Re-examining Gender, Gender Roles and Identity in Nigeria
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Date
2022
Authors
Akin-Otiko A.
Eshiet I.
Olokodana-James O.
Edisua M.Y.
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Lagos- African Cluster Centre (ACC), University of Lagos
Abstract
The African universe is typically one whole interconnected commune of existence. Just as the world of the living, the dead and the unborn connect in a transcendental manner, the flora and fauna are closely connected to the general and overarching cognition of the natural African person. It is in this very sense that ‘we are what we eat’, an idea that reflects the significance of dietary content to people’s general well-being and sociocultural outlook. For the Africans, therefore, food is life! By extension, in the circle and context of education, we can equally posit that ‘we are what we are taught and what we read’. To this end, the very essence of the Fattening Room practice among the Efik is to make women into what the society wants them to be. In this outlook to life and the world, the rites of passage through the cyclicity of life must be unbroken. Different commentaries already show that, as far as connubial relations are concerned, an average Efik woman has the requisite native education and training needed to hold onto a man and make a lasting home. In the fattening room, an Efik woman is groomed and moulded to know how to care for her prospective husband and what it takes to look after her future home. Regrettably, the fattening room practice is fast waning due to modernity. This book is a report of the field work on the fattening room practice of the Efik, conducted in Calabar, Cross River State in June, 2021. The study utilized the in-depth and key informant interviews as well as the focus group discussions methods to gather qualitative data from maidens who have ever been in the fattening room; chaperons; parents of ever been to fattening room maidens and leaders who are knowledgeable about the practice in the community. Findings reveal the fattening room practice as a rich cultural heritage of the Efik, which is however weakening and fast disappearing, due to the criminalizing of a major aspect of the practice – FGM; also due to the perceived not-too-healthy act of overfeeding the maiden in the fattening room, as well as the traditional length of time for which maidens are expected to stay in the fattening room, which varies from one month to seven years. While the fourth is the fact that many have linked the Anansa river goddess and Egbe ritual to the fattening room practice. This has occasioned a reality in which many who are Christians are seen to frown at the age-old practice. This book is therefore of very strategic importance. This is because essential information disappears with a waning culture.
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Citation
Akin-Otiko, A., Eshiet, I., Olokodana-James, O. & Edisua, M. Y. (2022). Re-examining Gender, Gender Roles and Identity in Nigeria: The Fattening Room Tradition of the Efik. Lagos: Lagos- African Cluster Centre (ACC), University of Lagos.