News

On 21 May 2026, Dr Stefan Le Courant (IFRA-Nigeria and CNRS) held a methodological seminar on the topic “Mysterious absences: initial reflections from an ongoing study in Ivory Coast”, where he went over his current fieldwork. Though his work touches on migration, he takes an original approach by not focusing on the movement of population aspect. For example, previously in France, he studied migrants forced to hide from authorities because they are illegally present in the country. What interested him was the question of building identity when you have to hide who you are.

His new project, which takes place in Côte d’Ivoire and Nigeria, focuses on the people who disappeared, usually while attempting to migrate to North Africa or Europe. Specifically, he interrogates what is the impact of their absence, how the people left behind manage this in their daily life.

On Wednesday, 6 May 2026, IFRA-Nigeria, in collaboration with the National Museum of Unity in Ibadan, hosted a guest lecture and practical workshop under the theme “Make Your Medicine: Heritage, Culture, and Health.” The event sought to foster public engagement with traditional medical knowledge, healing practices, and the interplay between culture, heritage, and health. The programme was part of the Nigerian Alternative Heritages Project, supported by the French Embassy Fund.

On Thursday 14 May 2026, the participants of the February workshop on "Sensitive ways of doing, writing and sharing research" presented their work in an exhibition at the Institute of African Studies, University of Ibadan, with the collaboration of the Cornelius Adepegba Museum of African Art (CAMAA). The four groups each carried out a fieldwork in the Ibadan central bus station, from which they extracted a scientific analysis in an original form: a creative writing piece, photographs and an audio montage. From the same location and with the same instruction, each revealed different insights on health, gender, the market and infrastructure in the station. This event is part of our 2026 "Debate of Ideas" programme on the theme "Listen to Sensitive and Alternative Voices to Pave the Way." 

The opening of the exhibition was attended by the participants, students, staff of the Institute of African Studies and representatives of workers at the bus station. After introductory remarks by Dr Pauline Guinard, IFRA-Nigeria Director, Dr Delphine Manetta, IFRA-Nigeria Deputy-Director and Professor Molatokunbo Seunfunmi Olutayo, the attendants were able to look through the students' creations and interact with them regarding their work. 

On 11 June, Andrew Esiebo and Dr Laurent Fourchard will present a visual ethnography work they have been carrying out together since 2024 on the National Union of Road Transport Workers (NURTW) in Lagos as part of our methodological seminar series. Through a mixed methodology of photography and ethnography, they explore the visible hand of an organization whose main functions are unseen, hidden, difficult to grasp or stigmatized. They aim to shed light on the front stage of the union and to expose the nature of public authority in spaces abandoned by the state. The seminar will explore at what conditions do collaborative work make it possible to overcome the clichés and stereotypical stories about this union and how, the practices of one modify the practices of the other. 

Practical information: 

Date & Time: 11 June, 2-4pm

Location: IFRA-Nigeria Resource Centre, Institute of African Studies, University of Ibadan

Sign-up here (deadline 5 June): https://forms.gle/CNvna2ZsnRqFtP2c8 

Abstract

This article by Youssef Bouri examines the contestation that emerged in late 2023 against an urban renewal project in Ibadan titled “Baywood Estate: a luxury gated community” built in lieu of the Ogunpa Forest Reserve, one of the last remaining urban forests of Ibadan, and affecting the adjoining Agodi Gardens. It draws, inter alia, on the analysis of narrative interviews, online tribunes, open letters, legal proceedings, news articles, and policy documents. The article situates the Baywood Estate project within a historical and contemporary continuum of urban renewal in Ibadan marked by the socially exclusionary appropriation of formerly public land. Interviewees argue that this real-estate project limits access to environmental resources and degrades a social space for the broader population while privileging economically privileged groups. They situate the project within Ibadan’s ecological history of recurrent forest clearing and resulting environmental damage. The analysis highlights a six-decade-long record in which successive Oyo State governments, regardless of political party or regime type, have converted public environmental commons, often into elite-oriented consumption spaces, with environmental costs borne by the broader urban population in the form of flooding, erosion, and the loss of social and biodiversity hotspots.

Participants in the mobilization were highly educated and exhibited substantial social capital. They initially preferred non-confrontational, dialogue-based approaches to engage the government but were met, according to accounts, by State-sponsored violence. In response, they attempted to sue the project promoter, the Oyo State government, and other actors. The article also finds generational differences within the movement, particularly in how opponents politicized both the mobilization and the Baywood Estate project itself. It proposes an explanation for these differing politicizations and regarding what the mobilization suggests about changes in the resources that enable political access in Ibadan.

The upcoming session of our "Imagine(d) Africa" conference series, organised in collaboration with the Institute of African Studies of the University of Ibadan, will tackle the topic of human trafficking. Dr Elodie Apard (Institute of Research on Development) and Flora Enifo (MIST association) will introduce their work both scientific and associative, to understand and help trafficked Nigerian women. 

Practical information: 

Date & Time: 4 June 2026, 2 to 4pm

Location: Draper's Hall, Institute of African Studies, University of Ibadan

The Department of History, University of Ibadan in collaboration with the French Institute for Research in Africa (IFRA-Nigeria) and the Institute of African Studies, University of Ibadan invite scholars, researchers and practitioners to submit papers for an upcoming international conference themed: “Urban Myths and Experiences in Africa”.

