outbreak of physical violence. The presence of contrastive characters or experiences possessed by wives in a polygamous setting – the procreative wife versus the non-procreative wife; the wife that has all male issues versus the one that has only female children; the wife whose children are in school or are educated versus the wife whose children are delinquents, etc. – often precipitate trouble. The husband, the nucleus of the women’s attention, most times worsens the already sensitive scenario by having a favourite among his many wives.

-In mugawa kaza ta fara shiga akurki ko wace ta zo sai ta tsare ta.

(If a wicked hen enters the fowl house first, everyone that comes in after her will be pecked by her).

What should be noted is that the major cause of the general discontent in most polygamous homes is envy. This envy steams from the fact that no two persons are created the same. A number of women under the same roof as wives to a particular man would use whatever attribute they possess to inflict pain on those who possess what they do not have, or to punish those who do not have what they possess. Thus,

-In na rena kaza ko ramonta ba na so.

(If I despise the fowl, I do not even want any soup from it).

This is another proverb often brandished by co-wives to one another. Any little event, experience or attribute can cause a feeling of animosity towards a co-wife. This rivalry which women generally manifest towards each other, especially in polygamous settings, is also reflected in the proverb,

-Mai koda ba ta son mai koda.

(A woman who is paid for grinding does not like another woman to be paid for grinding).

What this implies is that a woman does not like a rival in the form of another woman whose presence would diminish her person and importance in the eye of her husband and the public.

Wai kanama da ta harbi kasko ta ce ‘shegen duniya ko motsi ba ka yi’.

(The scorpion said to the small pot it stung, ‘you bastard thing, you don’t even move’).

Hausa men also believe that women talk too much. The proverb above is thus thrown at them to shut them up. Though there is a proverb used generally for people who talk a lot – Yawan magana ya kan kawo karya, meaning, ‘there is the tendency to tell a lie when one talks too much’ – it is believed that more often than not, women will always chatter away. The man is therefore, conditioned to be reticent, especially when in the midst of women. He is brought up to be sober and not to get into much argument with women as this could put him in trouble.

In tururuwa ta tashi lalacewa sai ta gashi.

(If the black ant is getting ready for an attack, it sticks out hairs).

This proverb refers to the supposedly temperamental nature of the woman, this time a scolding wife whose red hot anger forewarns her husband of her preparedness to leave him. The condition of the Hausa woman is made more pathetic by the fact that even an outright abusive proverb as this gets largely drawn upon by women in their descriptions of or attacks on fellow women.

Being the concluding part of a paper, ‘Subliminal Texts: Women, Proverbs and Power’ delivered by Anthonia Yakubu during an International Women’s Day seminar at the University of Lagos on March 9.

Academy Award
winning Hollywood veteran, Elizabeth Taylor, died today, Wednesday 23,
March 2011, at 79 years old in Los Angeles.

The two time Best
Actress winner, who started acting at the age of 12, had been
hospitalised for about six weeks at the Cedar-Sinai Medical Center in
Los Angeles, where she was receiving treatment for heart related
ailments.

According to a report on American news website, Msnbc.msn.com, the screen legend died with her family members by her side.

Aside her
pacesetting acting credentials, Taylor’s lifestyle, including serial
marriages and bizarre illnesses, made sure the spotlight never ceased
to follow her. Before her death, she had appeared in over 70 movies and
was a frontrunner in many humanitarian causes, including a fight
against AIDS.

She married eight
times in her lifetime and had four children. She was also known as a
good friend to the late Pop music legend, Michael Jackson.

The German Cultural
and Information Centre, Goethe-Institut Nigeria, is set to re-open
months after it closed shop at its former office on Ozumba Mbadiwe,
Victoria Island, Lagos.

The opening
ceremony will take place at its new office, Lagos City Hall, Lagos
Island, on Friday, March 25 by 12noon. The centre, now under the
directorship of Marc-Andre Schmachtel, has been running its normal
German language classes and other programmes at the new location since
January.

