Widening the Horizon The Challenges of Teaching Nigeria in the German EFL Classroom Frauke Matz and Michael Rogge With the introduction of Nigeria as a new country of reference in 2018 for English as a Foreign Language (EFL) at higher level, the German federal state of North-Rhine Westphalia (NRW) has taken a bold attempt to widen the horizon of educators and students alike. While this fresh perspective offers new opportunities for global education, the respective regulations and descriptors might diminish its potential by giving reductive options of implementation from an intercultural perspective. This theoretical article critically examines the (problematic) intercultural and postcolonial approaches, which are currently suggested, and proposes three principles of teaching Nigeria in the context of transcultural, cosmopolitan citizenship education. A practical example of how to teach aspects of religious beliefs in Nigeria concludes this article. Introduction With the beginning of the school year 2018/ 2019, Nigeria was introduced as a new country of reference for English at higher level in secondary schools in North-Rhine Westphalia (NRW) (MSB 2018: 4-6). Hence, these binding guidelines establish Nigeria as an exam topic for those students taking the Abitur 1 , making it part of a two-and-a-half-year syllabus that includes rather varied topics, such as the role of English as a lingua franca in the global and digital age, the United Kingdom and its imperial history, the concept of the American dream and its history, Shakespearean drama and sonnets, and, finally, dystopic visions of the future (ibd.). Introducing 1 This is the final exam after twelve, respectively thirteen years of regular school education. Students successfully completing these exams are allowed to continue their education at the university level. AAA - Arbeiten aus Anglistik und Amerikanistik Band 45 (2020) · Heft 2 Gunther Narr Verlag Tübingen DOI 10.2357/ AAA-2020-0018 Frauke Matz and Michael Rogge 154 Nigeria as a further topic poses a challenge for both teachers and students, since Nigeria - unlike North America, Great Britain, Ireland, South Africa, Australia and New Zealand - has never been part of an official German curriculum before. Thus, in the summer of 2018, there were no teacher's manuals, guidelines, or textbooks that educators could fall back on. Teachers had to - and still are bound to - react quickly, since, from spring 2021 onwards, every learner who takes English at higher level in NRW will have to learn about Nigeria and be prepared to take centralised exams dealing with topics regarding this African country. Despite all this urgency, though, it is vital to be conscious about not only the choice of what to teach but also how to teach it. Depending on the chosen approach, the narrative in the classrooms could go either way: Nigeria could represent an “Africa rising” (Dabiri 2017: 206), or, based on the example of Nigeria, Africa could be presented as a “dark, failing continent” (Salami 2013). However, it is not just the views and opinions that will be formed which are at stake: EFL educators are faced with an immense opportunity to view cultural learning differently, to truly widen the pupils’ horizons, not only geographically but also from a cultural learning point of view. This article takes the clear stance that Nigeria, as a new country of reference, should be viewed as an opportunity to re-imagine cultural education and to open the EFL classrooms to more transcultural, global and cosmopolitan approaches, which especially have human rights education at its core. Considering the curricula restraints, which will be elaborated on in the first part of this article, this might seem challenging - but it is a challenge worth embarking upon, as will be discussed in the second part. An example of how this can be achieved in the EFL classroom will also be presented, when looking more closely at the religious aspects of Nigerian life-worlds. 1. Curricular Restraints Despite the fact that the binding curricular guidelines give a general outline concerning the thematic fields that must be covered in lessons, in NRW teachers are relatively free to choose the exact focus, materials and aspects they would like to teach. Considering that Nigeria “has by far the largest population of all African countries, with an estimated one out of every five sub-Saharan Africans being Nigerian”, is “one of the largest democracies in the world” and has “traditionally played the most active diplomatic role on the world stage of any African country” (Campbell/ Page 2018: 1), it might prove difficult to find a starting point, a perspective which does justice to the vastness and importance of this country and its people. The Challenges of Teaching Nigeria in the German EFL Classroom 155 However, it is not just the agony of choice which poses a challenge: the curricular guidelines require educators to teach the cultural aspects in accordance with the model of intercultural education, as put forth by Byram (1997). Furthermore, the NRW curriculum is firmly rooted in both the Common European Framework of Reference (European Council 2001) and the German educational standards for English at higher levels (KMK 2012). As will be discussed later, this notion of (teaching and learning about) culture is problematic (not only) when teaching Nigeria because the concept of interculturality is based on the assumption that a nation has one identifiable culture, which students should learn about as well as interact with in a tolerant and sensible way, while supposedly checking their own values against those of the 'foreign culture'. 