Full call

Cities are built environments where people converge to live, work, exchange, and interact. As such, they constitute tangible economic, social, and political centres. Yet cities are not only material spaces. They are also shaped by the ways people imagine, dream about, narrate, and experience them across different scales of time and space. Cities are produced as much through concrete infrastructures and institutions as through practices and imagination.

The National Museum of Unity Ibadan and IFRA-Nigeria are organising an event with the theme “(Re)imagining Heritage, (Re) using the Museum”, which will feature a presentation of the research and artistic creation projects, and a roundtable discussion with the project team and grant beneficiaries. This event takes place as part of the French Embassy Fund project, Nigerian Alternative Heritages.

Practical information: 

Date: Wednesday, 20 May, 2026
Place: National Museum of Unity, Aleshinloye, Ibadan,
Time: 1 PM

On 29 April 2026, IFRA-Nigeria, in collaboration with the National Museum of Unity in Ibadan, hosted a week-long exhibition, guest lecture, and hands-on workshop. The event focused on the theme "Arts of Fashion and Textile Heritage" and aimed to highlight the cultural significance of Nigerian textile traditions as vital components of heritage and identity. This programme was part of the Nigerian Alternative Heritages project, supported by funding from the French Embassy. A total of 124 participants attended, including 58 students and 66 others.

The exhibition showcased carefully selected pieces, including fabrics such as Sanyan, Alaari, and Etu from the "Five Decades of Aso-Oke Collection" by Professor Felicia Adetowun Ogunsheye at the museum. The display also featured textile items created through crocheting, knitting, and embroidery, as well as works combining multiple textile art techniques on Aso-Ofi.

You can watch highlights of the event on our Youtube channel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NgOKKhEMwMo

Join us for the May edition of our Methodological seminar series titled “Mysterious Absences: Initial Reflections from an Ongoing Study in Ivory Coast”. This session will feature Dr Stefan Le Courant, research at CNRS and currently attached to IFRA-Nigeria.

In this presentation, Dr Le Courant will offer an initial set of methodological reflections on an ongoing study -conducted jointly with his colleague, Dr Carolina Kobelinsky, - focusing on the absent and the disappeared in the Ivorian contexts heavily marked by migration (mainly in Abidjan and Daloa).

Dr Le Courant will focus on examining the discourses used to discuss the absent, the role and position of intermediaries in the investigation. He will further address the ethical issues involved in researching such a sensitive topic.

IFRA-Nigeria, in collaboration with the Institut Français, Abuja, and the Cornelius Adepegba Museum of African Art (CAMAA) and the Institute of African Studies, University of Ibadan, is pleased to invite you to the exhibition titled “Sensitive Ways of Doing, Writing & Sharing Research”.

The exhibition showcases the works of participants from the workshop held from 9 -12 February. The featured pieces include texts, photographs and audio recordings gathered at the Ibadan Central Bus Terminal during a collective fieldwork session. Together, these works reflect experimental, reflexive and collaborative approaches to research, highlighting how knowledge can be produced and shared through sensitive engagement with everyday spaces and experiences.

We warmly invite you to join us for this unique presentation.

Details

Date: 14 May 2026

Time: 12.00 PM – 2.00 PM

Venue: CAMAA, Institute of African Studies, University of Ibadan

Marie Lureau, IFRA’s Research Project Manager, will hold a panel on " Exploring ‘non-religion’ in Africa" at the Lagos Studies Association Conference 2026. This exploratory panel opens the topic of ‘non-religion’ and ‘anti-religion’ as social phenomena, related to a set of intellectual traditions in the contexts of sub-Saharan Africa.

Date & Time: 17 June 2026, 11:00am – 12:30pm

Venue: Room LR 9

You will find below the details of the panel.

The National Museum of Unity and IFRA-Nigeria are organising an event with the theme “Make Your Medicine: Heritage, Culture and Health”, under the FEF Alternative Heritage Project. The event will feature two guest lectures and a participatory hands-on workshop that centres on tangible and intangible aspects of these cultural heritage and practices, fostering a deeper understanding of their significance and impact.

Date: 06 May 2026

Place: National Museum of Unity, Aleshinloye, Ibadan

Time: 10:00 AM, preceded by an immersion session at 9:00 AM

Between 2 to 6 November 2026, the seventh edition of the Itinerant Doctoral School (EDI) will take place at Félix Houphouët-Boigny University in Abidjan (Côte d’Ivoire). This doctoral school is a partnership between the Institut de recherche sur le Maghreb contemporain (IRMC – Tunis), the Institut français de recherche en Afrique (IFRA – Nigeria), the Centre Jacques Berque (CJB – Rabat), the Scientific Interest Group “Pensées Genre Penser Autrement” (GIS – PGPA) of Félix Houphouët-Boigny University, and Alassane Ouattara University.

Doctoral students in social sciences enrolled in a PhD program at a university or research institution located in an African country can apply to participate in the doctoral school.

Application deadline: June 10, 2026 

Download the full call in English

Download the full call in French

From 13 - 16 April 2026, IFRA-Nigeria convened a multidisciplinary masterclass on vernacular architecture, bringing together scholars in architecture, history, sociology, urban geography and ethnography. The session explored how Nigeria’s built environment not only shelters life but also reflects cultural adaptation, social transformation and acts of resistance.

At the heart of the discussions was a shared understanding: vernacular architecture is far more than a collection of structures. It is a living archive of memory, identity and everyday practice. Often described as an “indigenous” science of building, it draws on local materials and techniques, as well as an accumulated knowledge, evolving through experimentation and engagement with changing environments. As architectural historian Paul Oliver famously observed, it is “a building of people, made by the people.”