Lipitz Lecture with Dr. Gloria Chuku

In this talk, Gloria Chuku traces the history of Igbo ethnic identity formation, negotiation, and integration in Nigeria and in the Diaspora, and explores the challenges, complexities and dynamics of maintaining a collective Igbo identity in a pluralistic Nigerian society under increased globalization.

Biography: Gloria Chuku is Professor of Africana Studies with a specialty in African History and the Department Chair. She is the author of Igbo Women and Economic Transformation in Southeastern Nigeria, 1900-1960 (Routledge, 2005), editor of The Igbo Intellectual Tradition: Creative Conflict in African and African Diasporic Thought (Palgrave Macmillan, 2013) and Ethnicities, Nationalities, and Cross-Cultural Representations in Africa and the Diaspora (Carolina Academic Press, 2015), and coeditor of Women and the Nigeria-Biafra War: Reframing Gender and Conflict in Africa (Lexington Books, 2020). Professor Chuku is the recipient of a number of distinguished awards, including the Lipitz Professor of the Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences (2020) and the prestigious Ali Mazrui Award for Scholarship and Research Excellence (2017). She is a member of the International Advisory Board of Journal of Genocide Research, and the Editorial Boards of History in Africa, the Journal of Nigeria Studies, and Lagos Historical Review (University of Lagos, Nigeria), Taylor & Francis Book Series on "Global Africa," and Lexington Books' "African Governance & Development" Series.

Co-sponsored by the College of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences; the Center for Social Science Scholarship; the Dresher Center for the Humanities; and the Department of Africana Studies.