1.1 Thematic fields: The Balancing Act between Postcolonialism and Globalisation In the NRW guidelines, Nigeria is meant to be taught as a new country of reference following two thematic perspectives: 1) Political and social realities and 2) global challenges and visions (MSB 2018: 4-6), which are divided into subtopics, as illustrated in the table below. Political and social realities Global challenges and visions Postcolonialism - life worlds in an additional anglophone culture 2 Opportunities and risks of globalisation Voices from the African Continent: Focus on Nigeria Voices from the African Continent: Focus on Nigeria Table 1. Binding specifications Abitur 2021 (MSB 2018: 4-6, adapted F. M. & M. R.) By adding the postcolonial perspective, the students' attention is turned to the past, while the latter not only focuses on the present but also looks to a future unknown. To some extent, both perspectives might seem a logical choice: on the one hand, while Nigeria does have a (post-)colonial past, for better or worse, it would not exist within its current borders had it not been for the British. On the other hand, to place Nigeria within the field of opportunities and risks of globalisation also makes sense, as it is both an affected and aspiring country in terms of global and digital industries. To bridge these two theoretical but conceptually very different aspects of the same country, however, seems an impossible task- especially within an average 2 The advanced EFL class (Leistungskurs) has the additional clarification ‘and their historical backgrounds’ (“und ihre historischen Hintergründe”), which is lacking from the guidelines of the regular class (Grundkurs). The question hence arises if it is at all possible and desirable to include postcolonial aspects without considering Nigeria's historical background. Frauke Matz and Michael Rogge 156 eight-week period that educators may have at their disposal to cover all topics. Yet, regardless of the time constraints, it seems difficult to fathom the original intention of choosing Nigeria as a new country of reference: the original aim appears to be lost in a possibly overzealous attempt to pursue an ambitious goal. In the following, the issues with those thematic fields are raised separately. 1.1.1 The Issue with Postcolonialism Learning about the “political and social realities” (ibd.) in an anglophone cultural area, aside from the countries that already belong to the established canon, makes sense: currently, over 70 countries have declared English as their official language, each of which could thus be chosen as a country of reference for an EFL classroom. Many of those countries have chosen English as the official language because of their colonial pasts, with their borders having been drawn in colonial times by the British colonisers, as has Nigeria. It is worth considering, however, whether a postcolonial perspective can actually be viewed as helpful when teaching “the political and social realities” in the “life worlds in an additional anglophone cultural area” (ibd.). The questions that educators need to ask themselves are a) whether a backward-looking approach can serve as a helpful introduction into the Nigerian life-worlds and their realities, and b) which life-worlds and whose political and social realities will be focused on. While this article does not dispute the importance and relevance of postcolonial theories in general, it may be important to raise an issue in line with Bauman’s objection to the continuous use of the term postmodernity (Bauman 2012): choosing postcolonialism as the first approach to teaching about Nigeria in a school context is, in essence, an unfavourable statement, in that it describes what Nigeria no longer is, instead of describing what Nigeria is today. It hence entails a negativity, as it does not encourage educators and students to ask what is new and what is different. Nigeria certainly has a colonial and, subsequently, a post-colonial past and present, but it also has newly developed identities, which should not be merely defined through a postcolonial lens. Therefore, it is important for teachers to be aware of their positions in this matter, as it will have implications on their choice of material, their approaches to teaching cultural topics and, hence, on the (possibly negative) narrative they present. The question could then be, in terms of the subject area, whether the term postcolonialism could be taken out of the guidelines and be replaced with more obvious and coeval concepts. Educators certainly have the intellectual tools at hand: as an approach to teaching Nigeria, concepts of global, even cosmopolitan citizenship education might prove to be more fruitful in understanding the political and social realities of these life-worlds. This by no means negates the relevance of historic facts of (post-)colonial times from a critical point of view. A postcolonial perspective, though, could and The Challenges of Teaching Nigeria in the German EFL Classroom 157 maybe even should actually be a result rather than a starting point of teaching Nigeria. 1.1.2 The Issue of Teaching Global Challenges & Visions The fact that students are required to learn about “global challenges and visions” as well as “opportunities and risks of globalisation” (MSB 2018: 4-6) also makes sense in the context of Nigeria, as Nigeria certainly has the potential to be an important global player in terms of its industries, since both import and export are imbedded in global markets. Also, it is a country that is meeting some of the opportunities and risks of globalisation head on, while at the same time it is one of the countries suffering immensely from global developments (see, for example, issues connected with the global oil industry, cf. Wenar 2017). But again, the issue of choosing a focus is also a question of framing this debate within the narratives of either “Africa rising” (Dabiri 2017: 206) or the “dark, failing continent” (Salami 2013). The guidelines at hand do not state which global challenges are supposed to be dealt with in class, and - again - the choices are as plentiful as they are immense in their potential consequences on the portrayal of Nigeria as an example for the African continent. According to the UN, the population of Nigeria is projected to grow by 200 million between 2019 and 2050 (cf. UN 2019: 12), which means that it is estimated to become