April 2020 - Adedeji ADEBAYO

 Interview of the Fellow of the month

   April 2020 - Adedeji Adebayo (PhD candidate at the Institute for Peace and Strategic Studies, University of Ibadan, Nigeria)

"Seek help; it gets better when you share your challenges with the right people."

Being part of the IFRA fellowship…

 Describe yourself briefly

I am Adedeji Adebayo, a postgraduate student at the Institute for Peace and Strategic Studies (IPSS), University of Ibadan, Nigeria. I am also a research assistant attached to the University of Ibadan Research Foundation.

Since when are you a fellow of IFRA-Nigeria?

I became a fellow of IFRA-Nigeria in 2017.

How have you benefited from IFRA-Nigeria?

I have been a regular attendee of IFRA-Nigeria’s monthly seminars since becoming a fellow. Some of the trainings I have received includes the use of reference manager software (Zotero and Mendeley for example), qualitative research methodologies etc. These trainings are important for me as a researcher in training and they have made some of my works quite easy.

In June 2017, I was one of the 18 postgraduate students selected to participate in a one-week masterclass on “Sacred Urbanism: Entrepreneurial Religion, Infrastructure and the New Urbanism in Nigeria”. The masterclass drew faculty members from Columbia University, Sciences Po, University of Lagos, IFRA-Nigeria and the University of Ibadan.

In July 2018, I was part of the three Nigerian students selected to take part in a summer school on “Methodological Training in Social Sciences” at Nandi Hills, Kenya. Through the training, I learnt how mapping can be useful in the course of field research.

In February 2019, the institute supported my trip to France to attend the Centre for South Asian Studies’ conference on gender knowledge production in Global South. IFRA-Nigeria was responsible for my flight ticket.

As a research fellow, the IFRA-Nigeria's team has continued to support my research in many ways. First, it has provided access to a favourable working space for me. It also, from time to time, provides me with relevant information with respect to my area of research.  

Have you contributed to IFRA in any way?

I was part of the first phase of the research TREEBADAN/IGI’BADAN: “Local Knowledges and Relations to Remarkable Trees in Ibadan (Oyo State, Nigeria)” conducted by Dr. Emilie Guitard, the immediate past deputy director and researcher at IFRA-Nigeria. The research aims at establishing an assessment of the natural heritage of the city of Ibadan, from a botanical, but also a historical and an anthropological perspective. I worked directly with Dr. Guitard (the Principal Investigator) as her research assistant. My job included conducting interviews in ethno-science, translation, transcription of data as well as logistics in some cases. The research experience I had under her has immensely improved my research and field work competencies.  

A bit more about yourself…

What are your main research interests?

I am interested in women’s political representation.

What research project are you currently working on?

I am working on women’s substantive political representation in Southwest Nigeria. I try to look beyond the statistics of descriptive representation by doing a background profiling of women’s representatives, and following up on their activities in the legislature. I have observed legislative proceedings in three states’ houses of assembly (Lagos, Ogun and Ekiti). I have also interviewed many of the current female honourable members of these states’ houses of assembly. I also analyse documents (records of bills for example) as an alternative source of data to corroborate my findings.

What is the main advice you will give to a junior researcher?

Seek help; it gets better when you share your challenges with the right people.

Where do you see yourself in the future? What’s your plans for next?

I aim to be a renowned research specialist in the area of women’s political representation in Nigeria in the nearest future.

More information about Adedeji ADEBAYO:

Check his Linkdn