This thesis is a micro-history of gender relations in nineteenth-century Yorùbáland (present-day south-west Nigeria) using the town of Abẹ́òkúta as a case study. It investigates the lived experiences of men and women in a time of radical and sweeping political, economic, social and cultural changes characterised by violent and debilitating intra-ethnic wars that lasted almost a century; the advent of Christian missionaries and their corresponding influences; the spread of Islam; and the dawn of British colonialism. It challenges existing frameworks for understanding gender in Africa, which often considers sex categories only, by exploring how the intersections of sex, age and socio-economic status shaped the pre-colonial gendered experience. Since nineteenth-century Yorùbáland was essentially a gerontocratic society, it analyses gender from a lifecycle perspective, illuminating how the lived experiences of males and females transformed from childhood, to youth to adulthood and then old age and eventually death. The study engages with current discourses about the highly contested notion of the presence of gender categories in Yorùbá society. Decades of research have either confirmed or contested the idea that gender categories based on biological sex existed in pre-colonial times. While some feminist authors, such as Oyeronke Oyewumi, have argued that sex-based gendered categories are strictly a western invention in Yorùbáland and most of Africa, others, including Bolanle Awe and Oyeronke Olademo have taken a more middle road. They claim instead that although sexed categories were present in precolonial times, Africans did not view sexual difference in western terms of male superiority and female subordination, neither was sex a significant contributor to a person’s life trajectories. They have argued that Western and African experiences had marked differences and that the relationship between men and women in Yorùbáland were complementary. Using nineteenth- and early twentieth-century written sources and oral traditions and building on the works of certain social historians who contest these constructions of the past, this thesis counters the gender complementarity arguments and contends instead that sex played a more significant role in the nineteenth century than previously realised. It maintains that although age hierarchies played a substantial role in social differentiation, sex was also an important factor in determining a person’s quality of life and future aspirations. Although the study is focused on women, a significant portion of the thesis discusses men in order to contextualise women’s experiences. It argues that since gender relations permeated all aspects of society including non-discursive practices, to study the experience of only one sex would give an incomplete and perhaps distorted view of society.

This study was designed against the background of the vital need for a comprehensive research on religious sisters in Africa and Nigeria in particular to address the problems and challenges of identity construction by them within the context of religious community life. It is an interpretative qualitative research study which used an interdisciplinary theoretical approach, drawing on theology of religious life and dialogical self theory to argue that the sisters‘ performance of identity is a context-bound activity. Interview data was drawn from 18 participants from two religious congregations (Daughters of Divine Love and Society of the Holy Child Jesus) in Nigeria in order to understand the meaning sisters give to their intersubjective exchange and the impact it makes on their development and performance of personal/religious identity. The results showed that the sisters used a multiplicity of I-positions to construct identity. This multiplicity of I-positions arises from self-positioning and self as positioned by others (including superiors/formators, senior/older sisters, priests) which are laden with conflicts and dilemmas of identity construction. The major dilemma of identity construction that the participants encountered is based on the discrepancy between the ideal and the lived reality of religious life. The participants presented the ideal as a call to do God‘s will in direct imitation of Christ, but the lived reality offers a mixed experience. On the one hand the participants indicated that relationships within the religious community, Church and wider Nigerian society are supportive, facilitating their development and performance of Christ-like identity. But on the other hand the findings reveal that the participants‘ performance of identity has been hindered by power relations and dominance (including gender related issues) which are prevalent in religious communities, the Church and wider Nigerian society, leading the participants to present their performance of identity as a struggle for survival. Thus their construction of identity is a constant negotiation process, in which they are engaged in appropriation and rejection of positions as they struggle to construct unity-in-multiplicity. To this effect the study recommends that leaders of religious life review their leadership style in order to adopt a more inclusive approach which gives every sister the opportunity to speak and be heard, thus create a more conducive environment for sisters‘ identity construction. / Thesis (Ph.D.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Pietermaritzburg, 2012.

