Towards an African feminist framework for students' welfare in Nigerian Higher Education

This proposed project builds on my PhD research study titled 'In Our Own Voices: A Critical Participatory Study of the Wellbeing of Female Undergraduate Students in Nigeria' (Nwako, 2020). Women students are disadvantaged and marginalised in African universities as they face a myriad of problems that threaten their physical health, emotional safety and academic progress. However, the wellbeing of women students in Nigerian educational institutions has received little research attention, the issues are neither given much policy consideration nor opportunities for improvement in practice. Thus, the study aimed to critically explore the ways in which the wellbeing and capabilities of female undergraduate students are conceptualised and understood in Nigeria, a country in West Africa, through a postcolonial feminist lens.

The privileging of the voice and agency of women participants, as well as an interrogation of the coloniality of university structures, was intrinsic to the research design used within the research context. The study engaged with and advanced African feminist sociological literature and employed a critical participatory methodology involving innovative methods of data collection and analysis (see Summary of completed thesis in the Case for Support).

The PhD research found that wellbeing is an inadequate concept tied to western policy discourses in education that does not reflect the realities of the Nigerian higher education context. The research introduced and developed a concept of welfare which not only was more commonly used and understood by African women in universities, but better reflected their negotiations of multiple dimensions of contextual experiences. This re-conceptualisation signified the importance of understanding and representing the experiences and motivations of women with respect to the material conditions of higher education. Thus, a new conceptual map, leading to a framework for rethinking welfare through an African feminist lens, was established through the research.

Significantly, my research equal importance on supporting women students develop their understandings and responses to welfare at an individual level as well as in relation with other women. This interaction between the individual and the collective underpins the participatory nature of my research and lends itself to the idea of collaboration and co-production of resources through the potential fellowship project.

The centring of women's voices and experiences within the study challenged a number of policy assumptions and priorities within Nigerian higher education. The project contributes important insights into ongoing policy debates on how to mitigate gender-based violence in higher education institutions. These questions will be taken up specifically through the engagement work designed for the postdoctoral fellowship.

This ESRC postdoctoral fellowship project will consolidate my career as an education researcher and critical academic commentator on African feminist scholarship. I will be able to work closely with Professor Arathi Sriprakash, a highly respected mentor who is experienced in gender and epistemic justice, as well as postcolonial and decolonial perspectives in comparative and international education.

In addition, I will implement a multi-targeted approach to communicate the above-mentioned findings, implications and recommendations from my PhD study. This approach will have academic and individual impact through:
- International peer-reviewed journal publications and grant development.
- Planned webinars to share policy-based research findings with education stakeholders and to support the development of institutional policies and procedures.
- Communication of research to a lay target audience through accessible, engaging and creative outputs.
- Facilitation of knowledge exchange between African female students to establish empowering national and international networks.