Speaker: ResearchGate

Abstract: »Sexual violence, especially against the female gender, is a recurring scourge in the Nigerian society. Usually, against the culture of silence which hitherto obtained, there seems to be a current trend – victims of this scourge seem to be gaining enormous confidence to speak up against their assailants, the social status of the victim and assailant notwithstanding. The Yoruba segment of Nollywood has begun to centre narratives of rape culture in the thematic exploration of their movies, and online news and social platforms post updates about this scourge, giving readers the leeway to deliberate on the post.
Sexual violence, especially against the female gender, is a recurring scourge in the Nigerian society. Usually, against the culture of silence which hitherto obtained, there seems to be a current trend – victims of this scourge seem to be gaining enormous confidence to speak up against their assailants, the social status of the victim and assailant notwithstanding. The Yoruba segment of Nollywood has begun to centre narratives of rape culture in the thematic exploration of their movies, and online news and social platforms post updates about this scourge, giving readers the leeway to deliberate on the post and textual analysis of the framing and representation of rape culture and rape and revenge in two Yoruba Nollywood movies: Aibikita and Right Time, and online discourse on rape culture and rape and revenge. This is particularly symbolic given recent actual scandals recorded in the Nigerian movie industry involving two Nigerian celebrities: Princess Damilola Adekoya (a Nigerian Comedienne who alleged that her male colleague, Olayinka Omidiran, also known as Baba Ijesha, molested her daughter) and Timi Dakolo (a Nigerian musician who together with his wife, sued a popular Nigerian pastor for raping Timi Dakolo’s wife when she was a teenager).
This study would analyse online discourse on the two cases. Using Entman’s Speculation of Framing, the study seeks to investigate the nature of narrative about rape in these two Nigerian media forms with a view to providing succinct details of the nature of Nigerian societal perception about rape culture and rape and revenge. By drawing the data from both Nigerian movie industry and online discourse, this study attempts to foreground the spaces by comparing how both forms negotiate an understanding of the visual and discursive continuities between Nigerian movie industry and Nigerian online spaces on narratives about rape culture and rape and revenge, especially in the light of the complex relationship between these phenomena.
The study provides a form of distinctive narrative about the extent to which rape and revenge provide emotional and physical closures for victims of sexual crimes, thereby reconfiguring notions of victimhood, guilt and culpability of all actors.« (Source: Online Program)

Publication: Ugah, Helen U. »Reconfiguring Victimhood: Rape Culture and Rape-Revenge in Nollywood Movies.« Rape and Revenge: Rache-Kulturen und sexualisierte Gewalt in intermedialer Perspektive. Edited by Christine Künzel et al. Göttingen 2024: 173-191. - Bibliographic Entry: Info

Wikipedia: History of Africa: History of Nigeria | Film: Nollywood | Film: Films about rape / Rape and revenge | Law: Arbitrariness / Revenge | Sex and the law: Rape / Rape in Nigeria, Rape culture