NCAC HONOURS 
LECTURE S E R IE S  6
CULTURE, NATIONAL IUENTITV 
AND eiOBALIZimON:
CULTURE, NATIONAL IDENTITY 
AND GLOBALIZATION:
THE NIGERIAN CONTEXT
DELE LAYIWOLA
Institute o f African Studies 
University o f Ibadan, Nigeria
December, 2007
INTRODUCTION
Considering the demands of our national expectations, there is need 
more than ever before, to identify, harness and develop all aspects of 
our living art and culture in order to meet the challenges of our time. 
Towards this, the Management of the National Council for Arts and 
Culture (NCAC) in line with its statutory mandate and in consonance 
with the National Cultural Policy (1988) is re-engineering, re-focusing
and repositioning the Council towards effective performance and
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contribution to the realisation of the role of Arts and Culture in fulfilling 
our national objectives.
The National Council for Arts and Culture (NCAC) Honours Lecture 
is designed to bring to the fore the virtues of our culture, creativity, 
hard-work, and excellence such that we can tap from in our collective 
quest in building a solid and virile nation.
Planned as an annual event, each lecture draws from various walks of 
life as well as features, scholars from the Academia, Captains of industry, 
Economic experts, Diplomats and Stakeholders in the Culture sector. 
The lecture dwells on values of our culture which promote creativity, 
hard-work, communal efforts, good governance, understanding and 
peace and other attributes which are necessary and meaningful in 
addressing the needs of our time.
The lecture being the main event, other activities such as cultural 
exhibitions, book presentation, awards to personalities that have
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distinguished themselves in the field of Art and Culture promotion were 
part of the package at the NCAC 6th Honours Lecture. The event was 
splendid and you will find the lecture of the day very worth while.
M. M. Maidugu
Executive Director/CEO 
NCAC, Abuja
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CULTURE, NATIONAL IDENTITY 
AND GLOBALIZATION:
THE NIGERIAN CONTEXT
INTRODUCTION:
Whilst there have been varied and desperate attempts at defining 
culture and its notions or tendencies, there hasn't been a match, 
hitherto, to conclusively define its complementary notion of 
identity. Certainly, an agreement could easily be reached on a 
general idea of what constitutes culture in a geo-political space. 
For instance, we may hazard that a conceptualization of culture 
is the totality of the ways, in which a given society lives and 
preserves its institutions. It is also implied that culture is dynamic 
and can change or re-aggregate its own outlines as to take on 
new accretions or discard old ones. This is true even within the 
specialized definitions of Fanon' or Gyekye" where culture is 
situated within a particular polity or within modernizing nation 
states. The point I make here is that culture is by and large 
tractable as Kroeber and Kluckohn1" have tried to do by listing 
over a hundred and fifty definitions of culture which they have 
classified into six categories: descriptive, historical, narrative, 
psychological, genetic and structural. Because the work of 
Kroeber and Kluckohn are preoccupied with definitions, there 
are indications that there will always be room for newer additions 
as societies move from one stage of articulation to the other. There 
are, however, limitations, which are inherently imposed on 
works, which dwell on definitions.
The first is that definitions, in themselves, tend to be limiting; 
they seek to establish boundaries, sometimes 'monopolies' if not
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'hegemonies'. There, certainly, is nothing overly wrong with this 
because definitions, in any case, help to configure and track 
down, even conceptualize frameworks. But the second and real 
problem is that definitions can also be value-laden; they are 
subject to the vagaries of individual perception depending on 
where one stands and what one stands for. One terminology, 
which is not free of value or assumption, is, according to Diagne 
and Ossebiiv, the term 'development'. They have rightly called 
for the establishment of an epistemological paradigm, which frees 
the conception of culture from a preconceived 'development'. If 
it is possible to describe in clear, concise terms what the culture 
of a people is like, then it can be safely assumed that we would 
be able to establish a stable identity -  political, social or cultural; 
inclusive of ethnicity and gender -  for such a people. In other 
words a particular culture validates a particular identity and a 
definite identity reinforces or fashions its own culture. But as 
we have earlier affirmed, it cannot be a needle-head affair. Culture 
is a dynamic phenomenon and can apply to as many definitions 
as there are studies. Also, it is only one half of the ingredients for 
identity formation.
In an attempt to trace the semblance of a cultural unity through 
the whole of Africa, in spite of her diversity of linguistic and oral 
forms, Jacques Maquetv grapples desperately with a protean 
phenomenon:
The total intuition o f the reality o f African life, the analysis 
o f artifacts and institutions, the claims o f  negritude, the 
political action o f Pan-Africanism converge on the same 
point: sub-Saharan Africa is culturally a unity. This 
cultural unity is Africanity. It is the special African 
Configuration o f  various features that may be found  
separately elsewhere.
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Prof. Dele Layiwola delivering his lecture
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Suspecting that he hasn't gone far enough, he tries an empirical 
analogy:
All human faces are made up o f the same elements: nose, 
eyes, mouth, etc.; one or another o f these elements may be 
identical in form in several faces, but the combination o f 
these features forms one unique face. Africanity is this 
unique cultural face that Africa presents to the world.
Sensing still that he has not succeeded in a convincing and holistic 
representation of this mercurial phenomenon, especially in a 
deeply pluralist situation, such as we have in Nigeria, he plods 
further, albeit apologetically:
It is true that each society has its own heritage, its culture.
To avoid confusion, let us continue to use this term in its 
exact sense; the totality o f ways o f living, working and 
thinking and the totality o f what results from these activities 
(institutions, artifacts, philosophies, etc.) as they are 
constituted in a given society. Each society has built up a 
culture, each culture is based on a society... 850 traditional 
African societies, which means 850 different cultures.™
I have quoted copiously from Maquet to demonstrate the typical 
predicament of definitions in their attempt to grasp at the 
particular and to set boundaries. Kroeber and Kluckohn have 
cast their nets wider to be able to escape the pitfalls of the 
particular. But Maquet's definition is still as relevant, if we relate 
it to the particular epoch in which he was writing. Definitions of 
culture have always related it to the summary of values, which 
make up the totality of a way of life. The whole problem arises 
because modernity, industrialization, globalization; new modes 
of production and consumption and new ways of thinking are 
always re-inventing preconceived notions and values.