the third largest country in this respect. However, in 2019, life expectancy at birth is below 55 years (ibd.: 30) and there are currently no predictions that the living conditions will improve by 2050. Despite the official regulation that primary education is free and compulsory, currently “about 10.5 million of the country’s children aged 5-14 years are not in school” (Unicef 2019). The country suffers from several human rights violations, ranging from police violence, communal conflicts to sectarian violence by Boko Haram, as well as corruption and violent confrontations, in addition to environmental destruction in the Niger Delta (see, for example, Amnesty International 2019, Human Rights Watch 2019). The list of risks and challenges could go on, as could the list of opportunities, but the issue remains: an intercultural notion cannot serve as a helpful approach when dealing with any of these topics in class. Although at first glance it might seem logical that concepts of global education would be the more obvious approach, it is curiously missing from the NRW guidelines, since these are from the CEFR or the German educational standards. 3 It would be a logical assumption, however, that, in order to understand global phenomena and developments and to assess the opportunities and risks, as well as understand the differences between 3 This is also true for Beck's theory of Risk Society of Modernity (cf. for example, 2008). Due to the choice of the word ‘risk’, his theory is implied, though never explicitly mentioned. Frauke Matz and Michael Rogge 158 them, students should be prepared to grasp the increasing interconnectedness of the world. This might be better achieved, as argued in the second part of this article, through global citizenship education (GCE), with a special focus on human rights education (HRE). 1.1.3 The Issue with (Far-Away) Voices from the African Continent The education players in NRW are currently discussing not only the choice of topics for the classrooms but also the literary texts that might serve as a basis for classroom discourses. Surprisingly, most exemplary curriculums currently recommend letting voices be heard that are far away from Nigeria and the African continent: most propose reading novels by authors, such as Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie and Teju Cole, who left Nigeria while at university and thus divided their time between Nigeria and the US. Although these texts surely have their literary and intellectual merits, it appears an odd choice, considering that these favoured, distant voices from the Nigerian diaspora give a somewhat estranged view of the country. While we do not dispute that “Africans outside the continent are Africans too” (Salami 2013), it is certainly not the perspective that a heading such as “Voices from the African Continent: Focus on Nigeria” suggests (italics F.M. & M.R.). As with the postcolonial perspective, educators must ask themselves if these are not in fact reductive options that may not lead to an understanding, let alone an analysis of contemporary Nigeria. Educators need to be critical of the direction this is taking, as a “reductive analysis fails to engage with the spaces in between, the fact that you have to be critical of the direction a movement is taking while also acknowledging that it is possible to imagine alternative possibilities for it” (Dabiri 2017: 205). In choosing such far-away voices, students may wonder why they are displayed as more relevant than voices from within Nigeria. Ogbechie (2008) raises this issue, not in connection with literature but with the arts, stating, In contemporary art discourses, “Africa” is everywhere but the African continent itself is everywhere invisible. It may come as a surprise to many that there is indeed an African continent composed of many countries where large numbers of artists live, work, and engage as best as they can in global discourses: their practice deserves recognition on its own terms. […] Globalizations shouldn’t always require Africa to emerge only in the West: people in Nigeria, Ghana, Kenya, Mali and Zimbabwe are active agents of global change even though we tend to marginalize their existence and contributions. […] He concludes his observation with a comment worth considering in the teaching context, as he states that if “we don’t need to study Africa to understand Africa, then we should state so upfront and spare everyone the sleight of hand that passes for contemporary curatorial focus and scholarship on the subject” (ibd). The Challenges of Teaching Nigeria in the German EFL Classroom 159 1.2 Intercultural Learning: Old and (Dis-)Trusted As previously mentioned, the binding curricular guidelines require teachers to teach cultural aspects in line with the CEFR and, thus, Byram's concept of intercultural communicative competence (ICC). 4 This means that, despite the recent academic discourse on this subject matter, the focus still (re)lies on an intercultural approach. This could and should be viewed as a problem, though: the CEFR clearly states that in “an intercultural approach, it is a central objective of language education to promote the favourable development of the learner's whole personality and sense of identity in response to the enriching experience of otherness in language and culture” (Council of Europe 2001: 2, emphasis added). This suggests that, firstly, Nigeria - and any other country of reference - is in fact to be viewed as 'the other', still abiding by the principle of binary oppositions, and that, secondly, Nigeria is expected to have only one variety of English and one identifiable culture. One crucial aspect of ICC is for the students to develop intercultural skills and know-how, which - again using the singular - is defined as follows:  the ability to bring the culture of origin and the foreign culture into relation with each other;  cultural sensitivity and the ability to identify and use a variety of strategies for contact with those from other cultures;  the capacity to fulfil the role of cultural intermediary between one’s own culture and the foreign culture and to deal effectively with intercultural misunderstanding and conflict situations;  the ability to overcome stereotyped relationships. (ibd.: 105, emphasis added) This analysis could be continued further but suffice it to state that, regardless of the (recent) interpretations, intercultural learning - as put forth by the CEFR and, hence, the German educational standards - is based on the principle of Fremdverstehen, on binary oppositions of 'self' and 'other'/ 'foreign' as well as on the concepts of cultures as being monolithic, which is, and always has been, highly problematic. 