Background and Aim: Globally, breast cancer is the most common cancer among women. The stage of the disease at diagnosis is a core determinant of its health outcome. In low to middle-income countries like Nigeria, advanced stage of disease presentation for medical care represents a significant problem. While mortality rates from breast cancer are declining in developed countries like Canada, they are increasing in developing countries like Nigeria. It is well documented that presentation for medical care at the early stages of the disease improves outcome. Knowledge of the factors that impact seeking medical care after breast cancer symptom discovery in women and knowledge of the factors that impact participation in breast health activities by women is important in reducing breast cancer-related mortality. Methods and Design: This integrative review critically examined the determinants of health outcomes of women living with breast cancer in Canada and Nigeria from 1990-2014. Specifically, it examined the factors that impact seeking medical care after breast cancer symptom discovery in women. It also explored the factors that impact participation in breast health activities by women in the two countries from 1990 to 2014. A total of 303 articles were identified and retrieved by searching the following databases: CINAHL, MEDLINE, and EMBASE. Grey literature from relevant organizations websites were identified using Google Scholar. Among the 303 articles identified, 55 met the inclusion criteria. Results and Conclusion: Findings from the articles that met the inclusion criteria showed that Canadians have a high level of breast health awareness. The findings also suggest that women in Nigeria have rather poor knowledge of breast health awareness and breast cancer. In Nigeria, presentation with an advanced stage of the disease made survival very low. This also compromises the quality of life of the patients. The major factors responsible for the late presentations were a lack of breast cancer awareness and education. Other social factors that mitigate against early presentations for medical care include misconceptions about breast cancer treatment and outcomes. In line with the findings of this study, it is recommended that wide spread culturally sensitive, linguistically appropriate, health education programs to teach breast health awareness should be developed and disseminated. Such health awareness programs should be targeted at women through various channels such as the media, the television, and radio. Also, within the hospital, the developed education programs should be integrated into the existing women health education programs. Non-government and other charitable organizations can also make significant contributions to breast health awareness through sponsoring health talks and workshops targeted at relevant segments of the population. Key search words: Breast cancer, breast neoplasm, diagnosis, prevention and control, health knowledge, patient attitude and practice, breast self-examination, awareness, patient education as topic, mass screening, early detection of cancer, Nigeria, Canada.

This thesis examines the intersection of oil enclave economy and the phenomenon of sexual liaisons in Nigeria’s Niger Delta region. The particular focus of this thesis is on the extent to which oil enclavity contributes to the emergence of sexual liaisons between local women and expatriate oil workers. Despite the fact that the Nigerian oil industry has been subjected to considerable scholarly debate for over five decades, this aspect of the social dimension of oil has not received adequate scholarly attention. Gender-specific discourse has tended to focus more on women protest. Other aspects, such as gender-specific violence that women in the region have had to live with, are either ignored or poorly articulated. Picketing of oil platforms by protesting women is celebrated as signs that women are active in the struggle against oil Transnational Companies (TNCs). While women protest is a significant struggle against oil TNCs, it has the potential of blurring our intellectual focus on the specific challenges confronting women in the Niger Delta. This study shows that since the inauguration of the Willink Commission in 1957, national palliatives meant to alleviate poverty in the Niger Delta region have not been gender sensitive. A review of the 1957 Willink Commission and others that came after it shows that the Nigerian state is yet to address the peculiar problems that the oil industry has brought to the women folk in the region. The paradox is that while oil provides enormous wealth and means of patronage to the Nigerian state elite, the oil TNCs, and better paid expatriate oil workers, a large section of the local Oil Bearing Communities (OBCs), especially women and unemployed youth, are not only dispossessed but survive in an environment characterised by anxiety and misery. With limited survival alternatives, youths resort to violent protest including oil thefts and bunkering. Local women are also immersed in this debacle because some of them resort to sexual liaisons with economically empowered expatriate oil workers as an alternative means of survival. This study therefore shifts the focus to women by exploring the extent to which sexual liaison reflects the contradictions in the enclave oil economy. The study employed an enclave economy conceptual framework to demonstrate that oil extractive activities compromise and distort the local economies of OBCs. This situation compels local women to seek for alternative means of survival by entering into sexual liaisons with more financially privileged expatriate oil workers. The study reviewed relevant secondary documentary sources of data. Further, it employed primary data collection techniques which include in-depth interviews/life histories, ethnographic observations, focus group discussions, and visual sociology. Besides obtaining the social profile and challenges facing the women involved in sexual liaisons with expatriate oil workers, the study provides an outline of participants’ narratives on the different social and economic dimensions of the intersection of oil enclave economy and sexual liaisons. The study found that some of the women involved in sexual liaisons with expatriate oil workers have been abandoned with ‘fatherless’ children. Some of them have also been rejected by their immediate family members and, in some cases, by their community. The study also found that the phenomenon of sexual liaisons and the incidents of abandoned ‘fatherless’ children that result from the practice, has over the years been played out through local resentment against oil TNCs and their expatriate employees. This finding helps to fill the gap in narratives and to make sense of the civic revolt and deepening instability in the Niger Delta region.

No description available.

This study describes and analyzes the impact of Structural Adjustment Programmes (SAPs) on the Jos women in the informal sector, as well as the strategies women adopt to ensure the survival of their businesses and families. Studies that have investigated the impact of SAP on women in the informal sector tend to take a rather disparate approach. Against this background, the present study develops a coherent conceptual framework for understanding the impact of SAPs on women in the sector. From an interview survey conducted with one hundred and fifty (150) Jos women in the informal urban sector, the study elicited data on the activities of the women and the ways SAPs affect their access to productive and reproductive resources, as well as on the responses of the women to SAPs-engendered socio-economic hardships. The data reveal that the Jos women engage in numerous income-generating activities, mostly in small-scale, low-income circulatory and service activities which are largely marginalized and bereft of institutionalized resources. In addition to their productive and income-generating activities, the Jos women perform the bulk of the reproductive and domestic work necessary for the support of the family. As well, the women perform some extra-household work for the welfare of the community and environment. The study shows that the Jos women are adversely affected by SAPs. Structural Adjustment Programmes are further limiting their access to business commodities, credit, stalls, information and training, food, healthcare, education and transportation facilities. Consequently, women are finding it difficult to maintain their businesses and families. Amidst the adverse effects of SAPs, the women are resiliently and innovatively responding to SAPs through numerous business and familial survival strategies. In addition to the responses of the Jos women, the Nigerian State, is attempting to reduce poverty among women through its various women-centered programmes. The study attributes the adverse and limiting effects of SAPs on the Jos women's access to resources to a number of forces. These include (a) the Nigerian limited and discriminatory opportunity structures which predispose women to the largely marginalized informal activities, (b) the small-scale and low-income nature of women's informal activities, (c) the unequal and exploitative relationship between the informal and formal sectors in which women provide consumer goods at low-cost for the regeneration of capitalist labour, (d) the circulatory and service nature of women's informal activities, (e) the gender- and class-biased structures inherent in SAPs, as well as in SAPs' implementing mechanisms and institutions and (f) women's altruistic and selfless attitudes. The study observes that the responses of both the Jos women and the Nigerian State to SAPs-engendered hardships are, at best, palliative or even cosmetic. The responses do not address the strategic needs of women. Hence the study makes a case for a transformatory strategy through the empowerment of women.

This study describes and analyzes the impact of Structural Adjustment Programmes (SAPs) on the Jos women in the informal sector, as well as the strategies women adopt to ensure the survival of their businesses and families. Studies that have investigated the impact of SAP on women in the informal sector tend to take a rather disparate approach. Against this background, the present study develops a coherent conceptual framework for understanding the impact of SAPs on women in the sector. From an interview survey conducted with one hundred and fifty (150) Jos women in the informal urban sector, the study elicited data on the activities of the women and the ways SAPs affect their access to productive and reproductive resources, as well as on the responses of the women to SAPs-engendered socio-economic hardships. The data reveal that the Jos women engage in numerous income-generating activities, mostly in small-scale, low-income circulatory and service activities which are largely marginalized and bereft of institutionalized resources. In addition to their productive and income-generating activities, the Jos women perform the bulk of the reproductive and domestic work necessary for the support of the family. As well, the women perform some extra-household work for the welfare of the community and environment. The study shows that the Jos women are adversely affected by SAPs. Structural Adjustment Programmes are further limiting their access to business commodities, credit, stalls, information and training, food, healthcare, education and transportation facilities. Consequently, women are finding it difficult to maintain their businesses and families. Amidst the adverse effects of SAPs, the women are resiliently and innovatively responding to SAPs through numerous business and familial survival strategies. In addition to the responses of the Jos women, the Nigerian State, is attempting to reduce poverty among women through its various women-centered programmes. The study attributes the adverse and limiting effects of SAPs on the Jos women's access to resources to a number of forces. These include (a) the Nigerian limited and discriminatory opportunity structures which predispose women to the largely marginalized informal activities, (b) the small-scale and low-income nature of women's informal activities, (c) the unequal and exploitative relationship between the informal and formal sectors in which women provide consumer goods at low-cost for the regeneration of capitalist labour, (d) the circulatory and service nature of women's informal activities, (e) the gender- and class-biased structures inherent in SAPs, as well as in SAPs' implementing mechanisms and institutions and (f) women's altruistic and selfless attitudes. The study observes that the responses of both the Jos women and the Nigerian State to SAPs-engendered hardships are, at best, palliative or even cosmetic. The responses do not address the strategic needs of women. Hence the study makes a case for a transformatory strategy through the empowerment of women. / Arts, Faculty of / Anthropology, Department of / Graduate