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I believe that the greater benefit of this paper will be its attempt 
to use culture as a vector of identity. It will be its attempt to 
establish culture as a polar enantiomorph of identity. How do I 
mean? There is a relationship which makes a culture the vector 
of its identity and vice-versa. This makes it possible to locate the 
one concept as an index of the other. However, in attempting to 
do this, I do not intend to seek a definition, as indicated earlier, 
of culture because culture changes over time, space, historical 
condition and according to the degree of choices to be made. 
Instead, I shall attempt to locate the basis of identity in ideational 
and philosophical quantities like mythology, history and the 
concept of collective m em ory in art w hether p lastic  or 
performance. The latter concept is useful because we are dealing 
with post-colonial societies and nation states, which are relatively 
young in terms of the history of nation making and nation 
building. In many cases, we still rely on oral traditions and 
memories of our past; traditions of folklore and craft. For even 
in the works of individual authors, artists and performers, there 
are indications that the sum total of expressions and images do 
carry codes of a collective cultural identity. Art defines its own 
society and society, in turn, validates its own art and crafts. In 
establishing identities, I shall like to distinguish three forms of 
identities or 'pieces of identities':
i. Individual identity;
ii. Group identities which include ethnic and nationalistic 
identities;
iii. Post-modern, industrial or transnational identity.™
Whilst distinguishing three forms, I shall like to indicate that 
there are five other identifiable conditions of identity paradigms 
on which the three forms are based:
i. Blood and lineage ties
ii. Linguistic grouping
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The Minister o f Tourism, Culture & National Orientation Prince 
Adetokunbo Kayode (SAN) being ushered into the Lecture venue 
by the DirectorICEO, NCAC, M. M. Maidugu
The M inister in a warm handshake w ith the Honoured Speaker
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The Director/CEO NCAC, M. M. M aidugu welcomes the 
Chairman, Her Excellency, Mrs. Pauline Tallen.
Public presentation o f the 5th Honours Lecture publication by 
Hon. Wale Okediran, President, Association o f  N igerian Authors.
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iii. Geographical contiguity
iv. Historical necessity and
v. Economic regimes.
But let us discuss the forms of identities rather than the conditions 
which determine them.
I. INDIVIDUAL IDENTITY:
There is no doubt that Sigmund Freud and his apostles have 
exhaustively dealt with the concept of the individual ego and its 
attendant sub-conscious energies, which are in perpetual conflict 
to create, particularized identities. It is same for other such studies 
by Lionel Trilling™ and Charles Taylor.ix This phenomenon, as 
Eriksonx portrays it, often encourages a centrifugally controlled 
switching of impulses where, as Charles Taylor represents it, that 
identity that is particular to me; that of being true to myself; that 
is particular to my being. He takes this over from Trilling/' Karl 
Hausserxii says it culm inates in three identity components 
whereby self-perception creates self-concept; self-evaluation 
becomes self-esteem; and personal control helps belief in control. 
Though he states these principles, he does not highlight how 
this relates to the problems of individuation in a post-colonial 
setting. But events can be gleaned more graphically from the 
narratives of African writers and philosophers concerned with 
the theme of self-determination and identity complex. One such 
work is the novel by the Senegalese author and philosopher, 
Cheikh Hamidou Kane titled Ambiguous Adventure 
The novel raises a few questions in the quest after identity and 
thereafter comes to its own conclusions on what is to be the goal 
of a society in the search for an authentic identity. Some of the 
questions he raises are as follows:
i. Can identity be preserved after an external intrusion
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such as colonialism, conquest or displacement? (p.10)
ii. Can the search for identity equate with the search for 
harmony? (p.69)
iii. Is the lack of an identity a form of enslavement? (p.69)
iv. Is the search of an identity a search for truth or an 
eternal verity? (p.77)
v. Is identity concerned with internal or external values? 
(P-78)
The novel problematises the concept of identity; the individual 
and the collective search for it. The philosophical disputations 
in the novel are carried out through a series of dialogues between 
the narrator and hero, Samba Diallo; his father; his teacher and 
mentor; his aunt; friends and acquaintances. On other occasions, 
the disputations are carried on through a series of interior 
monologues and stream of consciousness technique.
Though Ambiguous Adventure takes through the career of a young 
m an and his com m unity at the crossroads, it concludes 
unambiguously that the concept of collective memory, religious 
fa ith , m ythologies and trad ition al believe system s are 
fundamental to the establishment of an identity (pp. 73,102,152, 
161 ff). After Samba Diallo's search for knowledge at home and 
abroad, he concludes that though the whole of nature imposes a 
uniformity of identity, humanity have their peculiar, disparate 
identities (pp. 152 -  3).
II. ETHNIC OR NATIONAL IDENTITY
There is no doubt that in pluralist societies, with diverse 
languages and communities, there is always a confusion of 
categories in establishing definitions and boundaries. But since 
the evolution of the nation state in Africa is relatively recent and
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The Hon. M inister Prince Adetokunbo Kayode presents the 
Honours Award to Prof. Layiwola.
Dr. Yakubu Levi O’bem receives his Honours Award for the promotion 
o f Nigeria culture through Visual Arts from the Minister.
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Chairman o f the occasion, Her Excellency, Mrs. Pauline Tallen presents 
the Honours Award for the promotion o f Nigeria culture through 
Choral Music to Prof. Laz Ekwueme represented by his wife.
