Hauwa Ali

Hauwa Alipronunciationⓘ (died 1995) was a Nigerian writer known for her novels exploring the lives of Muslim women and raising questions about Islamic values and women's independence.[1] Her best-known novel, Destiny, won the Delta prize for fiction.[2]

Life

She was born in Gusau in northern Nigeria.[2] She taught at the University of Maiduguri[3] and her novels were published in late 1980s. In 1995 she died of breast cancer.[3]

Writing

Her fiction is written from the point of view of a young unmarried woman, and presents education as "the gateway to a successful, stimulating future".[4]

The central character of her first novel Destiny (Enugu, 1988) is 16-year-old Farida. The story sets up tensions between, on one hand, education, employment, independence and a husband of Farida's choice and, on the other, a husband who persuades her relatives he offers financial security, but tries to coerce her to be subservient and agree to all his choices.[citation needed] Her second novel, Victory (Enugu, 1989), continues some of these themes and also introduces questions about inter-cultural marriage.[3]

One critic makes connections between Farida's problems and Islam, suggesting she shows "submissive acceptance of fate".[5] Another argues against this and emphasizes her "unwillingness to be discouraged" and her commitment to prayer, seeing her faith as a positive strength.[2] Destiny has been said to belong to a "tradition of Islamic resurgence, while managing to interrogate the consequence of its rigid application".[3] Ali has been described as one of the women writers in 1990s northern Nigeria "giving voice to [their] creative talents " within "walls of religion and culture". [6]

Destiny won the Delta prize for fiction.[2]

References

  1. ^ Ezenwa-Ohaeto. "Shaking the Veil: Islam, Gender and Feminist Configurations in the Nigeraian Novels of Hauwa Ali and Zaynab Alkali". Ufahamu: A Journal of African Studies. 24 (2–3): 121–138 – via eScholarship, University of California.
  2. ^ a b c d Shirin Edwin, "'Working' and 'Studying' Muslim Women: African Feminist Theory and the African Novel", Women's Studies, An inter-disciplinary journal , Volume 37, Issue 5, 2008.
  3. ^ a b c d Ezenwa-Ohaeto, "Shaking the Veil: Islam, Gender and Feminist Configurations in the Nigerian Novels of Hauwa Ali and Zaynab Alkali", Ufahamu: A Journal of African Studies, 24(2–3) 1996.
  4. ^ Stephanie Newell (2006). West African Literatures: Ways of Reading. Oxford University Press. p. 141. ISBN 978-0-19-929887-7.
  5. ^ Margaret Hauwa Kassam, quoted in Edwin (2008), "'Working' and 'Studying' Muslim Women".
  6. ^ Margaret Hauwa Kassam, "Some Aspects of Women's Voices from Northern Nigeria", African Languages and Cultures, Vol. 9, No. 2, Gender and Popular Culture (1996), pp. 111–125.