Sule Emmanuel Egya
Dados Biográficos
| ID | 3789360 |
|---|---|
| NOME | Sule Emmanuel Egya |
| PRENOMES | Sule Emmanuel |
| SOBRENOME | Egya |
| ASSINATURA | EGYA S E |
| AFILIAÇÕES | Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida University |
| ORCID | 0000-0003-1888-1822 |
| VERIFICADO | Sim |
| TOTAL DE OBRAS | 25 |
| TOTAL DE CITAÇÕES | 44 |
| TOTAL COMO AUTOR | 25 |
| TOTAL COMO EDITOR | 0 |
| PRIMEIRO ANO DE PUBLICAÇÃO | 2006 |
| ANO MAIS RECENTE DE PUBLICAÇÃO | 2026 |
| ÍNDICE H | 4 |
Introduction
This introduction outlines recent developments in the theory and practice of what has emerged as African ecocriticism. These include, among others, the shift toward a less anthropocentric ecological discourse empathetic to the agency of natural beings, the decoupling of ecocriticism from a rather narrow focus on traditional genres of literature (poetry, drama, especially fiction), the intentional bridging of the Anglophone-Francophone divide in e…
Nature, and a Social Revolution in Wole Soyinka’s "Alápatà Àpáta"
This essay attempts to emphasise the agency of nonhumans and its use to achieve a social revolution in Wole Soyinka’s play Alápatà Àpáta. In Soyinka’s dramatic aesthetics, anthropocentrism is reconsidered to demonstrate the posthuman world as a sphere where nature and culture are no longer dichotomous but entangled. Using ideas of material ecocriticism, we argue that the play presents nonhumans as the protagonist in the revolution against politic…
“Rooted in Earth”
Ecology and Decoloniality
In this article, I argue that pioneer African writing (in the frame of the empire writing back) hinges its anti-colonial aesthetics and politics on what I see as the African natural world—a space of nonhuman–human entanglement ruled by the natural order of things. In confronting colonial discourse, the writers, in most cases, resort to deploying the natures (I prefer the plural form) and the nonhuman elements of their traditional societies, which…
Poetry, protest, and environment
Since its inception, Nigerian poetry in English has always been characterized by protest in nature. Beyond its aesthetic scope, it has been critical of socio-political and environmental problems that have bedevilled the nation. This paper is concerned with such literary instrumentalism; the use of poetry by Nigerian writers, living in Nigeria, as an instrument against abuses of human and environmental rights. The theoretical framework that is emp…
The Ecopoetics of Flooding in Contemporary Nigeria
Les inondations sont un drame récurrent au Nigéria à l’époque contemporaine. Elles sont, dans la plupart des cas, fatales, et leurs victimes tant humaines que non-humaines. La réalité physique des inondations nourrit un imaginaire culturel qui a donné naissance à un courant de l’écopoétique invitant à une attention critique, et c’est dans ce cadre que s’inscrit cet article. L’écopoétique des inondations, concept central ici, étudie la manière don…
The Ecopoetics of Flooding in Contemporary Nigeria
Sea-salt rides its currents to the city
Lagos is perhaps the most economically, socially and culturally crucial coastal city in Nigeria. The pressures of expansion and overpopulation have resulted in many ecological crises, one of which is flooding. Nigerian poets have poetised incidents of flooding in Lagos. These poems are concerned with the biophysical space of Lagos as a city as well as the species lives, including human lives, that get flooded away in the annual ritual of rising w…
‘Farmer-born peasant-bred’
Niyi Osundare is one of Nigeria’s most celebrated poets. Scholars working on his poetry are unanimous on what they see as his use of nature imagery, largely hinged on pastoral agriculture. He sings brilliantly of his father’s farms, of his childhood memories, and of the changing society in the face of modernity. A tension between African tradition and modernity is felt throughout his poetry. In this reading of Village Voices and The Eye of the Ea…
Out of Africa
This essay is an attempt to present a broader view of ecocriticism in Africa. Ecocriticism, in theory and practice, appears to have limited itself to the notion of environmental justice, with the aim of raising consciousness against institutional powers behind ecological crises. The reason for this is not far-fetched. International scholarship on African ecocriticism tends to focus on the activism of the Kenyan Wangari Mathai and the Nigerian Ken…
Nature, Animism and Humanity in Anglophone Nigerian Poetry
Sexualized body, exploited environment