Mallam Kassim Yaro receives his Honours Award for the promotion 
o f Nigeria culture through Folklore (theatre) from Mrs. Tallen
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does not always coincide with ethnicity, then we can conceptually 
refer to distinct ethnic groups as nationalities (see Davidsonxiv, 
Gyekyexv). But the confusion of categories often creates problems 
with the search for identities with respect to the placement of 
nationality sentiments and loyalties. The confusion has created 
hybridized citizens seeking to modify allegiances whenever it is 
convenient to do so. This phenomenon is what Peter Ekehxvi calls 
'the two publics in Africa'.
A resume of Ekeh's thesis is that in post-colonial Africa, the civil 
society and its individuals have two public allegiances. The first 
public is the primordial one consisting of family or ethnic links; 
and the second realm; the civic, is that of public service or 
government to which the individual holds vocational or career 
links. Because these two publics do not synchronize as in Western 
societies, the individual in a post-colonial society often shows 
loyalty to one public to the detriment of the other. For example, 
it is usual to find public servants or politicians who would take 
funds from public coffers to satisfy the needs of their ethnic 
relations or kin. If we pause to give this a bit of thought, we can 
hazard that this is an identity-legitimizing phenomenon.
The roots of African politics, the emergence of a new elite as 
inherited from the colonial era; especially that idea of an elite 
corps that lives apart 'on the top of a hill' has given a different 
texture to the idea of citizenship. The consequence of this is that 
the elite in the governance of the new nation is always alienated 
from the civic public, which it serves or governs. There is 
therefore, almost like the emergence of a parallel economy, the 
evolution of a primordial public which, in any case, has a longer 
history in its relationship to the individual or the new elite. This 
phenomenon is so pervasive that the post-colonial woman or 
man is often overwhelmed by the semblance of loyalties that 
often comes from the ethnic group whenever a son or daughter
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is elected to serve in the civic public. It is only logical that 
something is always returned, quid pro quo, for that primordial 
loyalty. Ekeh touches on the actual point when he writes that: 
'the individual sees his duty as moral obligations to benefit and 
sustain a primordial public of which he is a member'. His analysis 
states further that:
The foci o f such duties may o f course vary from one setting 
to another but in most o f Africa they tend to be emergent 
ethnic groups.™"
In addition to the point made by Ekeh, a strong geo-political 
factor subsists in the case of particular ethnicities or language 
groupings creating isolated, homogenous quarters in urban 
centers and settlements. Wherever they settle outside of their 
hom eland, they seek to m aintain a separate identity and 
propagate a primordial culture. It is therefore clear that quite 
apart from the mere sentiment of allying with something familiar, 
there is some other thing to be gained from holding or 
encouraging such allegiances. Or can we convincingly argue that 
it is just symptoms due only to libidinal identity drive? Hardly! 
For, as Ekeh posits:
Although the African gives materially as part o f his duties 
to the primordial public, what he gains back is not material.
He gains back intangible immaterial benefits in the form o f 
identity or psychological security.™"1
It needs no gloss to see why bribery, and political corruption, 
have become a public feature of many young nation states in 
Africa. For unless there is a strong national identity rather than 
ethnic, religious or class identities, which are in any case, diffused 
identities, there can be no loyalty to a unifying, broad-based 
centrifugal ideal. Rather, a weak national identity will encourage 
profuse, centripetal attraction from a center or a number of 
centers; the public domain, and encourage a de-centering
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attraction to other minute centers which are actually ethnic, 
religious or class based.x,x But the point needs to be made that 
Ekeh's study is by no means the last word on the subject since 
the primordial is far from limited to Africa or third world nations 
alone. There is amazing evidence to show that primordial shifts 
occur along professional, vocational, and mercantile as well as 
racial lines.xx It would appear that people seek for areas of 
identification or primordial strength whenever their survivalist 
interests are threatened or modified. There is a classic inference 
in David Laitin's study to which we shall turn in the next section.
With respect to Nigeria, Vremudia Diejomaoh and Wambui wa 
Karanjaxxi have made suggestions on how to attain a strong 
national identity. I have summarized their ideas as follows:
(a) The emergence of strong national leaders;
(b) The introduction of a broad-based democracy where 
leaders strive for national appeal amongst various 
ethnic groups;
(c) The emergence of political parties with national 
appeal and spread;
(d) The fabrication of a strong federalist constitution;
(e) The invention of a consistent cultural policy.
But even with these in place, the two scholars realize that from a 
historical perspective, a young nation-state like Nigeria will need 
several decades of growth before a distinctive national identity 
can be expected to emerge. I do not hesitate to lay a premium of 
emphasis on group or corporate identity because the individual 
automatically gives image to what Taylor terms "significant 
others" outside of the self and to which the "self" must relate. 
Ultimately, a national identity is the sum total of that exchange 
between the self and its concentrically related others to which, 
ordinarily, his/her life relates like a web and with which it attains 
to significant meaning.
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There is every indication that the sense of a group identity is not 
totally bereft of a strong, particularistic individuality. Afterall, a 
group identity is the sum total of the majority of the individual 
identities subsumed within it; and which is what gives it a 
peculiar form. It is also useful to note as an addendum to 
D iejom aoh and Karanja that as M abogo M orexxii infers, a 
constitution 'despite the accommodation of diversities and its 
pretensions to synthesis, remains an expression of liberal 
universalism'. This leaves us with the responsibility to be critical 
of constitutions because, by default, they often guarantee 
individual rights and tend to gloss over group rights. Group 
rights are thereby subordinated to the general individual rights 
enjoyed by all. The problem often arises that minority identities 
and expressions are marginalized when the sum total of the 
individual rights correspond to that of a particular majority who 
would always hold sway in political and economic matters.
