Benjamin Maiangwa – författare

One Boy! is an emotionally charged—at times even humorous—coming-of-age narrative. In this debut work of creative non-fiction, Benjamin Maiangwa draws readers into the intimate interior of a boy navigating the delicate space between youthful innocence and the harsh realities of a Catholic boarding school.The story traces a young man's journey through the tangled terrain of love, loss, and self-discovery. Set against the backdrop of cultural expectations and religious doctrine, the protagonist endures betrayal, bullying, and the fragile beauty of friendship. As he matures within the strict confines of the boarding school and the religious hostilities of the outside world, he arrives at a moral crossroads: should he uphold the Judeo-Christian values of forgiveness instilled in him—or yield to the seductive pull of revenge?One Boy! is more than a story of survival; it is a meditation on what it means to remain whole in a world that so often insists you break. In the end, the question isn’t just what the boy will choose—but what we would choose in his place.

This book offers a grounded framework for Peace and Conflict Studies (PACS) that not only analyses conflict but also actively contributes to the well-being of marginalized communities.In response to rising authoritarianism and shrinking democratic spaces, the volume calls for inclusive peacebuilding processes that center the voices, experiences, and agency of those historically excluded, particularly those on the periphery of the global system. The book critically engages with the limitations of traditional, Western-centric PACS frameworks and proposes a decolonial restructuring of the field. It foregrounds the lived experiences, knowledge systems, and aspirations of marginalized communities such as artists, members of the diaspora, and LGBTQIA+, thereby challenging dominant paradigms and positioning the periphery as a vital site of transformative action and knowledge production. Through practical, context-sensitive solutions, the volume seeks to make PACS more responsive, equitable, and capable of fostering sustainable peace in an increasingly complex world.This book will be of much interest to students and practitioners of peace and conflict studies, social justice, development studies, and international relations.

This book explores the contested notions of territory and belonging in Nigeria, most especially among the Fulani and other ethnic groups in Kaduna. The book argues that these controversies center around Indigenous, nomadic, and autochthonous claims of belonging. The author identifies these differing notions of belonging as a major condition of violent conflicts in Kaduna and across various postcolonial societies. The author’s analysis demonstrates how dynamic ideological impetuses for these conflicts underscore broader issues of citizenship rights, nationhood, and local peacebuilding in Nigeria.

This book explores the complex and contested terrain of conflict and peace in Southern Kaduna, Nigeria, through the voices of community members and the author’s own lived experience. It centers people’s narratives to illuminate the historical and contemporary dynamics of land, identity, and power among ethnic minority communities and the dominant Fulani and Hausa groups. Through these accounts, the book reveals how colonial legacies, state policies, and enduring sociopolitical structures have intensified struggles over belonging and territorial entitlement. Responding directly to the voices of those affected by violence, it challenges homogenizing discourses surrounding victims and perpetrators and offers a grounded, everyday understanding of peacebuilding rooted in survival, negotiation, reconciliation, and coexistence.

This book explores how questions about home and belonging have been framed in the discourses on race, migration, and social relationships. It does this with the aim of envisioning alternative modes of living and reimagining our political communities in ways that question the legacy of colonization and constructed identities which detract from our sense of obligation to each other and the planet. The book questions problematic categories of difference to transform human relations beyond the materialism of our global political economy. Questions addressed in the volume include: In what ways are combative colonial identities of difference manufactured within our national and global spaces of encounter? How can we expel the racialized and tribalized political identities that seek to purify and deny the complexities and sacredness of being human? How do we embrace the notion that everyone we encounter is a mirror reflecting our fears of suffering and our desires for happiness?The book is set in the context of re-emerging ultra-nationalists and anti-migrant politicians on the national and international stage, advancing various strands of extreme-right and protectionist ideology couched as redemptive-welfarist strategies. The adverse impacts of these strategies seem to be reifying a possessive idea of citizenship and identity, engendering a national fantasy that portrays communities as homogenous entities inhabiting enclosed borders. This is essentially a compendium of conversations across the intersection of the racial, national, ethnic, spiritual, and sexual boundaries in which we live.