Formation: The Making of Nigeria from Jihad to Amalgamation – Fola Fagbule, Feyi Fawehinmi

Description

Before Nigeria was ‘created’ in 1914, West Africa had empires, revolutions, slave trades and resistance movements that shaped the nation’s identity. Formation traces how jihad, slavery andcolonialism forged modern Nigeria.

Formation: The Making of Nigeria tells the story of how modern Nigeria emerged from a century of upheaval between 1804 and 1914. Beginning with the Sokoto jihad that created West Africa’s largest empire, the book traces how Islamic reform movements, British colonial expansion, the transatlantic slave trade’s abolition, and African resistance shaped the territories that became Nigeria. This is Nigerian history not as colonial creation story but as process of competing African and European forces.

Essential for university students studying African history, Nigerian professionals seeking to understand their country’s formation, and general readers curious about how modern nations emerge from complex historical forces. If you want to understand why Nigeria’s regions have such different political cultures, this book reveals the century of divergent experiences that created those differences.

Inside this narrative history:

● Sokoto Caliphate’s rise from religious reform to West Africa’s largest empire

● British colonial expansion and African resistance movements that shaped territorial boundaries

● Transatlantic slave trade’s abolition and its impact on West African economic and political systems

● 1914 amalgamation creating Nigeria from territories with vastly different histories and cultures

● Clear analysis explaining why Nigeria’s regional tensions have deep historical roots

Understand Nigeria’s formation through the century of jihad, slavery and colonialism that forged Africa’s most populous nation.