Since Shell BP began oil exploration in the Niger Delta region of Nigeria in the 1950s, the people and the environment of the region have experienced psychological and physical violence. This violence, over the years, has been captured in literary works mainly written by males, some of which have increasingly enjoyed critical attention. The interest of this article is to shift the focus by highlighting the contribution of female writers to the hu…
The pristine past, the plundered present
Tanure Ojaide is a major voice of post-war Nigerian poetry in English, distinguished by his recourse to the orature of his birthplace. Ojaide takes orature as a locus of an aesthetics that is cognizant of the arts and politics of rural people, especially in the face of a modernity-driven, viperous establishment. His poetry’s dependence on orality, I argue, implies its rootedness in nature. But far more crucial to this article is the contention th…
Literary Militancy and Helon Habila's Oil on Water
In this article, I argue that the strident response of Nigerian writers, in the form of belligerent discourse of resistance, to the systematic destruction of the environment and its inhabitants in the Niger Delta region of Nigeria could be taken as literary militancy. This literary militancy is provoked by what one may see as the tripartite system of ruination, having three agents of destruction, namely the multinational oil corporations, the fed…
Nature and environmentalism of the poor
What is increasingly known as Niger Deltan poetry is a poetry that distinctly identifies itself with the peoples and environment of the Niger Delta region of Nigeria. The poetry of Gabriel Okara, Christian Otobotekere, Tanure Ojaide, Ogaga Ifowodo, Nnimmo Bassey, Ebi Yeibo and others seeks to draw attention to the fate of both humans and non-humans in the face of oil exploration and its negative consequences in the region. The ecocritical imagina…
Eco-human engagement in recent Nigerian poetry in English
With particular reference to the work of Nnimmo Bassey and Ogaga Ifowodo, this article discusses the ongoing engagement of Nigerian poets with issues of ecology. It argues that, for these poets, issues of ecology are largely bound up with the fate of the human beings who depend for their survival on their environment, through fishing and farming. These poets emerged in the 1980s with a strong sense of commitment to their immediate environment, wh…
Historicity, power, dissidence
Modern Nigerian poetry in English has proved to be a significant medium of action against authoritarian leadership in Nigeria. In historicizing the socio-political condition of regimes, Nigerian poets have responded to circumstances distinct to their historical period. This article examines the work of the younger writers widely regarded as the third generation of Nigerian poets, the condition of its production, and its ‘generational’ response to…
Teaching about homosexualities to Nigerian university students
Nigeria’s diverse cultures, religions and political parties appear to be unified by a strong taboo against homosexuality and gay rights. This has affected academic research, HIV/AIDS programmes, and sexuality education, all which commonly show evidence of heterosexism, self-censorship and even explicit condemnations of homosexuality. Yet a dissident discourse in Nigeria, as well as research from elsewhere in the region, suggests that this appeara…
Imagining Beast
This essay analyses recent poetry in Nigeria, especially poetry produced after 1988, the year in which the anthology Voices from the Fringe, edited by Harry Garuba, announced the emergence of a new generation of Nigerian poets. One of the peculiarities of this poetry is its formation and deployment of animal images, specifically the use of ugly, destructive, carnivorous animals as metaphors in the construction of an oppressor-figure. The poetry i…
The Aesthetic of Rage in Recent Nigerian Poetry in English
Infraction and change in the Nigerian feminist novel
Over the years, Nigerian feminist discourse seems to have shifted its focus from the plight of the servile housewife or the peasant woman to the engagements, whether restricted or not, of the professional woman in her (urban) society. This shift in paradigm is the main thrust of my article. Using the novels of Zaynab Alkali and Akachi Adimora-Ezeigbo I attempt to demonstrate that the Nigerian feminist novel, especially in the twenty-first century…
Poetry as Dialogue
Recent Nigerian poetry in English seems to concern itself with the most pressing socio-political condition in Nigeria, especially the prolonged military despotism in the past decades whose consequences are still felt in the society. One of the strategies the poets use to dramatise and historicise the situation is the dialogic approach. Their poetry reveals a dialogue between the poet and the people, and between the poet and the despot. The poem t…
In this land we love with pain
New poets in Nigeria continue to historicise the decades of despoliation and despondency during which Nigeria suffered undue militarisation. Subjecting artistry to the exigencies of the society, the new poets, projecting themselves as ‘town criers’ (in the sense Christopher Okigbo uses the word), evolve an artistic vision that centres on the plight of the common people. This reading of Toyin Adewale's poetry attempts to explore the theme of oppre…
The Nationalist Imagination in Remi Raji's Lovesong for My Wasteland
Remi Raji, one of loudest and most eloquent political poets in Nigeria today, sees his craft as a means of conveying serious social message to his land. Raji's consummate political theme, which is powered by what he calls the nationalist imagination, is skillfully explored in his latest volume of poetry, Lovesong for My Wasteland (2005), more than in any of his previous collections. Following tradition of social commitments of African literature …
The Minstrel as Social Critic
Ezenwa–Ohaeto is one of the modern Nigerian poets who, in their creative endeavours, have continued to tap the rich sources of orature in their culture, in what is now known as 'the minstrelsy tradition'. The maturity of his explorations of the minstrelsy tradition comes through in the last volume of poetry he published before his death, (2003). In a close reading of some selected poems from this volume, this contribution not only looks at the mi…
Teaching about homosexualities to Nigerian university students
Nigeria’s diverse cultures, religions and political parties appear to be unified by a strong taboo against homosexuality and gay rights. This has affected academic research, HIV/AIDS programmes, and sexuality education, all which commonly show evidence of heterosexism, self-censorship and even explicit condemnations of homosexuality. Yet a dissident discourse in Nigeria, as well as research from elsewhere in the region, suggests that this appeara…
Literary Militancy and Helon Habila's Oil on Water
In this article, I argue that the strident response of Nigerian writers, in the form of belligerent discourse of resistance, to the systematic destruction of the environment and its inhabitants in the Niger Delta region of Nigeria could be taken as literary militancy. This literary militancy is provoked by what one may see as the tripartite system of ruination, having three agents of destruction, namely the multinational oil corporations, the fed…
Eco-human engagement in recent Nigerian poetry in English
With particular reference to the work of Nnimmo Bassey and Ogaga Ifowodo, this article discusses the ongoing engagement of Nigerian poets with issues of ecology. It argues that, for these poets, issues of ecology are largely bound up with the fate of the human beings who depend for their survival on their environment, through fishing and farming. These poets emerged in the 1980s with a strong sense of commitment to their immediate environment, wh…
The pristine past, the plundered present
Tanure Ojaide is a major voice of post-war Nigerian poetry in English, distinguished by his recourse to the orature of his birthplace. Ojaide takes orature as a locus of an aesthetics that is cognizant of the arts and politics of rural people, especially in the face of a modernity-driven, viperous establishment. His poetry’s dependence on orality, I argue, implies its rootedness in nature. But far more crucial to this article is the contention th…
Out of Africa
This essay is an attempt to present a broader view of ecocriticism in Africa. Ecocriticism, in theory and practice, appears to have limited itself to the notion of environmental justice, with the aim of raising consciousness against institutional powers behind ecological crises. The reason for this is not far-fetched. International scholarship on African ecocriticism tends to focus on the activism of the Kenyan Wangari Mathai and the Nigerian Ken…
Sexualized body, exploited environment
Since Shell BP began oil exploration in the Niger Delta region of Nigeria in the 1950s, the people and the environment of the region have experienced psychological and physical violence. This violence, over the years, has been captured in literary works mainly written by males, some of which have increasingly enjoyed critical attention. The interest of this article is to shift the focus by highlighting the contribution of female writers to the hu…
Nature and environmentalism of the poor
