Hausa Society Research Articles

Nazarin Wasu Waibuwar Masunta

Fishing has long been a revered traditional occupation within Hausa society, dating back to ancient times. This paper, titled "The Fishermen's Magic and Wonders," aims to analyze the magical and extraordinary practices exhibited by fishermen in Hausa society during traditional ceremonies, special occasions, or in times of dire predicament. Given the inherent risks and dangers associated with fishing, fishermen have historically sought precautions and protections against the hazards they encounter in rivers. This necessity has rendered them deeply knowledgeable and vigilant in all activities related to water. Additionally, they offer specialized treatments or remedies to individuals afflicted by waterborne diseases or injuries sustained from encounters with dangerous aquatic animals.

Unveiling Unspoken: Exploring Queer Dynamics In The 21st Century Hausa Prose Literature

This research meticulously examines queer elements within a carefully selected Hausa novel. The paper aims to identify queerness in selected Hausa novels and to unravel the intentions of authors. As Hausa literature becomes a space for cultural exploration, this article contributes to the discourse on queer representations. Employing queer theory, the study combines systematic textual analysis and insightful author interviews to explore the portrayal of queer elements within the specific subset of Hausa prose. Findings from this exploration reveal deliberate navigation by Hausa novelists through societal norms, illustrating a subtle yet impactful inclusion of queer elements. For instance, the literature often offers nuanced perspectives on identity, love, and societal expectations, subtly challenging prevailing norms. This nuanced incorporation not only stimulates readers' emotions but also potentially enhances the marketability of these novels. Many interviewed authors express scepticism about promoting non-normative sexual orientations, drawing attention to the cautious dance between cultural authenticities and evolving societal expectations. This scepticism often stems from concerns about the reception of such elements within the Hausa literary landscape. However, these reservations also underline a recognition that unconventional experiences find resonance within a limited yet significant portion of Hausa society.

Utilization of Fish in Some Hausa Folk Medicine

Hausa land is blessed with abundant water bodies in the forms of rivers, natural and man-made lakes, and ponds. These water bodies are teeming with freshwater fish. The availability of these fishery resources has led to the habitation of people whose main occupation is harnessing these resources in Hausa land. These people are professionally known as the Sarkawa. The Sarkawa's primary occupation is fishing and hunting aquatic animals that inhabit the waters. The practice of traditional healing is not alien to the Hausa people. It is an old practice that was used even before the Hausa people came into contact with foreign civilizations from the east or the west. In Hausa society, practitioners of various traditional occupations play a pivotal role in the traditional healthcare delivery system. They often resort to the use of herbs, such as roots, bark, stems, and leaves, as some of the ingredients in their remedies. Parts of animals are also used for the treatment of ailments and diseases. Fish and fishery products also form part of the ingredients used in Hausa traditional healing. This paper, therefore, seeks to explore the uses of fish in Hausa's traditional healing practices. Through a survey, different practitioners of traditional healing were sampled and interviewed to obtain information from them regarding the usage of fish as medicine or as an ingredient in the treatment of various ailments. This paper has revealed that Hausa professional fishermen are knowledgeable in the use of fish as medicine for the cure of diseases and ailments that afflict human beings. They also offer their health services to those who seek their assistance.

The Contributions of Language to The Cultural Heritage of The Hausa Society

Language is the most important information and communication characteristic of all human beings. Only human beings have spoken and written language and language is the key note of culture because without it, culture does not exist. Language is power as well as great instrument for cultural preservation and transmission. This paper discusses the influence of language on the Hausa culture. How language affects the Hausa speaking community in Nigeria. This paper points out how language affects the thinking, career, norms, traditions etc. of the speech community of study. It is the medium of language that conveys the socio-political, economic, and religious thoughts from individual to individual and from generation to generation. Language and culture are so intertwined that one cannot survive without the other.

