Making Research on Hausa Films available online: Ali Liman Abubakar’s MA thesis: Storyline Structure in Hausa Home Videos: An Analysis of Mai Kudi, Sanafahna and Albashi

One of our goals here at the Hausa Home Video Resource Centre is to make as much scholarly information about Hausa films as possible available to researchers.  We have created a working bibliography with a list of publications, theses, and ongoing work to assist researchers, which can be accessed at the above link. (This is still very incomplete, so we welcome contributions from and collaboration with other institutions who would like to provide us with lists of theses available at their institutions or from scholars who would like to fill in the missing holes in the publications bibliography.)

 

We also hope scholars will help us make their work available either as a hard copy to keep on file here at Bayero University or online at this website. We welcome book donations (to keep  on file at the centre), pdf files of articles, or PhD, MA, and BA theses.  We hope to provide some amount of correction to global inequalities in access to literature by providing online access to the work of those doing scholarship in Nigeria, which often is available only in an institutional library, as well as access to available research for Nigerians and others doing research in locations without access to massive libraries and expensive scholarly journal sites.

 

Ali Liman Abubakar, who completed his MA thesis: Storyline Structure in the Hausa Home Videos: An Analysis of Mai Kudi, Sanafahna, and Albashi, in the Department of Mass Communications at Bayero University is the first to agree to allow us to upload his MA thesis here. The MA thesis can be accessed at this link: Liman–MA thesis 2006–BUK–Hausa film PDF.

 

In the working bibliography, we have also tried to provide links to other works that are available online. If other scholars would like to follow suit or already have their scholarly work online and would like us to link to it, please send us an email at hausahomevideoresource[at]gmail.com. We welcome peer-reviewed scholarly material on any aspect of Nigerian or African popular culture, but particularly film.

 

 Storyline Structure in the Hausa Home Videos: An Analysis of Mai Kudi, Sanafahna, and Albashi by Ali Liman Abubakar

Abstract:

 This study analyzes storyline structure in three Hausa home videos;

Mai Kudi (The Rich Man), Sanafahna (with time truth shall dawn) and Albashi (Salary). The study measures storyline structure in these films against a Hollywood film industry model of story writing “the Hero’s Journey”. It uses narrative analysis as its analytical tool, and narrative theory as its framework. After analyzing these videos, the study found that the major elements of storyline structure in Vogler’s model formed the framework of the storyline structure in Hausa home videos analyzed. However, in spite of the preponderance of these elements within the storyline structure, there are significant variations to Vogler’s model. Specifically, Vogler’s model has some twelve stages spread on the universal structure of storytelling, i.e. beginning, middle and end. Few of these stages were found to exist in Hausa narrative structure, perhaps due to cultural differences between Western, Indian and Hausa cultures. The study therefore recommends screenwriters and producers to be aware of the existence of standard models of scriptwriting. It also recommends more training for script writers in the Hausa film industry.