Jonathan Haynes: Pioneering Nollywood Studies

2019 LSA DISTINGUISHED SCHOLAR AWARD: JONATHAN HAYNES (PROFESSOR OF ENGLISH AND FILM STUDIES, LONG ISLAND UNIVERSITY, USA)

Nomination Submitted by Paul Ugor, Associate Professor, Illinois State University, USA

It is indeed my pleasure and honor to nominate Professor Jonathan Haynes of Long Island University, New York as the LSA Distinguished Scholar for 2019. I have known Prof Haynes for eighteen years and I know of no other Africanist scholar who is deserving of this prestigious award than him. Not only has Prof Haynes been a consummate scholar of African literatures and cultures for the past twenty years, in those two decades, he has been an incredibly gracious and generous mentor, ally, advocate, and guardian to many Africanist scholars in the humanities.

Prof. Haynes’ research work in African literature and cinema marks him out as a scholar of towering international reputation whose persistence of scholarly inquiry into African modes of self-expression has secured legitimation for a field of study now known globally as Nollywood studies. To get a sense of Haynes’s scholarly achievements, it is important to remember that only a few years ago, Nollywood was a film industry scoffed at by mainstream cinema directors and elite scholars in the humanities. With his longtime friend and research associate, Prof. Onoookome Okome, Prof Haynes worked tirelessly to make sense of the artistic worth of Nigerian video films and to defend the legitimacy of the industry as a remarkable mode of African self-expression worthy of critical attention. Today, Nollywood it is at the centre of scholarly inquiries in prestigious scholarly fields such as Media Studies, Popular Culture, Film Studies, Anthropology, English and Cultural Studies, History, Linguistics, and other disciplines in the humanities.

Dave Allen on First Encounters with Religion

Dave Allen 

Eke, Orie, Afo, Nkwo: Igbo Market Days

"EKE: (taking stage vigorously and waving the ogirishi branch) I am Eke! First part of the whole. My day is sacred. I hold the Eastern pillar of the earth. Agwu, the unpredictable, multi-faceted, creative and destructive force, patron of diviners and medicine men, is my consort. The ogirishi is my sacred staff. (waves it).
          ORIE: (taking stage and waving the ikenga) I am Orie! I hold the pillar of the earth on the West. Ogwugwu, that fearsome spirit, benefactor of the just and industrious, protective yet ruthless in anger, patronises my markets. I wield the ikenga.
          AFOR: (taking stage and waving the ofo branch) I am Afor! I hold up the earth at the Northen corner. The fearsome Amadioha is my impatient instrument for justice. The ofo is my staff.
          NKWO: (taking stage and waving the aboshi) I am Nkwo! Ala, the pacific nature spirit of fertility, guardian of morality and prosperity patronises my markets. I hold up the Southern edge of the world. I wield the sacred aboshi branch.
          ALL: We are the four pillars of the earth!
          AFOR: We gave our names to your market days.
          EKE: We are the four market days.
          ORIE: We are Izu! Complete.
          NKWO: We represent your forebears!
          ALL: We are your forebears!"

Toni Duruaku, 2003, 44-45

A Matter of Identity

This Lagos: Carnivorous and Voracious

(By Toni Kan) - "Lagos is a beast with bared fangs and a voracious appetite for human flesh. Walk through its neighbourhoods, from the gated communities of Ikoyi and Victoria Island to Lekki and beyond, to the riotous warrens of streets and alleyways on the mainland, and you can tell that this is a carnivorous city. Life is not just brutish - it is short.
          In Lagos, one is sometimes struck by the scary fact that some crazed evil genius may have invented a million quick, sad ways for people to die: fall off a molue, fall prey to ritual killers, be pushed out of a moving danfo by one-chance robbers, fall into an open gutter in the rain, be electrocuted in your shop, be killed by your domestic staff, jump off the Third Mainland Bridge, get shot by armed robbers, get hit by a stray bullet from a policeman extorting motorists, get rammed by a vehicle that veers off the road into the pedestrian's walkway, die in a fire, get crushed in a collapsing building. You could count the ways and there would still be many others.
          Yet, like crazed moths disdaining the rage of the flame, we keep gravitating towards Lagos, compelled by some centrifugal force that defies reason and willpower. We come, take our chances, hoping that we will be luckier than the next man, willing ourselves to believe that while our fortune lies here, the myriad evils that traverse the streets of Lagos will never meet us with bared fangs.
          Abel and Santos were in Mushin when Lagos bared its fangs. There are no quiet streets in Mushin. It crackles with electric intensity and ripples with animosity. It is as if everyone, from shifty-eyed men to paranoid women, feels you are out to get them.

Lagos: A City Still Becoming

(By Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie) - Still Becoming: At Home In Lagos With Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

The novelist has lived in Lagos on and off for a decade. Here, in an essay for Esquire's new Travel & Adventure issue, she reflects on life in Nigeria's biggest city

          Lagos will not court you. It is a city that is what it is. I have lived part-time in Lagos for 10 years and I complain about it each time I return from my home in the US — its allergy to order, its stultifying traffic, its power cuts. I like, though, that nothing about Lagos was crafted for the tourist, nothing done to appeal to the visitor. Tourism has its uses, but it can mangle a city, especially a developing city, and flatten it into a permanent shape of service: the city’s default becomes a simpering bow, and its people turn the greyest parts of themselves into colourful props. In this sense, Lagos has a certain authenticity because it is indifferent to ingratiating itself; it will treat your love with an embrace, and your hate with a shrug. What you see in Lagos is what Lagos truly is. 

          And what do you see? A city in a state of shifting impermanence. A place still becoming. In newer Lagos, houses sprout up on land reclaimed from the sea, and in older Lagos, buildings are knocked down so that ambitious new ones might live. A street last seen six months ago is different today, sometimes imperceptibly so — a tiny store has appeared at a corner — and sometimes baldly so, with a structure gone, or shuttered, or expanded. Shops come and go. Today, a boutique’s slender mannequin in a tightly pinned dress; tomorrow, a home accessories shop with gilt-edged furniture on display.

Nollywood, Alaba Markerters, and New Nollywood

(By Andrew Rice) - “Most of [Nollywood] movies … are awful, marred by slapdash production, melodramatic acting and ludicrous plots. [Kunle] Afolayan, who is 37, is one of a group of upstart directors trying to transcend those rote formulas and low expectations. His breakthrough film, the 2009 thriller “The Figurine,” was an aesthetic leap: ... it announced the arrival of a swaggering talent keen to upset an immature industry. Unlike most Nollywood fare, “The Figurine” was released in actual theaters, not on cheap discs, playing to packed houses next to Hollywood features. “Many observers,” Jonathan Haynes, a scholar of Nollywood, recently wrote, “have been waiting a long time for this kind of filmmaking, which can take its place in the international arena proudly and on equal terms.” …

The economic realities of African filmmaking conspire against an improvement in quality. The consumer base is huge — there are more than a billion Africans, [200] million of them in Nigeria alone. But access to those buyers is controlled by the clannish merchants who congregate on the outskirts of Lagos at the Alaba International Market, the distribution hub of the African movie business. …

Nollywood’s bawdy humor — or fright or fantasy — appeals to a public seeking escape from depressing living conditions. The industry itself was born out of economic desperation during the early 1990s, a period of military dictatorship, low prices for Nigeria’s oil and Western-mandated “structural adjustment” of its economy. Actors and cameramen were out of work because of budget cuts at the national television station. Movie theaters were closed because no one wanted to venture into the dangerous streets at night.

Ajofia Nnewi: Ana Were Were

"Sitting on a Man": Aba Women's War and Igbo Women's Strategy

Aba Women, early 20th century

"A group of Igbo women in 1929 rose up as a unitary women would and with one voice and a single-mindedness of purpose waged war against the oppressive measures put in place by the conquering British colonial government. Through the three arms of the administration ... the British administration's District Officer (D. O.), the Church (the clergy) and the School (teachers) and the Court (judges), incessantly taxed the poor. This resulted in the de facto removal of the husbands from their homes to work in the cash-crop farms to support the British economy. Back in Europe, it was the era of industrial revolution and, in effect, Igbo men slaved on their lands as laborers working for their masters and paid taxes from whatever little they earned, leaving them weak, spent and with not enough to take care of their families. Under the circumstances, they were often unable to perform their conjugal obligations with their spouses in their matrimonial homes. On the fateful day in 1929, the Igbo women of Aba marched on government hill and stoned the District Officer. He was forced to call reinforcements, and when they came they too were again stoned by the women. The enraged women would not back down or leave government hill until their demands were met. The people called it the Igbo Women's 'War' but the British called it the Igbo Women's 'Riot.'
          What was unclear at the time was that what took place between the women and the ruling colonial power was a strategy, albeit on a small scale, which many an Igbo woman would usually employ to bend a recalcitrant husband for dereliction of duties and obligations to wife and family. They call it 'sitting on a man.' Therefore, the Aba women at war with the British had employed the Igbo women's radical strategy of 'sitting on a man' when aggrieved. Such a recalcitrant woman would 'sit' on her abusive husband's homestead, refusing to cooperate with food preparation, sex and emotional company until her husband promised to change his ways. Sometimes, it was a group of wives that 'sat' on their offending men."