The Writer and Society: A Literary Study of Balaraba Ramat Yakubu’s Reflections on Hausa Society

Styles were used by different authors to ensure a proper channeling of messages from their novels to the targeted readers. Balaraba Ramat Yakubu who is among the few reputable Hausa women authors combined the position of mother, elder, leader, and responsible married woman. At the time she strived hard to acquire what can sustain her family and relatives she wrote many Hausa fiction books in which she depicted her wisdom and opinions in exposing the need to have a decent society base on her life experience, a society that respects women dignity, display honesty, discipline and promote a violent free society and encourage respect for one another. Balaraba Ramat Yakubu has tried to symbolize some of these issues in her books as her contribution towards sustaining responsible society in Nigeria, Africa, or the world at large. Styles as used by authors is a toolbox in the manipulation of their talents to expose their mission in their works. Balaraba Ramat used her styles to display her opinions on how different dimensions of our lives should be. This paper analyzes how Balaraba Ramat Yakubu addressed some of these issues and analyzes them. The paper used her Hausa novels and the academic works done on them and other things related to her. The paper, however, makes contact with both primary and secondary sources for further justifications. It however concludes with the findings that in Hausa society, men remain behind their wives in whatever they do to earn their lively hood as long as their strives do not contradict Islam and Hausa culture. Again going by the power of the pen, the paper also encourages writers especially women to use their pen as their powerful weapon to fight all forms of insurgency which rendered hundreds of thousands of women and children victims of circumstances in many African countries.

Linguistic Diffusion in the Development of Hausa Language

The purpose of this paper is to prove that intercultural relationship and sufficient contact between Hausa and other languages result in linguistic diffusion or borrowing. The study adopts both the historical and descriptive survey research design, predicated on the need for a brief history of Hausa and the donor languages, and descriptive design to facilitate the use of secondary data generated from textbooks, theses, dissertations, seminar and conference papers. The study traces the location of Hausa people in order to vividly comprehend the nature of contact with the donor languages which effectively bears on the objective nature of the borrowed words. It is in this light that three types of language relationship emerged: genetic, typological and cultural. The intercultural relationship can be unidirectional (English and Hausa) or bi-directional (Hausa and Yoruba). The work provides concrete examples from Tuareg, Fulfulde, Kanuri, Yoruba, Nupe, Arabic and English languages to demonstrate the long contact with the Hausa language. The study finally observes suppressive interference on the structures of Hausa especially from Arabic and English, which have attained second language status in Hausa society, which, again, does not make the language lose its originality.

Tradition of Concubine Holding in Hausa Society (Nigeria), 1900 – 1930

This paper examined the tradition of holding women as concubine in Muslim societies of the Hausa. Concubine holding changed the status of women and was acquired by slavery. This paper analysed concubine holding as a phenomenon that challenged female status in Hausa society. It put into perspective, the trajectories of concubine holding from the legends in the tradition of origin. It analysed the rights and privileges accrued to a concubine. And by the beginning of the twentieth century, the question of concubine holding was conveniently desirable under Islamic law and while the British law attempted to change the practices as part of efforts to abolish slavery. Thus, the paper contended that; concubine holding was part of the accepted norms in the sexual notions, which specifically privileged women to change their status and negotiate power in Hausa society. The paper adopted the historical approach by analysing court records, archival materials of the Nigerian National Archives, Kaduna, as well as books and journals relevant to the theme.
 Keywords: Concubine holding, British law, Islamic law, Hausa society

Memorializing a Legendary Figure: Bajajidda the Prince of Bagdad in Hausa Land


 
 
