Yabbing and Wording

Description

Yabbing and Wording: The artistry of Nigerian stand-up comedy is a long-overdue academic interrogation of the novel stand-up practice in Nigeria as performance. 'Yabbing' comes from the Nigerian Pidgin English verb, 'yab', which means a satirical jibe thrown at individuals, groups or institutions. Nigeria's Fela Anikulapo-Kuti used this effectively in his recorded and live music performances against successive military regimes. 'Wording' derives from the English term 'word' and refers to a game in which parties exchange insults. It is a modern-day coinage for traditional forms of joking that existed across Nigeria and elsewhere in precolonial times. In this book, Nwankw? identifies 'yabbing' and 'wording' as outstanding indigenous elements within contemporary stand-up practice in Nigeria. On the one hand, these local joking patterns inform how comedians fashion their narratives. On the other, they mitigate offence and how the audience responds to ridicule in joke performance venues. The book's strength is its academic perspective and the inclusion of as many examples of stand-up and comedians as possible, to give a panoramic view of the practice. It also traces the historical path of the development of professional stand-up comedy in Nigeria. Its closing chapters detail the global outreach of Nigerian stand-up while also anticipating its future developments.

Foreword

Preamble

Chapter 1: Origins and influences

Chapter 2: People and personae

Chapter 3: Techniques and devices

Chapter 4: Offence, taboos and themes

Chapter 5: Language and accent

Chapter 6: Audiences, venues and events

Chapter 7: Diaspora performances

Chapter 8: Eyes on the future

Bibliography

Index

Sujets

• African Studies
• Ethnic Studies
• Social Science
• Sociologie, société et politique
• Comedy
• Cultural studies
• Social sciences
• Performing arts
• History of Africa

Informations

• Publié par: NISC (Pty) Ltd
• Date de parution: 31 décembre 2022
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781920033866
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 5 Mo

