ABSTRACT
This chapter presents the term identity politics refers to forces organizing and appealing to a group defined by specific ascriptive characteristics, and mobilizing this group identity as a means of gaining access to power. During early colonialism the politics of identity was directed largely against the British as Christian overlords. In northern Nigeria the bases of identity politics have been particular definitions of ethnicity and religion, specifically Islam. Islam has been associated with state power in northern Nigeria since the fifteenth century. The conquest of Northern Nigeria by the British resulted in a new impetus for Islam. The position of Islamists in the 1980s has allowed women more rights than that of the 1950s. It has meant that women have increased access to basic literacy and ideological sanction not to be wholly restricted to seclusion. Nonetheless, the lack of women's organizations does not mean that women were not active in the restructuring and conflicts over gender relations within identity politics.