Nigerian-German
musician, Ade Bantu, whose single ‘Waiting’ done with singer, Nneka,
was released recently; the ageless Fatai Rolling Dollar; highlife
maestro, Orlando Julius and Chinaza – are some of the artists billed to
perform at the formal opening on Friday. There will also be a dance
performance, photo exhibition and trial language classes apart from the
musical performances.

A release from the organisers disclosed that guests stand the chance
to win a free flight to Germany sponsored by that country’s airline,
Lufthansa and other prizes in a quiz competition that will hold during
the ceremony. Goethe-Institut Nigeria offers services which includes
language courses, a well-stocked library with collections on Cultural
Studies, Geography, Literature, Art and German language. It also
organises and supports cultural events and workshops in Nigeria. The
annual ‘Danse meets Danse’ it organises with the French Cultural
Centre, is one of its popular events while it also focuses on visual
art.

A three-day
conference on the Nigerian film industry, tagged ‘Reading &
Producing Nollywood: An International Symposium’ commences today with
an opening ceremony at the Afe Babalola Auditorium of the University of
Lagos, Akoka, Yaba, Lagos.

Jonathan Haynes,
Professor from Long Island University in the United States, is billed
to give the keynote address ‘Reading Nollywood as Popular Art: Class
Character and the Campus Film’ at the opening. Haynes who has taught at
the University of Nigeria, Nsukka and the University of Ibadan
specialises in African Studies, African Film, Video and Literature and
English Renaissance Literature.

The symposium
commencing today and ending on Friday March 25 is being convened by the
trio of Duro Oni, Professor and Dean of Arts, University of Lagos,
Onookome Okome, Professor and Lecturer, University of Alberta, Canada
and Bic Leu, US Fulbright Research Fellow, University of Lagos.

On The programme
includes; plenary sessions, Film and Documentary screenings and
Roundtable Discussions, all centred on the Nigerian Film Industry.

Today’s plenary
sessions are themed ‘Reading the Popular, Reading Nollywood:
Perceptions of the Popular in an African Popular Culture’; ‘Debating
the Social Presence of Nollywood’ and ‘Reading Genre in Nollywood and
Modes of Story Telling in Nollywood’. The sessions will be chaired by
Carmela Garritano, Professor at St. Thomas University, Onookome Okome
and Francosie Ugochukwu, The Open University, UK respectively.

The following will
have the opportunity of discussing various topics at today’s event;
Cornelius Onyekaba on ‘Re-telling History and Changing Perceptions
Through Movies: A Study of Jeta Amata’s ‘Amazing Grace’ and Ambrose
Uchenunu on ‘The Stage, the Celluloid and the Emergence of the Home
Videos in Nigeria’.

Other speakers
include: Anulika Agina, Tunde Awosanmi, Tolu Onabolu and Jenkari Zakari
Okwori among others. ‘Nollywood Babylon’, a Documentary Film will be
screened at today’s event.

Other participants
at the symposium on subsequent days include, Theatre Practitioner Ahmed
Yerima, who will today address the topic ‘Scripting the Popular: The
Art of Scriptwriting in Nollywood’, Documentary Filmmaker Busola
Holloway, and MD Nigeria Film Corporation (NFC) Afolabi Adesanya among
others.

On subsequent days,
Yerima, will be chairing a plenary session themed ‘Reading Culture,
Women and Religion in Nollywood’, while Holloway will discuss the topic
‘What is a movie?’. Leu will discuss ‘Tracking Nollywood and The
Informal Sector’ at a researchers’ forum while Okome who is also an
authority on Nollywood will discuss the topic ‘Reading Nollywood:
Production, Distribution, Reception’.

Barclays Ayakoroma of the National Institute of Cultural Orientation
will be moderating a roundtable on the topic ‘Reflections on
Distributing and Marketing Nollywood Effectively’, while Emeka Mba, DG
National Film and Video Censors Board, will chair a roundtable on the
topic ‘Nollywood in Motion: Practitioners, Policy Makers and Marketers
in the Industry’.

The author of ‘I Do
Not Come To You By Chance’ will feature in an interactive session today
in Abuja, in an event spearheaded by the Independent Corrupt Practices
and other related offences Commission (ICPC), to sensitise youth
against fraud and other criminal activities.

