Negotiating gender and social change in contemporary northern Nigerian fiction: A comparative study of Habiba and the thing about compromise

Abstract

This paper examines the representation of gender and social change in Razinat Mohammed's Habiba andMaryam Awaisu's The Thing About Compromise, focusing on how both novels construct female agencywithin the socio-cultural realities of contemporary Northern Nigeria. While existing scholarship hasextensively explored themes such as patriarchy, child marriage, female oppression, and women's educationin Northern Nigerian fiction, comparatively little attention has been paid to the ways in which negotiationfunctions as a culturally grounded strategy through which women challenge patriarchal structures andfacilitate social transformation. Drawing on Chikwenye Okonjo Ogunyemi's African Womanism and ObiomaNnaemeka's Nego-Feminism, the study adopts a qualitative comparative literary approach based on closereading and thematic analysis of the selected texts. The analysis demonstrates that both novels portraypatriarchy as a dynamic social system sustained through economic dependence, cultural expectations, andintergenerational complicity rather than male domination alone. At the same time, the protagonists resist theseconstraints through negotiation, education, strategic compromise, and personal resilience instead of outrightconfrontation. The study further argues that education emerges as a transformative force that enables womento renegotiate unequal gender relations while contributing to broader social change within their communities.Through a comparative analysis of the two novels, the study extends existing research on contemporaryNorthern Nigerian fiction and demonstrates that meaningful social transformation is portrayed as a gradualprocess achieved through culturally embedded forms of negotiation rather than radical rupture with tradition.