 This paper examines the various ways in which the Bayajidda legend is memorialized. In its current manifestations, the legend can be seen as an important agency for the remembrance of the past in the context of rapid socio-historical change in Africa, under the influence of modernity, technology and globalization. The analysis begins by highlighting the interface between folklore and history in everyday cultural practices in postcolonial northern Nigeria. The signposts that give a coherent structure to the paper include the chronicles of the Bayajidda legend, the essential oral version circulating in its different forms in Hausa society. Over the years, reference to the legend of Bayajidda has always been made through the use of different modes of cultural expression such as song, dramatic performance, film and other forms of narration. This range has served the political and ideological interests of the dominant power elite who are consistently alluding to the Bayajidda legend. The survival of the essential oral narrative therefore depends solely on a strategy of alluding to the legend in its various guises, including the form of museum artifacts, drama, films and musical songs. However, the paper explores each of the specific historical periods from the pre-colonial down to the colonial and postcolonial epochs with a view to highlighting how specific forms of the legend are deployed by hegemonic structures for the purposes of legitimation.
 KEYWORDS: BAYAJIDDA, LEGEND, HISTORY, HAUSA KINGDOM, MEMORIALIZATION, RECREATION
 
 

Prostitute’s Speech Style in Hausa Society: A Study of Ibrahim Sheme’s Novel ’Yartsana

This paper is titled Prostitute’s Speech Style in Hausa Society: A Study of Ibrahim Sheme’s Novel ‘Yartsana. The focus of this paper is to discuss the speech style of prostitutes of Hausa society as appeared in ‘Yartsana. The novel ‘Yartsana centres on the socio-cultural issue of prostitution as it relates to Hausa land. Prostitution is prohibited and negatively viewed in Hausa society. Prostitutes must leave their home town to other places for security purposes. In the other places, the prostitutes adopt a speech style different from that of non prostitute women in the society. The aim of this paper is to analyze the prostitute’s speech style as obtained in the novel ‘Yartsana. It discusses speech styles in ‘Yartsana in five sub-heading. These are the taboo, Proverbs, and bitter words the forth part of the paper comprises conclusion where summary and findings were discussed. The last portion is the bibliography where sources of the paper are listed.

Memorializing a Legendary Figure: Bayajidda the Prince of Bagdad in Hausa Land

This paper examines the various ways in which the Bayajidda legend is memorialized. In its current manifestations, the legend can be seen as an important agency for the remembrance of the past in the context of rapid socio-historical change in Africa, under the influence of modernity, technology and globalization. The analysis begins by highlighting the interface between folklore and history in everyday cultural practices in postcolonial northern Nigeria. The signposts that give a coherent structure to the paper include the chronicles of the Bayajidda legend, the essential oral version circulating in its different forms in Hausa society. Over the years, reference to the legend of Bayajidda has always been made through the use of different modes of cultural expression such as song, dramatic performance, film and other forms of narration. This range has served the political and ideological interests of the dominant power elite who are consistently alluding to the Bayajidda legend. The survival of the essential oral narrative therefore depends solely on a strategy of alluding to the legend in its various guises, including the form of museum artifacts, drama, films and musical songs. However, the paper explores each of the specific historical periods from the pre-colonial down to the colonial and postcolonial epochs with a view to highlighting how specific forms of the legend are deployed by hegemonic structures for the purposes of legitimation.

The Politics of Attack through Gendered Hausa Proverbs

Proverb may be defined as “pieces of folk wisdom expressed with terseness and charm. The "terseness implies a certain economy in the choice of words and a sharpness of focus, while the "charm" conveys the touch of literary or poetic beauty in the expression”. Apart from giving insights into human behaviour and psychology, Hausa proverbs serve as mirrors of the cultural norms and values of the society. They are employed not only to entertain, educate, advice but most often to buttress a point, and to give an argument universal acceptability. Patriarchy as a social system which has been in existence over the centuries most often make certain that members of the opposite sex sustain conditioned behaviours toward one another. Varying views and expectations about masculinity and femininity have to a large extent affected the socio-cultural beliefs and attitudes of men and women in Hausa society. Gender proverbs in Hausa society are very common. They deal with among other things gender relations and the status the different sexes accord each other. This paper, therefore attempts an appraisal of gender based proverbs which have over time been used as tool of attack by the different sexes in Hausa society.

