Oyeronke Oyewumi

Oyeronke Oyewumi

Oyeronke Oyewumi is a Nigerian gender scholar and full professor of sociology at Stony Brook University. She acquired her bachelor's degree at the University of Ibadan in Ibadan, Nigeria and went on to pursue her graduate degree in Sociology at the University of California, Berkeley.

Quotes

• So I think what African women as a group represent is an example a symbol of Africa’s vulnerability sixty years after independence. There’s violence against women as an offshoot of the general violence in the society.
  • what sixty years after first conference has meant for an African women

• The continent is in deep trouble and women must be at the vanguard of all of kinds of struggles. And we must document the ways in which women contribute.
  • How we address the contributions of women

• We must emphasise the pathology called the modern man. When you think of modern, it is women they associate it with but when you think of what has happened as a result of colonisation of this continent it is that men have garnered all sorts of resources that were not even traditionally in the hands of men or women, these were collectively owned things.
  • How the structure has changed

• Collectively as women we need to do something different, we need to support each other. Support the young ones, even as we transition and deal with the whole question of what sort of families do we want because the families are the most basic unit.
  • Advice for women who are increasingly self identifying as feminists

• For women scholars, the university is not a particularly user-friendly place. Because of this, for us to succeed, it is crucial to have structures in place such as affordable child care. This is not an individual problem that ought to be addressed by one person at a time.
  • Her advice for ladies who see her as role model