Ada Uzoamaka Azodo, 2019, 18-19

"Di-Feminism: Valorizing the Indigenous Igbo Concept of 'Agunwanyi,'" in African Feminisms in the Global Arena: Novel Perspectives on Gender, Class, Ethnicity, and Race, ed. Ada Uzoamaka Azodo

Nollywood Actors Fans Will Forever Love

(By Adunni Amodeni) - Ten Talented Nollywood Actors We Will Never Stop Loving

Some Nollywood stars who quit acting in the 90s made our childhood days memorable and lit, while some are still around entertaining their loyal fans. Their roles in classic movies helped set the pace for the industry we’ve come to love dearly today.

These great actors have been involved in one scandal or another and some have managed to remain scandal free. Amidst their endless dramas, their fans still can’t bear not seeing them on their TV screens. They also look out for their movies either on DVD or in the cinemas.

Legit.ng has come up with a list of Nollywood actors we will never stop loving:

LADIES:

 1. Genevieve Nnaji:

The world can never get enough of talented Nollywood actress, Genevieve Nnaji. The 39-year-old diva is also a movie producer, director, screenwriter and former model. She reportedly welcomed her first child at the age of 16 and did not let that affect her studies or movie career. Having joined the industry in her teenage years, the delectable actress has featured in countless movies both local and international.

Reporting Nollywood from Australia

(By Carol Rääbus) - Nollywood is huge — and there's never been a better time to check it out

           How many Nigerian films or TV shows have you watched?

Chances are, if most of what you watch is what's available in cinemas and on Australian broadcast TV, you haven't seen any — despite the fact Nigeria is the second largest producer of film in the world after Hollywood.

But that could be about to change as Nollywood — as the Nigerian film industry is colloquially known — films hit our small screens as streaming services tune in to the appetite for more diverse stories.

While films have been made in Nigeria for as long as people have been making films, the term Nollywood started to be used in the early 2000s as Nigeria began to really ramp-up its film production.

In the early 2000s, Nollywood made a name for itself with quickly made films with often low-production values, which were distributed on burned DVDs to be more affordable and accessible than the country's few movie theatres.

These days Nollywood is still pumping out an impressive volume of films with more than 1,000 titles released each year, and is also producing films with high production values and strong storylines that have captured Netflix's attention.

Academics Research Corruption Using Nollywood

(By Yomi Kazeem) - The Nollywood Movie Experiment to Research Nigerians’ Anti-corruption Behavior

The popularity of Nigeria’s Nollywood movie industry—the world’s second largest by volume—was covertly deployed for a social cause five years ago.

Researchers from Princeton University, the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) collaborated to commission a feature film to test local habits on reporting corruption. The research for the movie, which was funded by the Canadian Institute for Advanced Research and an anonymous donor, was approved by the Princeton Institutional Review Board.

Given the popularity of the local movie industry and the prevalence of corruption in Nigeria, the researchers looked to study how Nigerians report corruption using the high-profile actors to model behavior.

            Nigeria’s corruption problems are well-documented with a landmark survey two years capturing the scale of corruption especially among public officers. Despite his well-publicized anti-corruption stance and message in office, Nigeria’s president Buhari has struggled to definitely address the problem with his administration suffering corruption-related scandals of its own.

Female Kings Among the Yoruba

(By Sulaiman Salaw-udeen) – The Many Female “Kings” of Ekiti

Yoruba tradition precludes princesses from becoming kings, but many of them have been installed regents or stop-gap kings in many towns and cities across Southwest Nigeria.

Like the conventional monarchs, they often come decked in traditional Agbada, Buba and Sokoto and wear round-headed caps festooned in attractive designs. They wield the familiar royal horsetail and are normally graced with obeisance by humble and adoring subjects who call them ‘Kabiyesi’, a Yoruba word for ‘Unquestionable’.

But their often rotund faces and other feminine features do always set them apart from the male world which their looks and their relations with male chiefs gave them away as. They are females and are fleeting occupiers of the exalted throne of a traditional ruler or Oba across towns and communities in Ekiti. They carry the common title of regents.

Anambra, Politics, and Tragedy of Three Brothers

Andy (L) and Chris Uba

(By Comfort Obi) - Anambra: The Tragedy Of Uba Brothers

          In Anambra state, the ego of a political dynasty has just been punctured. Its members have self-destructed. And got dismantled during a political battle comparable to that of the Biblical Goliath and David.