Intrahousehold Relations and Environmental Entitlements of Land and Livestock for Women in Rural Kano, Northern Nigeria

Gender relations mediate access to the environment in a variety of ways, through formal institutions such as customary law or informal social norms operating at the household level. This is particularly so in rural areas of the global south that are highly dependent on natural resources for livelihoods. The environmental entitlements framework is useful in examining the influence of informal institutions on access to environmental resources among differentiated social actors. In this paper, we use the environmental entitlements framework to map entitlements to land and livestock, and explore the capabilities they provide for women in rural northern Nigeria. The aim of the study was to examine the influence of social norms governing marriage and inheritance on women’s entitlements to land and livestock. The study methods were qualitative and used in-depth interviews and household case studies. We find that environmental entitlements of land and livestock for women are mediated by their relationships to men, through marriage or kinship, and through the different intra household arrangements within marriage, including seclusion, non-seclusion, and polygyny. Women are able to gain command of natural resources through negotiations within these relationships and within the wider social norms governing Hausa society. While these institutions can restrict the capabilities women derive from natural resources, women may delay or forgo entitlements as a means of enhancing their wellbeing.

Encoded Ajami, Talisman and the Preservation of Arabic Spiritual Medicinee in Hausa Society

The paper is all about exploring the incorporated Ajami script in traditional Islamic astrology by the Islamic Scholars of Western Sudan from the jihad period to contemporary times. Talismanic practices, in the Islamic societies referred to as Asraru (the hidden) are based on numerological ascription to certain alphabets within Islamic literary texts (both religious from the Qur’an, and non-religious). These literary talismanic texts are often re-interpreted by Hausa ajami scholars as prescriptions for various spiritual and physical ailments as well as means of safeguard. This paper analyses the categories of Asraru publications commonly available in Kano markets, by looking at their origin, their availability, distribution, use and finally meaning. The fact that this type of spiritual practice is still currently subscribed to in the Hausa society makes it significant in understanding the force of Ajami literacy in communicating and preserving knowledge in traditional Hausa societies.It is divided into two parts, the first part contain the issue of encoded Ajami and its application in Astrological calculation and the second part deals with the Talisman and the use of Ajami (here not the encoded type) in its explanation for remote usage.

Development as a Trigger for Development of Language of Epithet in Hausa Society

The paper maintains that epithet, a genre of oral literature, grows with the coming of new scientific and technological innovations in Hausa society. In proving that, after giving a working definition of the term, evidences have been forwarded to show certain epithets which are on new developments and which came to the said society. Further, a general view on how new epithets are created has also been advanced. The paper concludes that, new epithets are always being created to suit the social changes in Hausa society since development remains a close galaxy for epithet creators and users.

Nigerian Realities: Can we ignore Traditional Leadership in developing successful CBR?

Purpose: To study the role of traditional leaders (Sarakuna) who provide a form of social welfare for persons with disabilities in the Hausa society of Northern Nigeria. From the results of this study, lessons are derived for cooperation with Sarakuna in (emerging) Community Based Rehabilitation programmes. Methods: A literature study was done using different (non-)electronic sources. In addition, 26 semi-structured interviews were conducted with different stakeholders (e.g., non-governmental organisations, disabled people’s organisations), and 8 focus group discussions were held with (leaders of) persons with a disability. Question-led analysis was utilised by considering 4 dimensions: rehabilitation outcomes, rehabilitation services, involvement of beneficiaries, and social acceptability. Results: Not much literature is available on the role of traditional leadership in rehabilitation programmes and social welfare. Nevertheless, this study found indications that traditional leadership is still present in contemporary Northern Nigeria. Some Sarakuna improve the socio-economic position of persons with disabilities by functioning as mediators and by their ability to provide social insurance. Their cooperation with multiple stakeholders enables them to distribute food and clothes. Also, since they possess essential information, NGOs are helped to access the community of persons with disabilities. Sarakuna are in a position to promote the inclusion and rehabilitation of persons with disabilities, but often lack necessary skills and training; yet, Community Based Rehabilitation programmes often ignore them. Conclusions and Implications: Community Based Rehabilitation programmes should take better note of social contexts and therefore should also work in the specific context of traditional leadership. In this way, rehabilitation programmes are more likely to meet the expectations of persons with disability.

