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2 Dress and Politics in Post–World War II Abeokuta (Western Nigeria) Judith By¤eld Market women supporters of the Action Group were furious on Thursday night, and several of them yesterday refused to cook for their Action Group husbands. Why? As one put it to a representative of the West African Pilot yesterday, the women had been erroneously led to believe that the Action Group would win and had donned . . . their best attire to dance to the tunes of Sakara, Sekere and Aro and Gbedu music only to be disappointed in the end.1 The Action Group’s loss to the National Council of Nigeria and the Cameroons (N.C.N.C.) in the 1952 by-elections to the Western House of Assembly clearly upset those women supporters who had put on their best clothes in anticipation of a celebration. The Action Group did not plan this effort. Rather, the women’s sartorial preparation emerged from an appreciation of the cultural meaning that would be conveyed by their dress. In Yoruba society’s rich aesthetic and cultural landscape , dress communicated a range of ideas and social conventions, including identity , character, and status. Though subject to rapidly evolving styles and fashions, dress could be adapted to express everything from material conditions to ideological debates. Thus it became a critical tool in the contentious and symbolically rich world of politics. There was no one relationship between dress and politics. Political actors deployed dress in multiple ways to express varied notions and ideas. For example, dress played an integral role in the development of nationalist thought. Cultural nationalists of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries displayed their critique of colonialism by shedding Victorian dress and recommitting to “traditional ” Yoruba dress. This visual medium of political expression communicated multiple messages to a diverse audience in Lagos and other urban centers. To British political, commercial, and missionary agents it signaled that these members of the elite had distanced themselves from colonial culture and an uncritical acceptance of its values. It also signaled their participation in a regional political discussion as well as their desire to align themselves politically and culturally with Yoruba society. This chapter examines the multiple political uses of dress in the Yoruba town of Abeokuta in the dynamic and politically tumultuous years immediately after World War II. The town experienced a signi¤cant rise in women’s political activism as women tried to meet their ¤nancial and social obligations during this period, which was also characterized by economic crisis.2 This agitation led to the formation of the Abeokuta Women’s Union (AWU), perhaps the most important women ’s organization in the postwar period. Under the leadership of Mrs. Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti, a teacher and nationalist, this organization staged a tax revolt that led to the temporary exile of the traditional king and Sole Native Authority, Alake Ademola II, a temporary abolition of taxes on women, and the inclusion of women on the local governing councils. The AWU was organized along much the same lines as associations formed in the political context of colonial Nigeria. It had a formal constitution and bylaws that expressed its mission and goals as well as what was expected of its members. It championed democracy, independence, political service,and women’s involvement in the formal organs of political power.The constitution also included prescriptions on dress. The analysis that follows explores the AWU’s dress policy, its implications, and the wider ways in which the organization used dress as a medium of political expression and protest. Changes in Women’s Dress Dress, as Barnes and Eicher de¤ne it, is a comprehensive term for direct body changes such as tattoos and hairstyles, and items added to the body such as clothing and jewelry.3 Among the Yoruba, clothing and its accessories constitute the most important form of aesthetic expression.4 Dress did not merely cover the body, it indicated one’s gender, character, wealth, and status, and it determined and negotiated social relationships. Yoruba popular thought often expressed the relationship between dress and social interaction,as in the saying “iri ni si ni isonilojo”— one’s appearance determines the degree of respect one receives.5 In the nineteenth century, Yoruba women’s apparel consisted of an undergarment , a knee-length apron or petticoat called a tobi that was tied around the waist with a strong cord or band, two or three wrappers, and a headdress. Age determined the combination of cloths women wore. Art historian...

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