          You must have heard of the three Uba brothers -Ugochukwu, Andy and Chris – from Anambra state. Ugochukwu is the eldest, and Chris, the last. Of the same parents, the brothers are politicians, and, each accomplished in his own right. They have name       recognition. They are very rich. Two of them, Andy and Chris, are billionaires. They have limitless contacts, and powerful friends.

          The first son of the family, Ugochukwu, has a doctorate degree. He did not buy it. He read, and acquired it. So, he is not one of those many illiterates, or half illiterates, who shamelessly prefix their names with Dr.

          When in 1999, Nigeria embraced democracy again, Ugochukwu won a senatorial seat. So, in the Nigerian way, he is free to answer Senator (Dr) Ugochukwu Uba. And, if any traditional ruler conferred him with any of the many chieftaincy titles on offer in Igboland, he is also free to answer Senator (Dr) Chief Ugochukwu Uba. Nigerians, we love titles.

          As a Senator, he was not a bench-warmer. A number of Senators are. Their colleagues dc their jobs. Many times, they are asleep in the Chambers. When awake, they are dumb. And only chorus “Ayes” or “A/ays” depending on where the tide moves their colleagues. But not Uba senior.

          Unfortunately, his was a-one-term tenure. As if the Uba brothers had appropriated that seat as their father’s farmland, Andy vied for the same seat, under same party. He replaced his brother. Many stories still abound as to why Andy did not allow his brother a second tenure. But following is the most popular.

Nollywood Takes Over Hollywood, Celebrates Feat

L-R: Ose Oyamendan (2nd L), Kemi Adetiba, and Banky W

(By Oluwagbemiga Asuelimen) - The Weekend Nollywood took over Hollywood

          When you live in Los Angeles, you often feel you have seen everything. You have most likely gone through an earthquake or two. You have seen men become women and women become men. You have seen stars rise and fall. You have eaten food you can not even pronounce. You have been on a roller coaster through life and, sometimes, you do not know what is real and what is make belief.

Last week, the city saw what it had not seen before, not in this light. Nigeria was in town.

“We’re gonna rock this town the way it’s not been rocked in a long time,” beamed Nigerian-American filmmaker Ose Oyamendan as he strolled in his Ankara shirt under the mild afternoon sun into a meeting with the big wigs at The Egyptian Theatre on Tuesday afternoon.

A few hours later, the online version of the prestigious Los Angeles Times spilled the beans on the unsuspecting city when it announced, “Watch Out Hollywood, Nollywood is coming to town”. This is the closest you get to a cultural coup. Nigeria, long bashed in the media for scandals, corruption and fraud, was getting a public rebranding, thanks to the Nollywood In Hollywood event.

          The headline lit up social media. Kemi Adetiba, the queen of Nigeria’s box office whose film, KING OF BOYS, was selected for screening posted a blurb of the newspaper headline on her Instagram page with a simple line, “Hey mommy… Hey daddy… Guess who just got featured in the @latimes”. Good news must travel fast. Within an hour, the news had been viewed or shared over a million times on social media. It would expand to over ten million in the next few days.

Of Marriage and Freedom to Choose a Surname

(By Motunrayo Agusto) - A few days ago, I had an amazing conversation with a 60-year-old man about why I’m married but not changing my surname. It was just the beginning of a broader and longer conversation about women in our society. I haven’t met many people, across any generation, who seek to understand views that are different from theirs and particularly, who open their minds to understanding a woman’s right to choose. I thoroughly enjoyed talking to this lovely man who I’d refer to as Mr. F going forward.

Mr. F started by asking me “Why?”

I explained, “changing my name is not a natural inclination of mine. It’s not something I have ever really considered doing or aspired to do. It’s just not my truth.”

What I didn’t tell him is that, at age 16, I didn’t even want to get married. I wanted to be President and my good friend Mr. A, who is from the Niger Delta region, was going to be my running mate because that would reflect Federal Character. Clearly, I didn’t fully understand how it works LOL! Plus, let’s not get into the ironic course of my young adulthood. Anyway, that was the future I envisioned. That was my truth.

           There are probably women everywhere who have looked forward to getting married since they were 16, and fantasised about being called Mrs. XYZ. They might value the cohesion of their families sharing one surname or maybe just don’t think of this as a necessary topic of discussion because the norm is the norm. Whatever their reasons, this is their right and it is their truth. Women do and should always have the right to choose. That’s why I define feminism as a woman’s right to choose.