What is increasingly known as Niger Deltan poetry is a poetry that distinctly identifies itself with the peoples and environment of the Niger Delta region of Nigeria. The poetry of Gabriel Okara, Christian Otobotekere, Tanure Ojaide, Ogaga Ifowodo, Nnimmo Bassey, Ebi Yeibo and others seeks to draw attention to the fate of both humans and non-humans in the face of oil exploration and its negative consequences in the region. The ecocritical imagina…
Historicity, power, dissidence
Modern Nigerian poetry in English has proved to be a significant medium of action against authoritarian leadership in Nigeria. In historicizing the socio-political condition of regimes, Nigerian poets have responded to circumstances distinct to their historical period. This article examines the work of the younger writers widely regarded as the third generation of Nigerian poets, the condition of its production, and its ‘generational’ response to…
Imagining Beast
This essay analyses recent poetry in Nigeria, especially poetry produced after 1988, the year in which the anthology Voices from the Fringe, edited by Harry Garuba, announced the emergence of a new generation of Nigerian poets. One of the peculiarities of this poetry is its formation and deployment of animal images, specifically the use of ugly, destructive, carnivorous animals as metaphors in the construction of an oppressor-figure. The poetry i…
Ecology and Decoloniality
In this article, I argue that pioneer African writing (in the frame of the empire writing back) hinges its anti-colonial aesthetics and politics on what I see as the African natural world—a space of nonhuman–human entanglement ruled by the natural order of things. In confronting colonial discourse, the writers, in most cases, resort to deploying the natures (I prefer the plural form) and the nonhuman elements of their traditional societies, which…
Sea-salt rides its currents to the city
Lagos is perhaps the most economically, socially and culturally crucial coastal city in Nigeria. The pressures of expansion and overpopulation have resulted in many ecological crises, one of which is flooding. Nigerian poets have poetised incidents of flooding in Lagos. These poems are concerned with the biophysical space of Lagos as a city as well as the species lives, including human lives, that get flooded away in the annual ritual of rising w…
Poetry as Dialogue
Recent Nigerian poetry in English seems to concern itself with the most pressing socio-political condition in Nigeria, especially the prolonged military despotism in the past decades whose consequences are still felt in the society. One of the strategies the poets use to dramatise and historicise the situation is the dialogic approach. Their poetry reveals a dialogue between the poet and the people, and between the poet and the despot. The poem t…
The Nationalist Imagination in Remi Raji's Lovesong for My Wasteland
Remi Raji, one of loudest and most eloquent political poets in Nigeria today, sees his craft as a means of conveying serious social message to his land. Raji's consummate political theme, which is powered by what he calls the nationalist imagination, is skillfully explored in his latest volume of poetry, Lovesong for My Wasteland (2005), more than in any of his previous collections. Following tradition of social commitments of African literature …
The Minstrel as Social Critic
Ezenwa–Ohaeto is one of the modern Nigerian poets who, in their creative endeavours, have continued to tap the rich sources of orature in their culture, in what is now known as 'the minstrelsy tradition'. The maturity of his explorations of the minstrelsy tradition comes through in the last volume of poetry he published before his death, (2003). In a close reading of some selected poems from this volume, this contribution not only looks at the mi…
The Nationalist Imagination in Remi Raji's Lovesong for My Wasteland
Remi Raji, one of loudest and most eloquent political poets in Nigeria today, sees his craft as a means of conveying serious social message to his land. Raji's consummate political theme, which is powered by what he calls the nationalist imagination, is skillfully explored in his latest volume of poetry, Lovesong for My Wasteland (2005), more than in any of his previous collections. Following tradition of social commitments of African literature …
In this land we love with pain
New poets in Nigeria continue to historicise the decades of despoliation and despondency during which Nigeria suffered undue militarisation. Subjecting artistry to the exigencies of the society, the new poets, projecting themselves as ‘town criers’ (in the sense Christopher Okigbo uses the word), evolve an artistic vision that centres on the plight of the common people. This reading of Toyin Adewale's poetry attempts to explore the theme of oppre…