The ICPC is
collaborating with The Write Squad, an Abuja-based literary group on
the event, which will involve readings and discussions. According to
Rashidat Okoduwa, the Director, Education and Awareness at the
Commission, the collaboration is part of its efforts to intensify the
corruption campaign among the youths. “We have come to identify the
power of literature, especially when it comes to shaping the thought of
our younger generations. This is the spirit behind our collaboration
with The Write Squad by hosting this edition of My Book & I,” she
said.

Maintaining that
the choice of the guest speaker was influenced by the appropriateness
of the book to the discussion, she said, “And of course as an
anti-corruption agency, we find the book ‘I Do Not Come To You By
Chance’ very relevant to our objectives and such decided to use it to
engage the youth in an interactive session.” The Write Squad since its
inception in October 2009 has held monthly reading and interactive
sessions to help students cultivate reading culture. Among the many
writers hosted by the monthly sessions are Ahmed Maiwada, Sade Adeniran
and Sello Duiker.

Students from both
private and public, Junior and Senior Secondary Schools will
participate in the session. This was affirmed by Jerry Adesewo, founder
and coordinator of the group. According to Jerry Adesewo more students,
coordinator for The Write Squad, this will be the largest of the
group’s events so far. “We started with just 24 students in March 2010,
from where we grew to between 60 – 100 on monthly basis, depending on
funds available for purchase of books to distribute to the schools; and
now we shall be having 200 students,” he affirmed.

Currently Opinion Editor at NEXT, Adaobi Tricia Nwaubani won the
2010 Commonwealth Writers’ Prize (Africa Region) for her novel, about
the notorious ‘419’ advance fee fraud. ICPC will donate copies of the
book to the libraries of 20 Abuja schools.

After the staging
of Jimbay’s dance production, ‘Tears in the Rain’ on March 12, NEXT got
to talk with Anthony Edet Offiong, one of the choreographers and the
man behind the show.

When and where did you learn dance?

I started dancing
[professionally] 13 years ago. I learnt it at the National Theatre. At
some point in my life, I was a science student but I have always loved
the Arts. When I was unable to continue with formal education due to
lack of funds, I went into Dance fully.

What form of dance are you into?

I do all kinds of
dance. I started as a traditional dancer, then I went into hip-hop and
contemporary dance. Now you could say my style is more of
traditional/contemporary. I also do Latin dance.

What else do you do?

I do a little bit of stand-up comedy and I anchor shows.

What is Jimbay all about?

Jimbay
International Services is not only for Dance. We do consultancy,
research and documentation, mostly in the arts. It is run by five young
artistes: Abdul Kazeem Adeowolu, Babs Ademoye, Folake Cole, Ugo Obiayo
and me. We have been friends for a long time before we came together
last year to form this company.

What inspired ‘Tears in the Rain’?

‘Tears in the Rain’
is based on different experiences that we as young artists are facing.
All the stories you heard (during the performance) are things that we
have all gone through as dancers and we are saying that enough is
enough when it comes to dance. As dancers, we are not respected. People
think that the only thing we do is come on the screen and shaky our
booty in one music video or the other. People are not interested in
attending dance productions except when it is a part of a stage play.
It was hard to get sponsorship for this particular production. We (the
production crew) had to dip our hands into our own pockets to finance
it. And then we did not change a gate fee as we wanted people to come
and see what they have refused to sponsor. The irony is that now we are
getting praised by the audience.

Who choreographed the dances?

I and Uche Onah
were in charge of the choreography but the rest of the cast were also
allowed to bring in their own originality especially in the individual
performances. Uche and I just streamlined everything in the direction
that we wanted.

How far do you intend to take the production?

I want to take it on tour to universities.

Do you have adequate sponsorship for that?

No, I don’t. And I
am begging people, members of the public, corporate and individual
sponsors, to get involved and not let this dream die. The individuals
that took part in this are not taking a kobo back by way of
compensation. Everybody just came out to do it because we love what we
do.