III. POSTMODERN, INDUSTRIAL OR 
TRANSNATIONAL IDENTITY:
What do we mean by an industrial age identity? For the want of 
a more representative term, this identity formation is one that 
can be attributed to situations that are not synonymous with truly 
conservative, truly traditional worlds. And such societies are now 
very rare. This identity matrix is inchoate and amorphous and is 
often mainly found in truly industrialized or industrializing 
societies. In such industrialized societies, there have crystallized, 
in the past, classed derived identities where we could differentiate 
between working class, or 'lumpen' elements, and an owner or 
bourgeois class. In 18th or 19th century England, for instance, a 
miner would belong to the former class whilst a factory owner 
or landed gentry would belong to the latter. However, in late 
20th century societies, migrations and settlements across borders
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%
Mr. Emma Eze receives his Excellence Award  
from  the Hon. M inister
Ondo State C ultural Troupe entertains guests on the occasion
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Adamaiva State Troupe performs a t the event
Performing Arts Division presents a dram a sketch a t the event.
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and continents have tended to create an epigenetic kind of 
humanity where modernizing tendencies have disrupted age- 
old markers of identity. We now have a growing population 
where our prim ordial identities are slowly giving way to 
influences, material as well as moral or spiritual which -  in a 
manner of speaking -  partake of multitudes. For instance, 
Chinese or Japanese Americans will neither be Chinese nor 
Japanese in spite of their distinctive physiological features. 
Rather, history and accidental circumstances have now put these 
otherwise different persons into the same identity matrix: they 
are simply Americans. This then go to show that in negotiating 
'new horizons', we must be prepared to give up as much of our 
own being as we have adapted from  others. Then the 
transnational citizen will be truly born when we begin to fine- 
tune those prejudices which often drive us to the selfish motive 
of ethnic puritans. This is a moral as well as a theoretical point.
One salient factor about this class of identity formation is that 
instead of deriving its propelling power primarily from ethnic 
of nationalistic solidarity, as in the previous group, it derives its 
power from a means of'production and a parallel means o f consumption 
which can be roughly termed transnational or trans-cultural. 
Whilst it can be argued that its goal is to improve the condition 
of living of those in its fold who have migrated or immigrated to 
a present geopolitical space, it does not depend solely on 
primordial psychology. It therefore has a guarantee that it is 'non­
religious', non-puritanical and only seemingly 'apolitical' since 
industrialization takes place in societies irrespective of their 
political or religious ideologies.xxlii Here, identity formation is 
first of all mechanical and, thereafter, affective. This factor is what 
makes a modern, industrial citizen more attached to his country 
than to his primordial kin. There are, of course, occasional 
exceptions, which prove the rule. This means that, in spite of
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global and cosmopolitan drives, a group can identify based on 
the seemingly racial or ethnic categories alone. But often, it will 
be seen that there are more fundamental modes of consumerist 
tendencies involved where categories and boundaries have been 
temporarily destabilized or confused. Even then, the cultural 
identities of displaced persons make more sense to outsiders 
within the totality of the cultural capital against which they have 
chosen to act and live. This may sometimes confound otherwise 
inform ed debate where a theorist may suppose that the 
phenomenon of race or ethnicity is phony or even non-existent. 
This is also dependent on political m anipulations, which 
challenge or threaten well being or survival. Citizens from the 
present categorization of identity matrix have the same public 
and private realm. This is a post-industrial identity. For some 
curious reason, this identity marker has a throwback reflex to a 
psychological approach for its understanding. We have to 
theorize again through an apostle of Sigmund Freud, Erik 
Erikson:
Primitive tribes have a direct relation to the sources and 
means o f  production. Their tools are extensions o f the human 
body. Children in these groups participate in technical and 
in magic pursuits; to them, body and environment, 
childhood and culture may be fu ll o f dangers, but they are 
all one world. The inventory o f social prototypes is small 
and static. In our world, machines, fa r  from remaining an 
extension o f the human body, destine the whole human 
organizations to be extensions o f machinery.. .xxiv
It is worthy of note that in many instances, a reflex from without 
can essentially compel identity as indicated here by Erikson. But 
even when this is the case, there must be an inwardly propelled 
coherence to help the character to tow a line of consistency as he 
writes: Tt is this identity of something in the individual's core
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with an essential aspect of a group's inner coherence which is 
under consideration here: for the young individual must learn 
to be most to himself where he means most to others -  those 
others, to be sure, who have come to mean most to him.xxv In 
meaning most to one, it may sometimes be that those individuals 
may be chosen without reference to ethnicity, race or class.
It is of course certain  that Erikson is concerned w ith 
developmental psychology as it occurs in youths. But he also 
attempts a wider scope by affirming that the self-sameness within 
a thing or person is at the same time sameness shared with others. 
This confirms the fluidic, enantiomorphic nature of identity, 
which renders it prone to change either way. This is why he thinks 
that the more one probes the identity concept; the more 
ambiguous it becomes. This recalls what Anthony Appiah tries 
to describe when he writes that collective identities often come 
up with loose norms and model which then shape the lives of 
those whose individualities partake in those collective identities. 
Those norms become almost like scripts and written codes into 
which narratives from which individual life patterns are drawn 
and in which they derive validity.xxvi I am interested in the 
chirographic dimension because of the self-determination that it 
entails and the somewhat entrepreneurial dimension of culture 
elite who vend the notions of identity for their own selfish ends. 
I shall take this on in the last section of the paper. Unless an 
individual or group succumbs to a mindset, their identity codes 
will slowly change or metamorphose with the currency of 
historical or political culture. But it is exasperating to accurately 
predict or attempt to legislate a permanent identity status as 
Erikson equally infers in his conclusion:
At one time, then, it will appear to refer to a conscious 
striving for  a continuity o f personal character; at a third, 
as a criterion for the silent doings o f ego synthesis; and,
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finally, as a maintenance o f an inner solidarity with a 
group's ideals and identity (Emphasis)**™
Though Erikson ends the chapter inconclusively with an apology, 
his hesitation has been resolved with the notion of the split, 
complex or multiple identities. It may be useful to take up David 
Laitin's defense of Erikson in this respect.