Extrait

Dedication
To dad and mom, for all the love!About the Series
Te African Humanities Series covers topics in African histories, languages,
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Series editors: Adigun Agbaje & Fred HendricksAfrican Humanities Series Editorial Board members as at December 2021
Africies Series editors:
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Professor Emeritus Fred Hendricks, Rhodes University, South Africa
Consultant:
Professor Emeritus Sandra Barnes, University of Pennsylvania, USA (Anthropology)
Board Members:
1 Professor Kof Anyidoho, University of Ghana, Ghana (African Studies &
Literature) (Director, Codesria African Humanities Institute Program)
2 Professor Ibrahim Bello-Kano, Bayero University, Nigeria (Dept of English
and French Studies)
3 Associate Professor Wilfred Lajul, College of Humanities & Social Sciences,
Makerere University, Uganda (Dept of Philosophy)
4 Professor Bertram Mapunda, Principal, Jordan University College, Tanzania
5 Professor Innocent Pikirayi, University of Pretoria, South Africa (Chair &
Head, Dept of Anthropology & Archaeology)
6 Professor Josephat Rugemalira, University of Dar-es-Salaam, Tanzania (Dept
of Foreign Languages & Linguistics)
7 Professor Idayat Bola Udegbe, University of Ibadan, Nigeria (Dept of
Psychology)
8 Professor Sati Fwatshak, University of Jos, Nigeria (Dept of History &
International Studies)
9 Prof Sr Dominica Dipio, Dept Literature, School of languages, Literature
& Communication, College of Humanities & Social Sciences, Makerere
University, Uganda
10 Dr Benge Okot, Dept History, Archaeology & Organisational Studies, School
of Liberal & Performing Arts, College of Humanities & Social Sciences,
Makerere University, Uganda
11 Associate Prof Bernard Matolino, Philosophy, University of KwaZulu-Natal,
South Africa
12 Associate Prof Nicky Falkof, Media Studies, University of the Witwatersrand,
South AfricaPublished in the African Humanities Series
Dominica Dipio, Gender terrains in African cinema, 2014
Ayo Adeduntan, What the forest told me: Yoruba hunter, culture and narrative
performance, 2014
Sule E. Egya, Nation, power and dissidence in third-generation Nigerian poetry in
English, 2014
Irikidzayi Manase, White narratives: Te depiction of post-2000 land invasions in
Zimbabwe, 2016
Pascah Mungwini, Indigenous Shona Philosophy: Reconstructive insights, 2017
Sylvia Bruinders, Parading Respectability: Te Cultural and Moral Aesthetics of the
Christmas Bands Movement in the Western Cape, South Africa, 2017
Michael Andindilile, Te Anglophone literary-linguistic continuum: English and
indigenous languages in African literary discourse, 2018
Jeremiah Arowosegbe, Claude E Ake: Te making of an organic intellectual, 2018
Romanus Aboh, Language and the construction of multiple identities in the Nigerian
novel, 2018
Bernard Matolino, Consensus as Democracy in Africa, 2018
Babajide Ololajulo, Unshared Identity: Posthumous paternity in a contemporary Yoruba
community, 2018
De-Valera NYM Botchway, Boxing is no cakewalk! Azumah ‘Ring Professor’ Nelson in
the social history of Ghanaian boxing, 2019
Dina Ligaga, Women, visibility and morality in Kenyan popular media, 2020.
Okaka Opio Dokotum, Hollywood and Africa: Recycling the ‘Dark Continent’ Myth,
1908–2020, 2020
Molefe Motsamai, African Personhood and Applied Ethics, 2020
Kwesi Yankah, Beyond the political spider – Critical issues in African Humanities, 2021YABBING AND WORDING
The artistry of Nigerian
stand-up comedy
IZUU NWANKW ỌPublished in South Africa on behalf of the African Humanities Association
by NISC (Pty) Ltd, PO Box 377, Makhanda, 6140, South Africa
www.nisc.co.za
First edition, frst impression 2021
Publication © African Humanities Association 2021
T ext © Izuu Nwankwọ 2021
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted
in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying,
recording, or any information storage or retrieval system , without prior permission in
writing from the publisher .
ISBN: 978-1-920033-85-9 (softcover)978-1-920033-86-6 (PDF)
ISBN: 978-1-920033-87-3 (ePub)
Project manager: Peter Lague
Indexer: Sanet le Roux
Cover design: Advanced Design Group
Cover photograph: © Fer Gregory/Shutterstock
Te author and the publisher have made every efort to obtain permission for and
acknowledge the use of copyright material. Should an inadvertent infringement of
copyright have occurred, please contact the publisher and we will rectify omissions or
errors in any subsequent reprint or edition.Contents
Acknowledgements viii
Forewordix
List of fguresxiii
Preamble1
ChaPter1Origins and infuences 8
ChaPter 2 People and personae29
ChaPter 3 Techniques and devices45
ChaPter 4 Ofence, taboos and themes68
ChaPter 5 Language and accent 87
ChaPter 6 Audiences, venues and events107
ChaPter 7 Diaspora performances129
ChaPter 8 Eyes on the future 149
bibliograPhy 158
index 191
viiAcknowledgements
I am grateful to God for the opportunity to have this work fnally in print. Without
the inspiration and direction You give, I would be nowhere near where I am today.
Tank You! Much love to Nenye and our boys, Daniel and Dubem. Te way you
climb my back and your mom encouraging you with smiles is all the inspiration and
motivation I need. You guys rock! A signifcant portion of my appreciation goes to the
American Council for Learned Societies (ACLS), which has supported my research
variously through its African Humanities Program (AHP). Tis publication’s success
is attributable to its unwavering support for humanities research in Africa. Trough
the AHP network, I have come to know great scholars who have, in no small measure,
positively impacted my career. Special thanks to Ibukun Filani for his wealth of
knowledge and commitment to the study of stand-up in Nigeria. I am also grateful
to the Stellenbosch Institute for Advanced Studies (STIAS), the Alexander von
Humboldt Foundation, and the Department of Anthropology and African Studies,
Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz, for the several opportunities provided for
researching, commencing and completing this book. Special thanks to my Alexander
von Humboldt postdoctoral fellowship host, Professor Dr. Matthias Krings, for his
trust, support, suggestions, and timely interventions. Tere are also individuals that
I owe special thanks to, for this work – Rowland Amaefula for reading the frst
draft and making impactful suggestions, and Daria Tunca, Ifeyinwa Okolo, Laura S.
Martin for their characteristic encouragement and nudgings.
viiiForeword
Today, Nollywood flms and Afrobeats music are the two genres of popular culture
for which Nigeria is best known beyond its borders, across the African continent
and globally. Equally prolifc, yet somewhat less known outside Nigeria, is a third
genre: stand-up comedy. Like the other two, it originated during the 1990s, took of
during the 2000s and has matured over the past decade. From its humble beginnings
on radio and television and its evolution into multimedia variety live shows, staged
not only in Nigeria but also in the diaspora, stand-up comedy has developed into
Nigeria’s third genre of popular culture to be reckoned with internationally.
Whereas the genre’s name hints at inspirations taken from US models and
elsewhere abroad, its very essence is uniquely Nigerian. It is rooted in the experience of
the Nigerian everyday whose multiple challenges aford patience, witty workarounds
and a personal approach that rather laughs about the inevitable than risk being
dragged down by it. A wonderful expression of this attitude is to be found in the
funny and often ironic ‘translations’ of acronyms almost every Nigerian is familiar
with; during the 1980s, when the National Electric Power Authority (NEPA) failed
to deliver a constant fow of electricity, its acronym thus came to stand for ‘never
expect power always’; also immortalised by a Tony Allen album of the same title in
1984. Creating their jokes mostly from the vantage point of the ordinary people, it is
only consequential for comedians to perform in Nigerian Pidgin English, the lingua
franca of the postcolonial Nigerian urban experience. In this sense, Fela Anikulapo
Kuti, who decidedly craf