Teaching about homosexualities to Nigerian university students
Nigeria’s diverse cultures, religions and political parties appear to be unified by a strong taboo against homosexuality and gay rights. This has affected academic research, HIV/AIDS programmes, and sexuality education, all which commonly show evidence of heterosexism, self-censorship and even explicit condemnations of homosexuality. Yet a dissident discourse in Nigeria, as well as research from elsewhere in the region, suggests that this appeara…
Imagining Beast
This essay analyses recent poetry in Nigeria, especially poetry produced after 1988, the year in which the anthology Voices from the Fringe, edited by Harry Garuba, announced the emergence of a new generation of Nigerian poets. One of the peculiarities of this poetry is its formation and deployment of animal images, specifically the use of ugly, destructive, carnivorous animals as metaphors in the construction of an oppressor-figure. The poetry i…
The Aesthetic of Rage in Recent Nigerian Poetry in English
Infraction and change in the Nigerian feminist novel
Over the years, Nigerian feminist discourse seems to have shifted its focus from the plight of the servile housewife or the peasant woman to the engagements, whether restricted or not, of the professional woman in her (urban) society. This shift in paradigm is the main thrust of my article. Using the novels of Zaynab Alkali and Akachi Adimora-Ezeigbo I attempt to demonstrate that the Nigerian feminist novel, especially in the twenty-first century…
Poetry as Dialogue
Recent Nigerian poetry in English seems to concern itself with the most pressing socio-political condition in Nigeria, especially the prolonged military despotism in the past decades whose consequences are still felt in the society. One of the strategies the poets use to dramatise and historicise the situation is the dialogic approach. Their poetry reveals a dialogue between the poet and the people, and between the poet and the despot. The poem t…
Historicity, power, dissidence
Modern Nigerian poetry in English has proved to be a significant medium of action against authoritarian leadership in Nigeria. In historicizing the socio-political condition of regimes, Nigerian poets have responded to circumstances distinct to their historical period. This article examines the work of the younger writers widely regarded as the third generation of Nigerian poets, the condition of its production, and its ‘generational’ response to…
Eco-human engagement in recent Nigerian poetry in English
With particular reference to the work of Nnimmo Bassey and Ogaga Ifowodo, this article discusses the ongoing engagement of Nigerian poets with issues of ecology. It argues that, for these poets, issues of ecology are largely bound up with the fate of the human beings who depend for their survival on their environment, through fishing and farming. These poets emerged in the 1980s with a strong sense of commitment to their immediate environment, wh…
Nature and environmentalism of the poor
What is increasingly known as Niger Deltan poetry is a poetry that distinctly identifies itself with the peoples and environment of the Niger Delta region of Nigeria. The poetry of Gabriel Okara, Christian Otobotekere, Tanure Ojaide, Ogaga Ifowodo, Nnimmo Bassey, Ebi Yeibo and others seeks to draw attention to the fate of both humans and non-humans in the face of oil exploration and its negative consequences in the region. The ecocritical imagina…
Literary Militancy and Helon Habila's Oil on Water
In this article, I argue that the strident response of Nigerian writers, in the form of belligerent discourse of resistance, to the systematic destruction of the environment and its inhabitants in the Niger Delta region of Nigeria could be taken as literary militancy. This literary militancy is provoked by what one may see as the tripartite system of ruination, having three agents of destruction, namely the multinational oil corporations, the fed…
Nature, Animism and Humanity in Anglophone Nigerian Poetry
Sexualized body, exploited environment
Since Shell BP began oil exploration in the Niger Delta region of Nigeria in the 1950s, the people and the environment of the region have experienced psychological and physical violence. This violence, over the years, has been captured in literary works mainly written by males, some of which have increasingly enjoyed critical attention. The interest of this article is to shift the focus by highlighting the contribution of female writers to the hu…
The pristine past, the plundered present