David Laitinxxviii realizes that unlike the strictly ideological 
expression of the nation, which can hold a national identity 
strictly to the notions of a common culture, language, economic 
life and a common territory, there often exist the possibilities for 
identity shifts. There are, after all, no true boundaries for ethnic 
groups in nations where boundaries had been drawn arbitrarily 
and the concept of the nation fairly artificial. This is the sense to 
which Wole Soyinka also applies the concept of identity in new 
nation states.xxix In any case, economic notions, trade relations 
and survival are the new parameters for nation formation even 
within European nations, which have had a longer history of 
nationhood. Now individuals within those nations have become 
transnational citizens moving without the restrictions of visas 
and other forms of invented identity markers.xxx The collapse of 
the Berlin wall had given the lie to Stalin's straitjacketed concept 
of the nation state. In the next century, identity may as well 
become the subject of politics and pure convenience, or in some 
other cases, pure survival. David Laitin's observations are worth 
noting in some detail here:
Usually, people's identities change with the level o f  
aggregation: ivithin their community, they may identify 
themselves on the basis o f  socio-economic backgrounds; 
within their country, outside o f  their community, they may 
identify themselves with a brand o f politics; and outside 
their country, they may identify themselves with their 
nation. All societies -  perhaps especially today -  have
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cultural entrepreneurs who offer new identity categories 
(racial, sexual, and regional), hoping to find "buyers". I f  
their product sells, these entrepreneurs become leaders o f 
newly formed ethnic, cultural, religious, or other forms o f 
identity groups.*™
The long term implication of the above claims is that we are 
gradually getting into an era where communication is bringing 
the world closer in terms of cultural sharing; collaboration and 
awareness are becoming new factors of political evolution. 
Constructed boundaries are once again disappearing, as they 
were, before the colonial adventure. The era of primordial 
identities is giving way to constructed or invented identities. This 
will have its welcome as well as its unfavourable sides depending 
on the motives and choices involved. For instance, if prejudices 
and barriers were broken down, a new era of universal 
brotherhood will begin to emerge. But if identity peddlers and 
constructivists have their hidden agendas based on supremacy 
and hegemonies, then the stage is set for upheavals, and the 
constant preparations for new forms of alliances. Since human 
motives are often unpredictable, and bases for alliance often carry 
with them all manners of ideologies and values, a long-term 
equilibrium is difficult to guarantee.
What is left to explore is the extent to which colonized societies 
and their citizens will continue to have a neutral basis for the 
construction of identities because, as Ekeh argued earlier on, 
colonialism has created two incongruous publics instead of one. 
Worse still, in some of the post-colonial territories, there have 
been multiple colonial experiences. In West Africa, for example, 
there are nations, which were colonized first by Arabs and Islam 
before Europeanization and Christianity arrived on the scene. 
In East Africa, there are nations which have the triple yokes of 
being colonized by Arabs, Germans, and later, the British; though
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Tour o f arts and crafts curated by the Arts & Design Dept.
The DG NT/NTN, P ro f Ahm ed Yerima in a chat w ith a dignitary
a t the event.
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the two subsequent colonialisms can be conflated into one. But 
if we look closely, there are subtleties of psychological trauma 
and erosion of confidence that have taken place under such a 
tripartite heritage. Such subtleties are visible when certain aspects 
of culture are mutually compared. Whilst it might be intensely 
political to say it, the extra degree of intrusion visible in, say 
Tanzania, and to a lesser extent Kenya, is responsible for the 
reason that many of the nationalities in the region have lost their 
original ideas of the form and patterns of their national costumes; 
indigenous designs of fashion and forms of regalia. What they 
are left with is either residually Arab or entirely European.
The last point I shall like to discuss under this sub-heading is the 
extent to which the new constructivist tendencies impact upon 
the individual psyche, especially where formative years are 
concerned. It would seem that where identity codes are myriad 
and in fierce competition, the result might be less than salubrious 
on personality form ation in a growing adolescent who is 
swamped with a montage of 'changing scenes' at every turn. 
This may, in turn, lead to multiple identity formations in the 
individual and the consequences of this on the larger society is 
predictable, especially where choices have to be made. An 
identical situation may also occur as a symptom in the adult who 
suddenly discovers that a radical reversal has occurred in his / 
her circu m stances and fundam ental changes need be 
accomplished. A classic case study is the one David Laitin gives 
of a certain Mrs. Liuba Grigor'ev who lives on the border of 
Estonia with Russia. When the Soviet Union crumbled and 
Estonia became a sovereign country, Russian, the erstwhile 
official language became a dud tender in Estonia. Her children 
speak Estonian and are now 'citizens of the new nation whilst 
she who speaks only Russian has to learn a new language or risk 
the loss of her citizenship. The consequences would be to live
26
apart from her family. In such a political anomie, a choice has to 
be made for and within the individual. This is how Laitin puts 
it:
Multiple identities, however, can coexist within a person 
only insofar as choice is not necessary. Yet when the actions 
or behaviours consistent with one identity conflict with 
those o f another identity held by the same person, as they 
do when two identities represent antagonistic groups on 
the political stage, people are compelled to give priority to 
one identity over the other.xxxii
IV. IDENTITY AND THE RECONSTRUCTION 
OF MEMORY.
