Senior Wednesday - The Military Decades in Africa: War and Gender in Twentieth Century Nigeria
Wednesday, July 2, 2025 | 1:30 PM – 2:30 PM
Tickets: $4 +tax, FREE for Museum Members
Join us every first Wednesday at 1:30 PM for Senior Wednesday at the Museum of World Treasures!
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Tune in live or watch the recording afterwards.
Event Details
- Date: Wednesday, June 2
- Time: 1:30 PM
- Location: Museum of World Treasures [Get Directions]
Cost
- Museum Members: Free
- Non-Members: $4 per person plus tax
Attending Information
- Open to all ages
- No need to register; simply walk in!
- Light refreshments provided.
Talk Summary
The Nigerian Civil War marked the beginning of the contemporary confrontation between the Nigerian government and the pro-Biafran activists whose activities have been found to paralyze economic, political and social engagements in southeastern Nigeria. The civil war was fought between Biafran and Nigerian soldiers, and the war’s event led to the demise of many people in the Biafran heartland, especially women and children. This talk explores how women in the Biafran heartland responded to these developments. Particularly, it focuses on women’s attempt to escape wartime starvation by devising new survival measures and the implications of those measures aimed towards rendering the Nigerian government’s war strategies ineffective. In this talk, I suggest that the women’s broad support to Biafra qualified them as enemies of Nigeria, hence, the attacks by the Nigerian soldiers.
Speaker Bio - Taiwo Bello
Taiwo Bello is an Assistant Professor of African History at Oklahoma State University. He is a specialist in gender and Women's history, War and Society, violence and conflict studies, Black and diaspora studies, and global and transnational history. Dr. Bello has published widely on the above themes in specialist, multidisciplinary, and area studies journals including War and Society, The International History Review, the Journal of World History, Gender & History, Africa Today, Journal of Globalization Studies, and Canadian Journal of African Studies. His latest article appeared in War in History (Fall 2024), and he has another one which is forthcoming in The Journal of Global South Studies. He is a fellow of the Society for Military History (SMH), and an Associate Fellow of the Royal Historical Society (RHS).
Senior Wednesdays are informational and entertaining sessions, designed for active seniors and offered by a collaboration of Wichita institutions. To learn more, visit: