Public Lecture: Women and Survivability: Ecofeminist Representation of Oil Pollution and Environmental Degradation in Niger Delta Poetry, Speaker: Chinasa Abonyi (University of Nigeria, Nsukka)

Abstract:

Environmental Degradation is a global phenomenon that affects all life forms including plants, animals, humans and especially women and children. One major cause of environmental pollution and degradation is oil exploration and this has been a major problem in the Niger Delta region of Nigeria. In contemporary Nigerian literature, ecological writings are dominated by postcolonial eco-critique of socio-economic and political marginalization of the Niger Delta people. The objective of my study is to critically evaluate the representation of women found in the polluted Niger Delta environment and their various efforts for environmental transformation using the poetry of Tanure Ojaide, Nnimmo Bassey, Ebi Yeibo and Ibiwari Ikiriko. From oral interviews and participant observation method, my study develops a rich background to an ecofeminist engagement of women and the environment amidst oil pollution and crises. Trauma and repression are further investigated as psychoanalytic voice of women which is foregrounded in return of the repressed and ecofeminist activism for resistance and environmental sustainability.

Dr. Chinasa Abonyi is a budding scholar in gender and environmental studies, specializing in eco-poetics and ecofeminist theorization of the environment and sustainability studies. Chinasa has attended many conferences and has published in both local and international journals including her 2022 article in AlterNative: Journal of Indigenous Peoples (SAGE). She is a lecturer in the Department of English and Literary Studies, University of Nigeria, Nsukka, Nigeria. Dr. Abonyi is also a poet whose first poem “Moribund” appeared in the 37th no of African Literature Today. She is a fellow of Ife Institute of Advanced Studies (IIAS) and a member of African Literature Association and the Association of the Study of Literature and Environment. Dr. Abonyi is presently a postdoctoral fellow of MIASA at the University of Ghana, Accra. Her passion for decoloniality of knowledge and indigenous consciousness is foregrounded in her multidisciplinary approaches to the study of African oral narratives and modern literature.