Whenever the roll call of identity is taken, it is always convenient 
to exhume a certain 'memory', which brings to life a relationship, 
or bond irrespective of its diversity difference. It then means that 
there is no construction of identity or identity-shift without some 
kind of recourse to memory, to a notion of community and to 
whatever we relate or hold dear. In other words, there is a form 
of re-membering;xxxiii re-construction; a mnemonic recall. The 
indices may be race, ethnicity or religion. Inter-connectedness is 
always thought out as a force, almost as a linguistic rallying point; 
a language spoken; a signifier understood and responded to. It 
becomes a manifested interior irrespective of any evanescent 
outwards. This kind of dialogic relationship between events and 
memory may appear somewhat, as a component of orality. A 
minor point from Walter Ong comes to mind here:
Because in its physical construction as sound, the spoken 
word proceeds from  the human interior and manifests 
human beings to one another as conscious interiors, as 
persons, the spoken word forms human beings into close-
21
knit groups. Wl\en a speaker is addressing an audience, the 
members o f the audience normally become a unity, with 
themselves and with the speaker... The interiorizingforce 
o f the oral word relates in a special way to the sacral, to the 
ultimate concerns o f existence.™™
This identifies language, and beyond it, deep mnemonic 
communication as a factor of identity which moves human beings 
to choice and, of course, ultimately to action.
In meta-narratives fiction, an African writer who has exploited 
this means to the fullest is Ayi Kwei Armah in the historical novel, 
Two Thousand Seasons.™™’ Emptied of its anger and outrage, the 
mythology constructed as narrative in the novel points to newer, 
stylistic dimensions of the resources of memory as a rallying point 
of identity construction or shift. A certain mythic journey is 
employed as a trope to invoke memory or remembering as a new 
way of life. The novel itself appears like one long interior 
monologue manipulated by an omniscient narrator for colour 
and tonal inflection as occasion demands. In this respect, the style 
and the dimensions are oral, performative and epical. Almost as 
in a dream, characters are forced to invoke, through memory, a 
history that helps them to make a conscious choice. Each decision 
is a point in a journey. It is thus a mythic as well as an existential 
parable to:
...renew the battered sense ofivho we are, who we intend 
to be, that we needed time to throw out the portions that 
welcomed rottenness into our people's soul, time to grow 
new parts to replace the lost.xxxvi
In the same way that Ong remarks orality and memory, Armah 
relates memory to the sacral, describing them in prophetic terms. 
The mediums of communication he characteristically calls utterers
28
and rememberers who merely seek to communicate with the world 
and remain consistent.
In the light of the three models of identity construction and shift 
we have thus discussed, it would appear that there is no 
watertight identity formation pattern without the aggregation 
of a number of underlying political and survival-potential factors 
where choice is the motivation for identification. We must 
remember that there are varities of choices; for the lack of an 
obvious choice is itself a form of choice especially as other forms 
of choice are covert rather than overt. We may therefore begin to 
reconstruct identity paradigms within an era of industrialization 
and trans-nationalism.
CONCLUSION:
RESOURCE CONTROL AND CITIZENSHIP.
I cannot conclude this kind of lecture without casting asides on 
forms of sub-cultural identities that have emerged in the late 
20th century as a corollary of economic regimes in post-colonial 
states and emergent nation states of Africa. This identity index 
is tied to landmass as an identity index or as a marker of the 
identity complex of persons and groups. It is true that in pre­
colonial societies, land and littoral masses were owned jointly 
by clans, families and lineages. But the growth of the materialist 
ethic and colonialism had emphasized the concept of ownership 
as individualist rather than corporate. It also became clear that 
the sanctity of life degenerated with intense materialism and the 
need for conquests. It would appear that intense primordial 
instincts could only appear as a stabilizing factor for the 
individual when in actual fact it weakened the post-colonial 
concept of the civic public. The colonial authorities, in drawing
29
national boundaries, often fragmented identities and confounded 
the balance of self-confidence in their imposition of instruments 
of governance. For instance national boundaries often divided 
kith and kin and left some as Anglophone whilst others became 
Francophone. This does not detract from the fact that groups of 
different nationalities still spoke the same mother tongue but 
their civic rights underwent paradigm shifts. The inherited 
m ethods of ad judication also had greater preference for 
retribution rather than indigenous arbitration which emphasizes 
reconciliation. Hence it was obvious after the turbulence of first 
republic post independence Nigeria and the ensuing civil war 
that a new vocabulary crept into the primordial register of 
Nigerian monarchs; the suffix, land. A sure example is the 
rulership of the Nigerian metropolis I know better than others -  
Ibadan. The monarch of Ibadan erstwhile addressed as His Royal 
Highness, the Olubadan of Ibadan suddenly became known as 
the Olubadan of Ibadan(land). I can vouchsafe the information 
without the least fear of contradiction that the new identity of 
all the Royal Fathers in that domain thenceforth reflected the 
suffix, land in their titles. It has since become something of a 
national phenomenon.
But the point I seek to reinforce is that there would seem to be a 
'return to source'. There emerged an unusual association with 
land, marshy ground, the creeks, the mangrove swamps and even 
the water once a collectively derived or group identity is 
threatened or destabilized. I shall like to observe that right at the 
very roots of our fratricidal civil war was a deep identity crisis, 
and the after-effect lingers to this very day.
For the purpose of illustration in cultural production and 
productivity, I shall like to cite, without in-depth textual analysis, 
the manner in which this renewed understanding of the land
30
and the earth as permanent indices of identity invention has 
permeated the consciousness of Nigerians, in particular, and 
Africans, in general. The two dramas I shall offer are Ebrahim 
Hussein's At the Edge ofThim (1995)xxxvii and Ahmed Yerima's Hard 
Ground[2006]xxxviii Hussein's play reveals what the enthralling 
web and the extremes of primordial loyalties could do. This is 
what I had, myself remarked of it elsewhere:
The play presents a rather entrapping fagade. The play is 
deceptively simple, but it encapsulates deep ecological 
structures o f the mind, o f  clan loyalty and broad social and 
ethical relationships. The 'Thim' in the title, the author 
informs us, is a Dholuo word meaning bush or virgin land; 
a no man's land; a free space. So it is the sharp edge o f  this 
arena for  the clash o f  primordial forces that Hussein's play 
probes.xxxix
The play, though written by a Tanzanian exhumes memories of 
what had been a celebrated event of yesteryears in the life of 
Kenyan elite. The question is this: which is the home of a man or 
woman, is it the place of his/her birth or the place of his/her 
livelihood where[s]he resides and works? I can complicate the 
advocacy by asking whether it is possible to find out when each 
of our ancestors arrived where they presently reside. If it is 
impossible to do so, can a Nigerian citizen take on a multiple 
identity like the case of the Russian woman David Laitin cited?