The study was conducted to describe how socio-economic characteristics (SEC) of women affect their utilization of maternal healthcare services in Abuja Municipal Areas Council (AMAC) in Abuja Nigeria. A non-experimental, facility-based cross-sectional survey was done. Data was collected using structured interviewer administered questionnaire in 5 district hospitals in AMAC. Sample size of 384 was calculated a priori based on the assumption that 50% of the target population utilized maternal healthcare services during their last pregnancy. Equal allocation of samples per facility was done. The ANC register was used as the sampling frame and proportionate allocation of samples per clinic days was undertaken in each facility. Data analysis included descriptive statistics, cross tabulations and measures of inequality. Logistic regression analysis was used to test the hypothesized relationship between socioeconomic characteristics (predictors) and maternal healthcare service utilization. Other than birth order that showed consistent effect, the results of this study indicated that the predictive effect (predisposing and enabling factors) of the SEC of women included in this study (age, education, birth order, location of residence, income group and coverage by health insurance) on maternal healthcare service utilization were not consistent when considered independently (bivariate analysis) as opposed to when considered together through logistic regression. In addition, the study revealed that there was inequality in the utilization of maternal healthcare services (ante-natal care - ANC, delivery care and post natal care - PNC, and contraceptive services) among women with different SEC, and the payment system for maternal healthcare services was regressive. Addressing these predictors in the natural co-existing state (as indicated by the logistic regression) is essential for equitable access and utilization of healthcare during pregnancy, delivery and the postnatal period, and for contraceptive services in AMAC, Abuja Nigeria. Targeted policy measures and programme actions guided by these findings are recommended to optimise returns on investment towards achieving national and global goals on maternal health in Nigeria / Health Studies / D. Litt. et Phil. (Health Studies)

The study was conducted to describe how socio-economic characteristics (SEC) of women affect their utilization of maternal healthcare services in Abuja Municipal Areas Council (AMAC) in Abuja Nigeria. A non-experimental, facility-based cross-sectional survey was done. Data was collected using structured interviewer administered questionnaire in 5 district hospitals in AMAC. Sample size of 384 was calculated a priori based on the assumption that 50% of the target population utilized maternal healthcare services during their last pregnancy. Equal allocation of samples per facility was done. The ANC register was used as the sampling frame and proportionate allocation of samples per clinic days was undertaken in each facility. Data analysis included descriptive statistics, cross tabulations and measures of inequality. Logistic regression analysis was used to test the hypothesized relationship between socioeconomic characteristics (predictors) and maternal healthcare service utilization. Other than birth order that showed consistent effect, the results of this study indicated that the predictive effect (predisposing and enabling factors) of the SEC of women included in this study (age, education, birth order, location of residence, income group and coverage by health insurance) on maternal healthcare service utilization were not consistent when considered independently (bivariate analysis) as opposed to when considered together through logistic regression. In addition, the study revealed that there was inequality in the utilization of maternal healthcare services (ante-natal care - ANC, delivery care and post natal care - PNC, and contraceptive services) among women with different SEC, and the payment system for maternal healthcare services was regressive. Addressing these predictors in the natural co-existing state (as indicated by the logistic regression) is essential for equitable access and utilization of healthcare during pregnancy, delivery and the postnatal period, and for contraceptive services in AMAC, Abuja Nigeria. Targeted policy measures and programme actions guided by these findings are recommended to optimise returns on investment towards achieving national and global goals on maternal health in Nigeria / Health Studies / D. Litt. et Phil. (Health Studies)

This study attempts to understand prostitution from their definition of the situation. It differs in its method from other studies on prostitution in that the investigation was based on the prostitutes' own perspectives as interpreted by the researcher using the interpretative epistemological tradition. A comparative analysis of prostitution in two economically stable African Countries, namely Nigeria and Botswana was made. This study investigated society's perception of prostitutes and how it impacts upon their empowerment and emancipation as vulnerable members of the society and their participation in prevention and control of sexually transmitted infection including HIV/AIDS. Also the role of governments and individuals in creating and sustaining prostitution, an extensive insight to the modus operandi of prostitution and suggestions on how best to address prostitution in society, were discussed. A triangulated methodology of three hundred and twenty five sexworkers (325) that includes a quantitative study of two hundred and five sex workers complimented with a qualitative study of one hundred and twenty sex workers participating in focus group discussion and case studies informed the study. The findings of the research suggest that in the prostitutes' own definition of the situation; prostitutes contribute to the maintenance of societal equilibrium, the society creates and sustains prostitution. Economic need rather than lack of morals creates prostitutes and their situation of vulnerability as women is being reinforced by their status as prostitutes. Violence from partners that includes the police and the inability to reprimand their clients, are some hazards of prostitution and these result in their mobility and creates a challenge in adequately addressing the issue of prostitution in society, including their limited participation in the control of STDs. Respondents in Botswana had a very good knowledge of STI's /HIV/AIDS and had no difficulties in going to hospital in the event of any STD's as compared with Nigerian respondents. The Nigerian respondents' indulged in self-medication with antibiotics and traditional herbs mixed in local gin before and after a sexual act, rather than go to hospitals. The research findings should assist the government and international community's policies and programmes aimed at addressing prostitution and STDs/HIV/AIDS. / Sociology / D.Litt. et Phil.(Sociology)