5 It also implies that students in 4 Despite some attempts to seemingly widen the perspective, allowing for slightly more open views (see, for example the Companion Volume which was published by the European Council as an addition to the CEFR in 2018), the concept of ICC within the CEFR has never officially been revised since its first publication in 2001, and criticism from experts in the field has never officially been openly recognised by the European Council. Hence, this model, which was first published over 20 years ago, is still binding, despite all the developments on a global scale since then. 5 The descriptors in the NRW curriculum also use 'culture' in the singular and describe, for example, that students should be open to gaining experiences with a ‘foreign culture’ (“fremde Kultur”, QUA-LiS 2019). The binary opposition between ‘foreign and own’ virtues and attitudes is also part of the descriptors (ibd.). Frauke Matz and Michael Rogge 160 German classrooms have one singular identifiable culture, which is quite simply not a representation of students' life-worlds anywhere. Despite all attempts to make official guidelines to appear more open to diversity, suggesting a more 'democratic' approach (see Matz forthcoming), the problem inherent in the concept of ICC has been and sadly still remains to be this: We teach youth to think like states, or nations, in a time when global problems demand thinking beyond borders. The absurdity of the disconnect is stark - that despite mounting problems that cross boundaries, including migration, global warming, infectious diseases, war, we continue to use the nation/ state framework to solve problems that demand a different way of thinking. (Gaudelli 2019) The concepts of transculturality, of GCE as well as HRE are not new, and, yet, they are still simply neglected and marginalised within the European educational context. 6 The recent publication of the Framework of Democratic Education by the European Council (2018) serves as proof that there is no intention to even recognise the fundamental criticism intercultural learning has drawn from educators working in this field (see, for example, Doff & Schulze-Engler 2011, Freitag-Hild 2010). By choosing Nigeria as a new country of reference within EFL education, this article takes the stance that NRW has chosen a suitable example of why the intercultural approach is an ill-chosen one: Nigeria, as any other country for this matter, does not have one single, identifiable “foreign culture” to which students can relate their “own culture” of origin (Council of Europe 2001: 105). Hence, educators might miss a very valuable opportunity for cultural learning, for opening up to transcultural approaches, notions of hybridity and - as explored in the following - the opportunities that global and human rights education offer, by further promoting the idea of Fremdverstehen, of gaining socio-cultural knowledge of a single nation state. Since Nigeria was chosen as an example of the “[v]oices from the African continent” (MSB 2018: 3), a first aspect that teachers and students alike need to recognize is the inherent hybridity of this continent and its states. As Mbembe clearly states on behalf of citizens of all African countries: “Insofar as African states are total inventions, and recent ones at that, strictly speaking there is nothing in their essential nature that can force us to worship them - which is not to say that we are indifferent to their fate” (2017: 106). 6 This article especially bases its understanding of transculturality on the work of Delanoy (see, for example, 2006). The Challenges of Teaching Nigeria in the German EFL Classroom 161 2. Three Principles of Teaching Nigeria After having raised the fundamental concerns we envisage, should Nigeria be taught according to the current guidelines, we propose three principles that are closely interlinked and which may open the teaching and learning process to a broader understanding of cultural and global learning. Nigeria is a vast and hybrid country with human rights issues, a constantly changing and developing country, which has gained enormous importance within the globalised world. Hence, it is exactly those aspects that not only deserve closer attention but that can even be viewed as guiding principles when approaching this country within the context of EFL education. 2.1 Cultural Hybridity Transculturality emerged at the same time as the concepts of intercultural learning, as an “approach to culture particularity suited to exploring the hybridity of individual and collective identities and the cultural 'connections between things' in an increasingly globalized world” (Doff & Schulze- Engler 2011: 3). Delanoy states that transculturality and cultural hybridity can be used interchangeably and defines both as “a diverse set of cultural practices” (2006: 223). When considering Nigerian cultures, it becomes clear that cultural hybridisation is not only a phenomenon of 'fluid' or 'liquid' modern times (cf., for example, Bauman 2000), but it appears to have been a fact of what we would now describe as Nigerian life-worlds. Hence, in the EFL classroom it is vital to find a way of looking at “African identity as fluid, relational and always in flux” (Kalua 2009: 23) and recognising that “culture, arising from people's actions, including their capacity to