There is an even more interesting twist in the matter because in 
the play, a court of law ruled that in accordance with the wish of 
the immediate family at the death of Herbert, a hero of the play, 
his body could be buried in the city where he had lived, worked 
and died. But when the news got to his village, an old man 
dismissed the court ruling as such:
31
The High table congratulates the Honoured Lecturer 
after his lecture.
Questions, answers and contributions are key to the overall 
im pact o f  the Lecture
32
The Hon. Minister, Chairman o f  event and  others a t the buffet to
end th evening.
The Director, NCAC, Mr. M. M. M aidugu conducts other guests a t
the event buffet.
33
Ruled! Ruled! Ruled on what?
Where did they dig up that law? Very stupid. Stupid!
From where did they dig it up? (Stamps his foot)
You see this: this is our land. Our property since the days ofRouth. 
We got this land. It is our land.
We have redeemed it by Blood and glorified it with our culture. 
Herbert will be buried here, (he stamps his foot), [pp. 20-21 ].
The notion of identity in a modernizing state like Nigeria is a 
vexed one. For instance, how long could one live in a state to 
become a citizen of the place? Even if the indigenes trusts and 
likes my face, does the Constitution guarantee it? Does the 
constitution have concrete plans on the resettlement and the 
rehabilitation of the displaced citizens of the Bakassi peninsular? 
How long might they have to remain in the local government 
areas of their choice to become citizens of the place?
Yerima's Hard Ground is a story of the contradictions in the Niger 
Delta of Nigeria on the equally vexed question of resource control. 
Beneath the marshlands and the creeks, the protagonists of a 
bloody primordial battle feel that there is some measure of hard 
ground beneath them. But the truth is that the characters only hit 
that ground when they fall from the violence of what turns out to 
be a fratricidal war of attrition. The irony of circumstance which 
the play dramatizes is that the true identity of a citizen in the 
battle for resource control can only be revealed in his death. The 
hard lesson of that art can, therefore, be summed up in the 
message that the real basis of identity is the same basis of brutal 
and unscrupulous exploitation which almost always leads to 
violence and death. It thus means that Nigeria's civil war persists 
in the guise of resource control. Culture purveys identity and the 
latter reinforces and validates culture. Where there is the slightest 
disconnect between them, there always will be the absence for 
that spirit of citizenship which constitutes the basis of nationhood.
34
' Frantz Fanon, The Wretched o f the Earth (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1967)
" Kwame Gyekye, Tradition and Modernity: Philosophical Reflections on the African 
Experience (New York: Oxford UP 1997). Chapter 3 is particularly relevant.
uiA. C. Kroeber and C. Klcukohn, Culture: A Critical Review o f Concepts and Definition 
(New York: Vintage Books, 1963).
ivSouleymane B. Diagne and Henri Ossebi, The Cultural Question in Africa: Issues, 
Politics and Research Prospects (Dakar: CODESRIA Working Paper 3/96) p. 7.
v Jacques Maquet, Africanity: The Cultural Unity o f Black Africa, trans. ]oan R. Rayfield 
(New York: Oxford UP, 1975).
"Ibid., pp. 8 - 9 .
™ This classification does not claim to be exhaustive since experiences change over 
time, place and epoch.
vU Lionel Trilling, Sincerely and Authenticity (New York: Norton, 1969).
viii Charles Taylor, "The Politics of Recognition", in Amy Gutman (ed), Multi-
Culturalism: Examining the politics o f Recognition (Princeton: Princeton UP, 1994) pp. 
25 -  73.
ixErik H. Erikson, Identity and the Life Cycle (New York: Norton, 1980).
x Trilling, op. cit.
xi Karl Hausser, "Identity -  Some Suggestions for Sharpening the Outlines of the 
Concept in Psychological Perspective" in Approaches to African Identity ed. Eckard 
Breitinger and Reinhard Sander, Bayreuth African Studies series 4,1986, pp 21 -  34.
xiiCheikh Hamidou Kane, Ambiguous Adventure (London: Heinemann, 1963, 1972).
Basil Davidson, The Black Man's Burden: Africa and the Curse o f the Nation-State 
(New York: Random House, 1992).
xiv Gyekye, op. cit.
xv Peter P. Ekeh, "Colonialism and the Two Publics in Africa: A Theoritical Statement"
in Contemporary Studies in Society and History, vol. 17: 91 -  112,1975.
xvlIbid, pp. 106 -  7 
xvi'Ibid, p. 107
xviU Compare Davidson, op. cit. pp. 197 -  242.
xix I owe this point first to Olufemi Taiwo of Philosophy Department, Loyola
University of Chicago.
35
xxVremudia Diejomaoh and Wambui wa Karanja, "Identity and Socio-Economic 
Change in Nigeria: An Overview" in Approaches to African Identity ed. Eckard 
Breitinger and Reinhard Sander, Bayreuth African Studies 4: 51 -  74, 1986.
XX1 Mabogo R More, "Outlawing Racism in Philosophy: On Racism and Philosophy" 
in The African Philosophy Reader, ed. P. H. Coetzee and A. P. J. Roux (London and 
New York: Routledge, 1998) pp. 364 -  73.
xxUJ.H. Abraham, Technology, Politics and Value, Inaugural Lecture Series, University 
of Ghana, Legon (Accra: Ghana UP.), p. 8.
xxiiiErik H. Erikson, Identity and the Life Cycle (New York: Norton, 1980), p. 21. 
xxiv Ibid, p. 109.
xxvKwame Anthony Appiah, "Identity, Authenticity, Survival: Multicultural Societies 
and Social Reproduction" in Amy Gutman ed., Multiculturalism: Examining the 
Politics o f Recognition (Princeton: Princeton UP, 1994), pp. 149 -  163.
xxvi Erikson, ibid., p. 109.
