Biafra in the Present
Trauma of a Loss
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 17699369 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Olajide Oloyede (0000-0003-0504-8575), Oyekola Oloyede (0000-0003-1236-1009, University of the Western Cape, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2009 |
| Volume | 13 |
| Issue | 1 |
| Pages | 2-25 |
| Publication date | 2009-05-12 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | African Sociological Review / Revue Africaine de Sociologie (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 1027-4332 • E-ISSN: 1027-4332 |
| Publisher | Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa (PUBLISHER • SN) |
| DOI | 10.4314/asr.v13i1.57739 |
| OpenAlex | W2139027834 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 4 |
| References cited | 18 |
This paper forms part of a wider attempt at engaging the issues of nation building, war, and trauma within the context of a developing sociology of trauma. It focuses, specifically, on Biafra, a recurring issue in the political and economic discussions in Nigeria. It delimits the focus to trauma. The Igbo perception of their increased marginalisation in the scheme of thingsin contemporary Nigeria brings to the fore the idea of Biafra, an Igbo attempt to create an Igbo nation-state which subsequently resulted into the war which foreshadowed many of the conflicts that would threaten to ‘shatter’ many post colonial Africa. The war was traumatic:it inflicted fear and suffering. With the use of cultural trauma and the notion of the loss of assumptive world, the paper suggests that its loss was more traumatic because of the shattering of the cognitive representation of Biafra, an entity which was to bring a sense of belonging and connection that would cohere the Igbo being. In the wake of the loss of Biafra, the assumptive world of the Igbo was shattered. The paper suggests further that current recollection of Biafra by the Igbo serves as an illustration of the ‘collective trauma’ of its loss. The theoretical basis for the argument in this paper is that Biafra is rooted in the psyche of the Igbo
Colonialism · Igbo · Linguistics · Political science · Sociology · Gender Studies · Gender, Security, and Conflict · Historical and Contemporary Political Dynamics · History · Law · Medicine · Migration, Refugees, and Integration · Philosophy
Meaning reconstruction & the experience of loss.
Psychological Trauma and Cultural Trauma
Assumptive Worlds and the Stress of Traumatic Events
Toward a Theory of Cultural Trauma
Parenthood, marriage and fertility in West Africa
Unclaimed Experience
Hiroshima in America
The Search for Stability in Post Civil War Nigeria
Genealogy of a category mistake
Cultural Trauma
Finding aids to the past
Psycho-social transitions
Through Thick and Thin
The Birth and Death of Meaning
Legacies of Biafra
An Introduction to Nigerian Government and Politics
The Birth and Death of Meaning
Collective Memory
| Unique citing works | 4 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 0,8 |
| Citation span | 2021 - 2025 (5) |
| Citation velocity | recent |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 4 |