reinvent and reconstitute themselves […] cannot be a totality” (ibd.). Contemporary Nigeria encompasses more than 250 ethnic groups (Federal Government of Nigeria 2019) and languages; it was under official English colonial rule for over 60 years and, due to the richness in ethnic groups and languages, officially refers itself as “Unity in Diversity”, naming “dress modes, inter-ethnic marriages, shared religious beliefs and practices as well as commerce” as examples for this unity (ibd.). Hence, Nigeria could very well be considered to be what Jackson calls “mixing zones in cross-cultural contexts”, in which cultural change and transformation “are not rarities, or pesky exceptions. They are an important, normal aspect of human life” (2019: 26). Therefore, it is obvious that approaching Nigeria by using concepts of intercultural learning “where cultures are still treated as monoliths with clear boundaries” does not makes sense (Delanoy 2006: 223). Instead, models of transculturality that “conceptualize culture as an open, fluid (‘hybrid’) and individual (yet non-arbitrary) construct which cannot be seen as a separate ‘foreign’ entity and as such does not lend itself to be ‘understood’” (Doff & Schulze- Engler 2011: 7) appear to be more suitable. Adding a global perspective to this “Unity in Diversity”, we might even Frauke Matz and Michael Rogge 162 state that “the idea that we can live in isolated moral cultures makes no sense” (Appiah 2017: 271), as the example of Nigeria might teach us how to live together in an increasingly interconnected world: Even if we grow up in places with different ideas about manners and cuisine and religion and even if, in part as a result, we disagree about some moral questions, the problem of how to share the world with people who have different views about these matters is not a theoretical, but a practical one. (ibd.) On a regional level, Nigeria can thus serve as a very appropriate opportunity of teaching students “against the notion that there is an easy fit among concepts of culture, race, and civilisation, as they learn to question and not assume a sense of loyalty to groups describing themselves as civilisations for political aims” (Jackson 2019: 25). On a continental level, by approaching Nigeria as an example for the African continent from a transcultural point of view, educators could hence pay respect to the fact that “[…] like any other continent, Africa is entitled to have multiple subcultural movements and we should reject all attempts to relegate African culture to a monolith” (Salami 2013). Furthermore, when also dealing with literature from the Nigerian diaspora - as suggested by the Ministry of Education in NRW - educators and students alike need to be aware of Afropolitanisms, which are hybrid and transcultural by definition, as they can be understood as an awareness of the interweaving of the here and there, the presence of the elsewhere on the here and vice versa, the relativization of primary roots and memberships and the way of embracing, with full knowledge of the facts, strangeness, foreignness, and remoteness, the ability to recognize one’s face in that of a foreigner and make the most of the traces of remoteness in closeness, to domesticate the unfamiliar to work with what seems to be opposites. (Mbembe 2017: 105) Thus, it becomes obvious that texts that deal with such hybrid and transcultural lives can certainly not be approached following the concepts of intercultural learning. 2.2 Global Citizenship and Cosmopolitan Education While Nigeria is seemingly not only supposed to serve as a gateway to teaching aspects of globalisation, it also serves as an example of a country outside the Western industrialised realm. However, as with the discussion of (trans-)cultural issues, when opening the canon to global issues, challenges and visions, one of the questions educators must raise is why this is not envisaged in light of a GCE approach. We base our understanding of global education on Gaudelli (2002: 52), who defines it as The Challenges of Teaching Nigeria in the German EFL Classroom 163 a curriculum that seeks to prepare students to live in a progressively interconnected world where the study of human values, institutions, and behaviours are contextually examined through a pedagogical style that promotes critical engagement of complex, diverse information toward socially meaningful action. It is exactly this intention - to prepare students to live in this interconnected world - with the focus on human values and the promotion of critical thinking that we view as more pressing and important as the appropriate discourse in accordance with the concept of ICC. On the basis of this understanding, this article proposes that the principles of GCE and cosmopolitan education (cf. Appiah 2007) should be the starting point for teaching Nigeria. After all, the desirable learning outcomes may not be achieved through a mere intercultural approach. If we do not “encourage educators and learners to see themselves socially rather than individually, to imagine possibilities of working together in solidarity on issues that matter” (Gaudelli 2016: 59) or to “join their society in imagining and reimagining a better and more just world, from a personal and local to national and global” (Jackson 2019: 146), then we should refrain from such half-hearted attempts. As stated before, the narrative of Africa presented in classrooms can form a negative or positive view - especially in light of globalisation. It is vital to avoid an “unspoken subtext […] namely - how dare Africans not simply be victims, but also shapers of globalisation and all its inherent contestations? ” (Salami 2013). It is also important to avoid a mere superficial engagement and to make it “all too easy for teachers and students to dissociate” from the concerns discussed, thus “seeing them as someone else's problem” (Gaudelli 2016: 61). Nigeria as a new country of reference should instead encourage a discourse that allows for a “humanistic orientation to global