“ "'David Laitin, "A Theory of Political Identities" in Identity in Formation: The Russian 
Speaking Population in the Near Abroad (Ithaca and London: Cornell UP, 1998).
xxviii Wole Soyinka, The Open Sore o f a Continent: A Personal Narrative o f the Nigerian 
Crisis (New York: Oxford UP, 1996).
xxix Soyinka, 1996, ibid., Laitin, 1998, op. cit.
xxx Laitin, 1998, p. 11. 
xxx'Laitin, ibid., p. 23.
xxxii yhis classic stylistic connotation is originally from Ayi Kwei Armah.
xxxili Walter Ong, Orality and Literacy: The Technologising oftheWord (London and New 
York: Methuen, 1982), p. 74.
xxxiv Ayi Kwei Armah, Two Thousand Seasons (Dar Es Salaam: East African Publishing 
House, 1973).
xxxv Ibid, p. 90.
xxxvl Ebrahim Hussein, At the Edge o f  Thim, trans Kimani Njogu (Nairobi: Kenyatta 
University Press, 1995).
xxxvii Ahmed Yerima, Hard Ground (Ibadan: Kraft Books, 2006).
xxxviii p)e]e Layiwola, "African Drama and the Dilemma of Identities", Iba: Essays on 
African Literature in Honour ofOyin Ogunba, Ile-Ife: Obafemi Awolowo UP, pp. 109 -121.
36
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State. New York: Random House.
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Change in Nigeria: An Overview" in Approaches to African Identity ed. Eckard 
Breitinger and Reinhard Sander. Bayreuth: African Studies 4: 51 -  74.
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Statement" in Contemporary Studies in Society & History vol. 17: pp. 91 -  112.
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Harmondsworth: Penguin.
Gutman, Amy (ed.) (1994). "Introduction". Multiculturalism: Examining the Politics 
o f Recognition. Op. cit. pp. 3 -  24.
Gyekye, Kwame (1997). Tradition and Modernity: Philosophical Reflections on the African 
Experience. New York: Oxford UP. In particular, Ch. 3.
Hausser, Karl (1986). "Identity -  Some Suggestions for Sharpening the Outlines of 
the Concept in Psychological Perspective" in Approaches to African Identity ed. 
Souleymane Bachir Diagne. Bayreuth: African Studies Series 4: pp 21 -  34.
Hussein, Ebrahim (1988, 1995). At the Edge o f  TTn'm(ms). Trans. Kimani Njogu. 
Nairobi: Kenyatta UP.
37
Kroeber, A.C. and C. Kluckohn (1963). Culture: A Critical Review o f Concepts and 
Definitions. New York: Vintage Books.
Kane, Cheikh Hamidou (1963), 1972). Ambiguous Adventure. London: Heinemann.
Laitin, David (1998). "A Theory of Political Identities" in Identity in Formation: The 
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on African Literature in Honour o f  Oyin Ogunba. Ed Wole Ogundele and G. 
Adeoti. Ile-Ife: Obafemi Awolowo UP. Pp 109 -  121. (110)
Maquet, Jaques (1975). Africanity: The Cultural Unity o f Black Africa. Trans. Joan R. 
Rayfield. New York: Oxford UP.
Millet, Kate (1970). Sexual Politics. Garden City, New York: Doubleday.
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Philosophy" in The African Philosophy Reader ed. P.H. Coetzee and A.P.J. Roux. 
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Taylor, Charles (1994). "The Politics of Recognition" in Amy Gutman (ed.). 
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38
NCAC HONOURS LECTURE SERIES
1. SERIE 1 Culture and State-Craft: The Role of Culture in 
Nigerian Society and Polity.
V. C. Uchendu, December 2000
2. SERIES 2 Refurbishing the Expression of Community in the 
Nigerian Nation: The Role of Culture.
Christopher Olusola Kolade, con, December. 2002
3. SERIES 3 Culture and Intellectual Development: The Case of A 
Nigerian Child.
A’isha Madawaki Isah, mfr, December 2003
4. SERIES 4 The Coming is Good: The Future in Nigerian 
Discourse.
E. J. Alagoa, December 2005
5. SERIES 5 The Nigerian Project: The Mediation Role of Education 
and Culture.
Adamu Baike, con, December 2006
This lecture; Culture, National Identity and Globalisation: The 
Nigerian Context, laments the absence of national cohesion 
/identity which has given way to ethnic, professional/guild 
solidarity, identity and loyalty. This, the Honoured Lecturer 
argues, is a fallout of failed leadership and lack of consciousness 
to establish a rallying point that could serve as a uniting factor 
in building a strong nation. He also alluded to a shift in 
paradigm resulting from cultural dynamism that has aided the 
erosion of physical boundaries in favour of group, race and 
occupational loyalties.
The lecturer categorizes the different forms of identity to 
include, individual, group/ethnic and pro-modernist identities to 
further drive down the different factors driving modem day 
identity factors, and calls for strong leadership, democratization 
of the political process, fairness, equity and justice as bases to 
build a strong National consciousness/identity especially in the 
wake of the challenge of globalisation that is fast eroding 
primordial boundaries and loyalties.
THE HONOURED LECTURER
Professor Oladele Olatunde Layiwola is a scholar of 
international repute, who is engrossed in cultural researches in 
African and classical theatre forms and contemporary drama and 
theatre theories, in addition to a couple of other ongoing works. 
To date, Prof. Layiwola has fifteen books and book chapters to 
his credit. He has over thirty seven articles in learned journals 
and six more that have already been accepted for publication.
Professor Layiwola has invested his life in promoting ideas that 
enshrine hard work, versatility and a sense of patriotism.
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