What are African life narratives? How is Ken Saro-Wiwa connected to Maynooth University today, and what impact did he have on both Nigerian and Irish history as well as the discussion on energy systems? 

Explore these questions and more with íde Corley (Maynooth University) in this episode of the Arqus Knowledge Pills, in which we delve into the world of Nigerian activism and the impacts it has had on Corley’s research project, “Energetic lives: African life narratives and the struggle for energy justice.”

During the episode Corley digs into how her interests in Irish nationalism and the anti-apartheid movement led her to study African literature and Pan-Africanism, focusing on the intersection of race, culture and patriarchy in African nationalist rhetoric. 

The speakers highlights during this episode the history of Ken Saro-Wiwa’s activism in Nigeria and the role of Sister Magella McCarran, an Irish nun who documented his campaign against multinational corporations to explore these narratives. 

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Íde Corley is an Assistant Professor of English at Maynooth University and previously taught at the University of St. Thomas, the University of Vermont, Tuft University, Trinity College Dublin and held a visiting teaching fellowship on the Programa de Maestria y Doctorado en Letras at the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM).

Her research focuses on African and African diaspora literatures; petrocultures and the energy humanities; life narratives (particularly Ogoni) and human rights. She is the principal editor of Silence Would Be Treason, a collection of Ken Saro-Wiwa’s last letters from detention, which was cited by Amnesty International in their 2017 report, Shell: A Criminal Enterprise. She has also collaborated in the making of several documentaries about Saro-Wiwa’s globally-influential environmental and minority rights campaigns in Nigeria.

Her other published work has appeared in Modern Language Studies, Interventions, Wasafiri and the Journal of Postcolonial Writing. She is a member of the Petrocultures Research Group, the ESF College of Experts and an editorial consultant for the not-for-profit press, Daraja, based in Canada. She is currently working on her Eochair award-winning project, “Energetic Lives: African Life Narratives and the Struggle for Energy Justice".