ETHNICITY AND RELIGION IN INTER GROUP CONFLICTS IN NIGERIA

ETHNICITY AND RELIGION IN INTER GROUP CONFLICTS IN NIGERIA

CHAPTER ONE
1.1 INTRODUCTION

Ethnicity as a concept is an immensely complex phenomenon that portrays different perceptions. Even a search through the literature has revealed that ethnicity is relatively a new concept and it made its first appearance in the literature less than half a century ago.1 According to Osaghae, ethnicity refers to a social formation resting upon culturally specific practices and a unique set of symbols and cosmology.2 A belief in common organs and a broadly agreed common history provide an inheritance of symbols, heroes, values and hierarchies and conform social identities of both insiders and outsiders. As a social construct, ethnicity can be regarded as the employment of ethnic identity and differences to gain advantage in situation of competition, conflict and cooperation. In his own conception of what ethnicity is, Depress define ethnicity as largely a subjective process of status identification..3 Hence ethnic groups are formed to the extent that actors use ethnic identities to categorize themselves and others for the purpose of interaction. In similar view, ethnicity can be conceived as an interaction or relationship that exist among people of different ethnic groups who decides to base their relationship on their differences, such exist when two or more ethnic groups, interest relate with one another which normally brings about competition on issues like power or wealth.

The concise Oxford Dictionary defines ethnicity as how the aspirations and interest of ethnic groups are pursued in relation to other groups. To help it off, someone can say ethnicity is the contextual discrimination by members of one ethnic against the others in the process of competition for natural resources. Okwudiba Nnoli has defined ethnicity as a social phenomenon associated with interactions among members of difference ethnic groups. He also proceeded further to define ethnic group as:

Social formation distinguished by the communal character of their boundaries. The relevant communal factor may be language, culture, or both. In Africa, language has clearly been the most crucial variable. As social formations, however, ethnic groups are not necessarily homogenous entities even linguistically or culturally.4

ETHNICITY AND RELIGION IN INTER GROUP CONFLICTS IN NIGERIA