The Language of Hausa Films: Forging a New Discourse

The paper studies Hausa film language through the analysis of three communication strategies, namely proverbs, imperatives and forms of address. It shows that Hausa film creates a new discourse by reflecting modern and traditional Hausa society. The films preserve some accepted cultural norms of behavior and norms of communication in order to please the more conservative public. On the other hand, combination of traditional and modern Hausa lifestyle evokes changes in the discourse. The paper shows that proverbs are commonly used as communication strategy for indirectness, rather than a specialized language. It also discovers that imperatives are used as communication strategy in close relations between interlocutors (no matter what their social status is) to express the direct message. As for forms of address, traditional and borrowed terms reflect the changing style of life. The examples extracted from the Hausa films are to show how the regular grammatical and lexical means change their discourse function in new social context.

Being and becoming Hausa: interdisciplinary perspectives

Hausa society in West Africa has attracted researchers' attention for decades, and has featured in the historical record for at least 500 years. Yet, no clear picture is available of the historical trajectories that underpin Hausa ethnogenesis. This book addresses this gap, deploying interdisciplinary approaches to revisit questions to which single disciplines have given partial answers, often due to the paucity of written sources for early periods of Hausa history. Contributors draw from the disciplines of anthropology, linguistics, economic history, and archaeology to enquire into how a 'Hausa' identity took shape and what have been its changing material and cultural manifestations. The result is a compelling overview of one of the most iconic groups of modern West Africa.

Deviants and Outcasts: Power and Politics in Hausa Bori Performances

The jihad of Uthman dan Fodio in the early ninteenth century had by 1806 established Islamic cultural and religious hegemony over the Hausa territory of present-day Northern Nigeria. In the process, Islam had succeeded in pushing indigenous religious and cultural practices such as Bori to the margins or underground. However, while most of the other indigenous forms died or became inactive and ineffectual, Bori has managed to hold its own against the persecution and cultural war waged against it by Islam, mainly because the belief in the power and ability of the spirits to influence human life which is at the centre of Bori practice was never lost. In this article, Osita Okagbue argues that marginalization has made Bori attractive to groups and individuals in Hausa society who feel themselves similarly marginalized and oppressed for articulating alternative identities and viewpoints to those of the mainstream society. He also examines how the possession performances of the Bori cult enable members to subvert and occasionally to use moments of trance and possession to invert the power relationships between oppressed groups and their oppressors. Osita Okagbue teaches at Goldsmiths, University of London, and is the author of African Theatres and Performances (Routledge, 2007). He is President of the African Theatre Association (AfTA) and editor of African Performance Review.

Teaching and Learning Guide for: A Window on the ‘New’ Sociology of Childhood

Teaching and Learning Guide for: A Window on the ‘New’ Sociology of Childhood

Loud Bubbles from a Silent Brook: Trends and Tendencies in Contemporary Hausa Prose Writing

This paper traces the transformation of Hausa popular fiction, a genre created predominantly by young Muslim Hausa of Northern Nigeria. It specifically explores the interface between creative fiction and conservative society and shows how creativity and media technologies combine to reflect a transformational stage of an aspect of popular culture in a conservative African society. Contemporary Hausa prose fiction evolved as the product of British colonial policies which acted as the midwife at the birth of vernacular Hausa creative writing in 1933. State patronage was however removed and a massive independent publishing industry emerged among young Hausa novelists. Reacting against the staid conservatism of mainstream Hausa society, and embracing new media technologies they opted for a creative route different from their literary forefathers. Their open treatment of romantic themes drew the ire of the Muslim Hausa conservative establishment, and graphically illustrated a society in turbulent transition.