learning” (ibd. 152). Perhaps, in this respect, it might not even be constructive to just follow the principle of 'think global, act local', but to explore a more cosmopolitan view, which might help express a universal concern about this interconnected world that focuses on valuing others. After all, in this interconnected world, “the idea that we can live in isolated moral cultures makes no sense” (Appiah 2017: 271). It is time that educators also start considering teaching “ethics in the world of strangers” (ibd 2006). Thus, in line with Gaudelli, this article argues for not merely allowing a GCE approach to teaching Nigeria, which could be defined as a form of education that embraces recognition of the local as profoundly interdependent upon a myriad other locales; the presence of vast, inherent and perpetuated historical injustices and building the capacity to act in solidarity to address these injustices (Gaudelli 2016: 167). We would also like to suggest going beyond global education towards a cosmopolitan perspective, as cosmopolitanism Frauke Matz and Michael Rogge 164 with its claims for universal human rights, including the rights of those who legally have no state to guarantee such rights […] does not so much operate in opposition to ideas of national sovereignty but has transformed the status of sovereignty itself, so that the sovereign state (and any of its officers), instead of being the guarantor of rights, becomes answerable morally and in international law to the universal rights of humans. Cosmopolitanism, we might say, names a new form and practice of mediation, between the sovereignty of the state and the claims of the universal, between national and individual, between sovereign state and the ethics of human hospitality. (Young 2017: 136) 2.3 Human Rights Education As previously mentioned, Nigeria faces many human rights issues and it therefore may appear rather obvious that HRE might be a helpful starting point in teaching Nigeria. However, this article takes the stance that more is at stake here. In documents by the Council of Europe, both preceding and following the publication of the CEFR, HRE has been suggested as a helpful approach in foreign language education (see Matz forthcoming). Unfortunately, though, it has sadly lost the prominent position it once had, before the publication of the CEFR, and now appears to be included only to pay lip service to critical voices who insist on its importance within educational contexts: it is marginalised and not even considered as an addition, let alone as an alternative to ICC. In line with transcultural and cosmopolitan approaches on education (cf. Jackson 2019), HRE may be an obvious choice, nonetheless, as global or cosmopolitan citizenship education “invites a reimagining of the nation as cosmopolitan where its citizens are all connected to people in a world community extending beyond national boundaries” (Starkey 2018: 156). The United Nations Declaration on Human Rights Education and Training defines HRE as encompassing learning about rights, through rights and for rights. As well as knowledge (learning about rights) there is an emphasis on learning through rights (democratic upbringing and school practices, such as student councils and a climate that promotes recognition and respect of difference). Finally, there is learning for rights. This involves empowering young people to be able to make a difference, and equipping them with skills for change. It involves seeing human rights education as a means of transformation. (Osler & Starkey 2018: 37) 7 With regard to Nigeria, it might certainly be the more uncomfortable position to choose an HRE perspective: when teaching and learning according 7 It is interesting to note that while this definition was, for some time, accompanied by the term ‘democratic education’ in European documents, it was gradually deleted from these (see Matz forthcoming). The Challenges of Teaching Nigeria in the German EFL Classroom 165 to the principles of ICC, educators and students might just argue that, from their perspective, they disagree - in a tolerant and respectful manner - with the human rights violations in Nigeria and can then return to their everyday lives. HRE, however, demands that we think about our own possible contributions to the conditions that make these violations possible and take responsibility on a local or regional level, as human rights “demand human solidarity […], they are indivisible; they come as a package, they are not offered as a menu from which individuals or governments can select” (Osler & Starkey 2010: 48). Thus, in dealing with these issues, educators and students alike “need to be willing to recognize and defend the rights of strangers, including people with different cultures and belief systems from our own”, since “we have the responsibility to protect the rights of others” (ibd.). One might wonder how these three principles might be incorporated into a teaching sequence about Nigeria. The answer is as simple as it is logical: through topics that are closely related to the life worlds of students. 3. Religion - Nigeria as a role model for understanding and tolerance? As an example for teaching Nigeria in the EFL classroom, this article proposes to look at - amongst other topics -the diversity of religious lives within this country. A Gallup Poll in 2009 asked people worldwide about the importance of religion for their everyday life: while most European countries showed figures varying between 30 and 40% of the total population, in Nigeria, 96% of the people stated that religion was highly important for their everyday life (Crabtree 2010). This clearly underlines why Nigeria is often referred to as one of the most religious countries in the world (Campbell & Page 2018: 69). Accordingly, one cannot successfully grasp an understanding of Nigeria without having a closer look at its religions and the ongoing conflicts that are connected to them. Nigeria is by far the largest country in the world in which neither Christianity