Tanure Ojaide is a major voice of post-war Nigerian poetry in English, distinguished by his recourse to the orature of his birthplace. Ojaide takes orature as a locus of an aesthetics that is cognizant of the arts and politics of rural people, especially in the face of a modernity-driven, viperous establishment. His poetry’s dependence on orality, I argue, implies its rootedness in nature. But far more crucial to this article is the contention th…
‘Farmer-born peasant-bred’
Niyi Osundare is one of Nigeria’s most celebrated poets. Scholars working on his poetry are unanimous on what they see as his use of nature imagery, largely hinged on pastoral agriculture. He sings brilliantly of his father’s farms, of his childhood memories, and of the changing society in the face of modernity. A tension between African tradition and modernity is felt throughout his poetry. In this reading of Village Voices and The Eye of the Ea…
Out of Africa
This essay is an attempt to present a broader view of ecocriticism in Africa. Ecocriticism, in theory and practice, appears to have limited itself to the notion of environmental justice, with the aim of raising consciousness against institutional powers behind ecological crises. The reason for this is not far-fetched. International scholarship on African ecocriticism tends to focus on the activism of the Kenyan Wangari Mathai and the Nigerian Ken…
Sea-salt rides its currents to the city
Lagos is perhaps the most economically, socially and culturally crucial coastal city in Nigeria. The pressures of expansion and overpopulation have resulted in many ecological crises, one of which is flooding. Nigerian poets have poetised incidents of flooding in Lagos. These poems are concerned with the biophysical space of Lagos as a city as well as the species lives, including human lives, that get flooded away in the annual ritual of rising w…
Poetry, protest, and environment
Since its inception, Nigerian poetry in English has always been characterized by protest in nature. Beyond its aesthetic scope, it has been critical of socio-political and environmental problems that have bedevilled the nation. This paper is concerned with such literary instrumentalism; the use of poetry by Nigerian writers, living in Nigeria, as an instrument against abuses of human and environmental rights. The theoretical framework that is emp…
The Ecopoetics of Flooding in Contemporary Nigeria
Les inondations sont un drame récurrent au Nigéria à l’époque contemporaine. Elles sont, dans la plupart des cas, fatales, et leurs victimes tant humaines que non-humaines. La réalité physique des inondations nourrit un imaginaire culturel qui a donné naissance à un courant de l’écopoétique invitant à une attention critique, et c’est dans ce cadre que s’inscrit cet article. L’écopoétique des inondations, concept central ici, étudie la manière don…
The Ecopoetics of Flooding in Contemporary Nigeria
“Rooted in Earth”
Ecology and Decoloniality
In this article, I argue that pioneer African writing (in the frame of the empire writing back) hinges its anti-colonial aesthetics and politics on what I see as the African natural world—a space of nonhuman–human entanglement ruled by the natural order of things. In confronting colonial discourse, the writers, in most cases, resort to deploying the natures (I prefer the plural form) and the nonhuman elements of their traditional societies, which…
Nature, and a Social Revolution in Wole Soyinka’s "Alápatà Àpáta"
This essay attempts to emphasise the agency of nonhumans and its use to achieve a social revolution in Wole Soyinka’s play Alápatà Àpáta. In Soyinka’s dramatic aesthetics, anthropocentrism is reconsidered to demonstrate the posthuman world as a sphere where nature and culture are no longer dichotomous but entangled. Using ideas of material ecocriticism, we argue that the play presents nonhumans as the protagonist in the revolution against politic…
Introduction
This introduction outlines recent developments in the theory and practice of what has emerged as African ecocriticism. These include, among others, the shift toward a less anthropocentric ecological discourse empathetic to the agency of natural beings, the decoupling of ecocriticism from a rather narrow focus on traditional genres of literature (poetry, drama, especially fiction), the intentional bridging of the Anglophone-Francophone divide in e…
Postcolonial and Cultural Literary Studies (20 obras) · Art (17 obras) · Political science (16 obras) · Sociology (16 obras) · Literature (15 obras) · Law (13 obras) · Ecocriticism and Environmental Literature (12 obras) · Poetry (12 obras) · Politics (11 obras) · History (10 obras)