nor Islam is a minority religion, which might be one of the main reasons why Nigeria can draw on a long period of rather peaceful interaction between the different religious denominations (cf. Bourne 2015). Other religions also play an important role, ranging from Hinduism to traditional ethnic religions and beliefs. It is important to note that, in all its diversity, many hybrid forms of beliefs also exist, as many citizens “follow the traditional religion along with one of the world's major religions (Islam, Christianity etc.)” (Tersoo 2018). The main religious conflicts Nigeria faces today only started in 1978, after the military dictatorship had ended and Nigeria needed to introduce a new constitution. While the Muslim North mainly voted for the introduction of the Sharia law, Christian ethnic groups strictly argued against it. Frauke Matz and Michael Rogge 166 Ultimately, after years of violent tensions, twelve northern states introduced the Sharia law in 2000 (Loimeier 2007: 65). The attacks of the militant Islamist group Boko Haram have further damaged the relationship between Christians and Muslims, thereby paving the way for a formal division of Nigeria between a Muslim North (supporters include, for example, the Hausa, part of Yoruba people) and a Christian South (supporters include Yoruba as well as, for example, Igbo and Ijaw people, cf. Tersoo 2018). However, at second sight, Nigeria’s religious conflicts bear the danger of reducing religious life to a(nother) “single story” or creating the impression that the differences between the two main religions in Nigeria, Christianity and Islam, can be held responsible for Nigeria’s complex ethnic and religious conflicts. As Campbell and Page (2018: 69) point out: Conflicts between Christians and Muslims receive widespread media attention, even though they may begin as ethnic rivalries or disputes over land and water use, or by politicians seeking to advance their own agendas. The resulting conflicts often acquire religious labels and even coloration. When examined closely, incidents in which Muslim mobs burn down churches in the North and Middle Belt - or where Christian militias attack Fulani herdsmen and Hausa traders - appear to be motivated as much by ethnic and socioeconomic tensions as by religious antipathy. When conflicts are reported in the Nigerian and international media, religion often stands in as a proxy for more complex causes of conflict. Accordingly, the main focus for the EFL classroom should not be on the religious conflicts in Nigeria itself (e.g. the violence caused by Boko Haram, the persecution of Christians in the Muslim North) but on the complexities of religions and mutual understanding that take place beyond the conflicts. In terms of GCE, it is important to let students critically reflect on the fact that Western media only offers a very limited coverage of the ongoing conflicts between Muslims and Christians in Nigeria. The main focus of European media appears to be on Boko Haram and the killings of Christians in Nigeria, while there is hardly any news about the peaceful understanding between Christians and Muslims in most parts of Nigeria. Over the last years, there has been a strong trend in Nigeria's civil society towards peace and reconciliation, which is underlined by many non-governmental initiatives that promote understanding and reconciliation. The award-winning documentary The Imam and the Pastor (2006, dir: Alan Channer) focuses on this process of reconciliation, by presenting the story of Imam Muhammad Ashafa and Pastor James Wuye in northern Nigeria. Both had led armed militias during the violent ethnic and religious conflicts between Christians and Muslims in Kaduna since the late 1990s, which were caused by the introduction of Sharia law in Kaduna. The riots, which ended in 2000, probably led to more than 2,000 deaths. After years of violence, both The Challenges of Teaching Nigeria in the German EFL Classroom 167 men have since turned a different direction, are now co-directors of the Muslim-Christian Interfaith Mediation Centre and have joined their efforts to resolve the conflicts in northern Nigeria. The documentary, however, not only tells the story of the remarkable transition of the two religious' leaders, but it also puts a new light on Nigeria’s religious and ethnic conflicts, which might offer a helpful perspective in EFL education. Recent Nollywood productions, which could also be discussed in class, clearly underline the growing demand of Nigeria's society to overcome the conflicts and to find new ways of mutual understanding. The film More Troubles (2017, dir. Haggai Nwokolo) tells the story of a Christian young man and his Muslim girlfriend, who have fled from Boko Haram, and the everyday struggles between Christians and Muslims in the eastern parts of Nigeria. In a similar way, Hakkunde (2017, dir. Oluseyi Asurf) tells the story of a young graduate, who leaves Lagos to find work in Kaduna, in northern Nigeria. The film was Nigeria's first crowd-funded film production, which clearly shows that the film can draw on a wide consensus among Nigeria's society. It addresses a multitude of conflicts in Nigeria, including drug abuse, discrimination, unemployment, cultural conflicts and religious and ethnic diversity. In a rather light-hearted way, the film demonstrates how the protagonist is finally able to find his fortune in Nigeria, by realising the diversity of Nigeria, taking a different view and leaving stereotypes behind. For classroom contexts, it seems essential to stress Nigeria’s religious hybridity and, in light of an HRE approach, address the religious and ethnic conflicts between Christians and Muslims in Nigeria, without putting too much emphasis on the conflict itself. Instead of generally blaming, for example, Boko Haram or Islamic extremism for the religious and ethnic conflicts, and thereby taking a post-colonial perspective on Nigeria, students need to be critically aware of the ongoing change in Nigeria's society and the peoples’ attempts to overcome cultural, ethnic and religious conflicts. At the same time, students would be given the opportunity to learn about the hybridity of religion in Nigeria itself, as both world religions cannot be seen as monolithic: In general, though with many exceptions, relations are good between the mainstream Christian denominations and the traditional Sufi-influenced Islam of the emirs of Northern Nigeria. Salafist Muslims, again with many exceptions, do not have close relations with any of the Christian denominations. Particularly poor, are relations between Salafist Islam and the “African” or Pentecostal churches, perhaps because each has a populist and dogmatic outlook and they compete for converts among those who were previously adherent to traditional religion. (Campbell & Page 2018: 71) Frauke Matz and Michael Rogge 168 The lesson that can be learned is that overcoming cultural hybridity can and should not be a goal (which, in Nigeria's case, would ultimately lead to the separation of the country into various religious and ethnic entities). Instead, students could be offered the opportunity to learn how to start a conversation about this hybridity, in an effort to reach a mutual understanding (cf. Appiah 2017). It is this understanding, which sometimes might even lead to change, that the example of Chrislam underlines. Chrislam is a syncretistic movement, which blends the basic ideas of Christianity and Islam, based on the connections that are to be found in the Bible and the Koran. It emerged in the 1970s in Lagos and has grown rapidly over the last 45 years. The emergence of the various Chrislam movements in modern Nigeria (Ifeoluwa and Oke Tude being the most prominent) can easily be explained by the geographical distribution of the various ethnic groups in Nigeria, as Janson (2016: 646) points out: That these movements originated in Nigeria is of course revealing because its inhabitants are strictly divided between Muslims and Christians along a predominantly north-south axis. […] Christian-Muslim conflict has played a role in Nigerian politics since the centralization of the political system in the 1970s, and it has become increasingly important since the political liberalization associated with the return to civilian rule in 1999, when Christians and Muslims competed for access to the state and its resources. It is therefore highly remarkable that, in Nigeria's southwest, which is predominantly mixed in denomination and has developed a culture of mutual understanding and peaceful co-existence, Chrislam has emerged to actually overcome the religious conflicts that seem to dominate Christian-Muslim relations in most other parts of Nigeria. In contrast to Christianity and Islam, which both focus on orthodoxy (i.e. the correct belief and doctrine), Chrislam puts more effort on orthopraxy (i.e. the correct religious practice) and provides its worshippers with practical tools for everyday religious practice, drawing from Christianity and Islam alike: […] Chrislam does not just promise peace and fortune in heaven; it wants to ensure its membership that peace and fortune can be had on earth too. Remarkably, whereas Christian and Muslim theological doctrines focus on salvation and the afterlife, Chrislam promises a better life on earth (Janson 2016: 663). In classroom contexts, the analysis of Chrislam promotes a different understanding of the role of religion in Nigeria, moving beyond the rather traditional understanding of the conflicts between Christianity and Islam (thus making a peaceful understanding between the two religious groups highly unlikely), towards a more hybrid and tolerant understanding of religion in Nigeria, which can be described as The Challenges of Teaching Nigeria in the German EFL Classroom 169 a heterogeneous and unstable arrangement of practices that are not reducible to a single logic. Taking such a course may eventually shift the attention from a narrow analysis of ‘world’ religion as a coherent belief system towards a perspective that focuses on how religious practitioners actually live religion in their daily lives, and the ambiguities, inconsistencies, aspirations, and double standards as the constitutive moments in their lived religiosity (Janson 2016: 676). 4. Conclusion Choosing Nigeria as a new county of reference for EFL classrooms in North- Rhine Westphalia is a bold choice. It opens up the canon to an African country, which has not yet been considered in this educational context. At the same time, though, the possible effectiveness inherent in this choice may very well prove to be counteracted by the pursuit of an intercultural approach, as put forth in the current binding NRW guidelines, since this “reductive tendency […] to see others not as individuals, but as representatives of larger groups, and the subsequent way that we see ourselves in the light of others’ view of us, is seemingly connected to the categorical way we are wired to think about the world” (Gaudelli 2016: 83). We hope that educators might first use a hybrid/ transcultural approach to teaching Nigeria, presenting many voices and multimodal perspectives that might enable our students to entertain the possibility of being in “conversation with one another” and to recognise that “the heart of a conversation is not about the search for agreement. It is about getting to know each other in ways that mean we can share the world precisely without agreement” (Appiah 2017: 272). Furthermore, we also hope that different voices will be heard in our classrooms, as we also believe that, in Dabiri's words, “the problem lies in the fact that we still don’t hear the narratives of Africans who are not privileged per se” (2017: 207). As Jackson states in her observations about the importance of a global and cosmopolitan civic education, “Education is a moral act” (2019: 144), and it should be the aim of education to prepare students “for engaging in the dynamic, real world justly and meaningful” (ibd. 145). 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