The public culture’s criticism of the vibrant Hausa popular culture was so much that we were forced to organize an International Conference on Hausa film in August 2003. The main objective was to give an opportunity for all stakeholders to get together and thrash out issues. The conference was hugely successful, attracting 54 papers with leads from Matthias Krings and Brian Larkin. A book of the proceedings was published in 2004—and became the first documentation of the video film industry in Nigeria from the perspective of the practitioners themselves. 

The Great Soyayya Debate, curated by Ibrahim Sheme on his Write Stuff column in New Nigerian Weekly attracted international attention, especially of Graham Furniss of the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London. We became acquaintances when he came to Kano to present his book, “Poetry, Prose and Popular Culture in Hausa” (Edinburgh University Press for the International African Institute, 1996). 

Graham was also Sa’idu Ahmad Baɓura’s doctoral supervisor at SOAS, and Sa’idu being my friend, Graham also became my mentor. The relationship was further strengthened when he came to launch his book at BUK. He was very excited with the new debates about literature, having amassed hundreds of the books which he compiled into “Bibliography of Hausa Popular Fiction 1987-2002” (Rüdiger Köppe Verlag, Cologne, Germany, 2004). The debates frontend and enriched the bibliography. 

I was therefore surprised when on May 15, 2004 I received a mail from Kimani Njogu from  Kenya, informing me that the International African Institute was organizing a seminar on Media in Africa early August 2004 and I was invited to present a paper on film and video in Africa. It was Graham who gave my name. But even before the Nairobi conference, I received another mail from Anja Oed and Uta Reuster-Jahn from Johannes Guttenberg University, Germany,  inviting me to attend the Janheinz Jahn Symposium on African Language Literatures: Production, Mediation, Reception at the university from November 16-19, 2004. Again, on the recommendation of Graham Furniss who was originally invited, but suggested that my works were more current – and ethnographic – than his. That’s true mentorship. 

Earlier in Kano, I had extended an invitation to Heike Behrend, professor of Ethnology at the Institute of African Studies and Egyptology at the University of Cologne where she was the Director from 1994-2012. Through a student of hers, Matthias Krings, then in Kano for post-doctoral fieldwork, she became fascinated by my works and wanted to come to Kano to do fieldwork, particularly on a film, Titanic Masoyiyata (dir. Ashu Brown), a Hausa appropriation of James Cameron’s hugely successful Hollywood film Titanic (1997). Her brief visit to Kano was extremely rewarding in the sense of creating a greater bondage between our works. 

So, when I arrived Nairobi at the Njogu Seminar, the first person I met was Heike! It was a wonderful reunion for she was a truly wonderful warm and motherly person. When I told her I would be coming to Mainz in November, she immediately extended an invitation to me to address her class of PG students as a Visiting Professor on November 15, 2004. So, November 2004 saw me visiting Kenya and Germany for the first time. Germany was to become regular up to 2024 when, from my count, I have visited Germany more than 17 times. Indeed, Heike, who involved me in a series of researches adopted me as her ‘sohn’ because she shared the same birthdate as my own biological mother!

Additionally, Graham himself invited me to the School of African and Oriental studies, University of London in September 2006 to present the year’s Mary Kingsley Zochonis Lecture for the African Studies Association. The lecture, “Transglobal Media Flows and African Popular Culture: Revolution and Reaction In Muslim Hausa Popular Culture” was published as a monograph through the generous financial support from Ibrahim Ado Kurawa. 

The following year it was the turn of Brian Larkin to invite me to present a Public Lecture at Barnard Forum on Migration, Barnard College, Columbia University, New York, United States on November 7, 2007. We became acquaintances with Brian during his field work in Kano. He actually obtained his PhD in 1998, the year after I became a professor. Our research paths intersected so much. When I started writing my definitive history of Hausa Cinema, Brian helped to correct the title during a meeting we attended together in Saly, Senegal. 

When I returned from Germany in 2004, after seeing the success of the International Conference on Hausa Films, Gausu Ahmad, the then HOD Mass Communication Bayero University Kano invited me to teach some courses in the Department. This would not be my first engagement with the Department. Much earlier, the late Mike Egbon, then the HOD had invited me to help supervise Umar Faruk on his doctoral thesis. Umar is a family friend, so I was delighted to be involved in his research. Thus, by the time Mal. Gausu invited me to teach in the Department, I was already a familiar face. It was an opportunity for me to academically articulate all the various researches I have been doing in quite a few courses. By November 2005, I was formally appointed a Part-Time Lecturer in the Department of Mass Communication by the University. 

From 2004 onwards it was whirlwind of visits to various universities in Africa (Niger, Senegal, Morocco, Egypt, Kenya, Ethiopia), US (New York, Illinois, Florida, New Jersey), UK, and Europe (Germany, Switzerland, Poland)—truly having the time of my life—exploring libraries, book stores, and prawns in garlic sauce! The only bothersome thing was I was still stuck to Education, despite engaging in what I call Alphabet Soup Agencies and their spooky data gathering. Unknown to me, salvation was on the way. 

On November 30, 2008, I was a Visiting Professor at the Afrika-Asien Institute (AAI), University of Hamburg, Germany when I met Nina Pawlak who attended the conference I was invited specifically to address. She offered me the possibility of being a European Union Visiting Professor at the Department of African Languages and Cultures, University of Warsaw, Poland. While waiting for the process to actualize, I was privileged to be invited to present the Opening Lecture of the Center of Competence on Africa at the Center for African Studies, University of Basel, Switzerland on February 18, 2009. The paper, the very first in the series, was titled (Hell on Earth: Media-Mediated Urban Sexuality and Islamicate Popular Culture in Northern Nigeria and opened the doors for me for repeated visits to Basel, a beautiful city (Muhammad S Balogun, I know you must have been there!). 

In the meantime, after the usual bureaucratic protocols between the European Union and the University of Warsaw, Poland, I was eventually appointed European Union Visiting Professor for the project ‘The Modern University’ at the Department of African Languages and Cultures, University of Warsaw, Poland from 1st March to 31st May 2012. At Warsaw, I taught two highly popular courses: Transnationalism and African Popular Culture, and Oral Traditions in Local and Global Contexts. I also supervised and examined Isa Yusuf Chamo, a BUK colleague doing his doctorate at the Department. 

The drama happened after I returned from Poland in June 2012. I immediately reported to my Vice-Chancellor (who graciously approved the trip), Prof. Abubakar Adamu Rasheed,  with a full report. The next thing I knew, he grabbed my hand, dragged me to his office and ordered me to bring all my publications and research activities in “this area you are always flying out of the country for!” When I asked the reason, he said, “it is to consider the possibility of appointing you another professor, based on assessment.” I was shocked to say the least, because I have never heard of a person with two professorships, at least in Nigeria. It turned out that it is indeed a rare academic occurrence, even ‘over there’. 

There is, however, a difference between promotion to the professorial chair and appointment to the same chair. Promotion follows specific stages and milestones along a career trajectory, starting, usually from low (Graduate Assistant) to the ultimate (tenured professor). Appointment, however, does not follow that path, and is based on evaluation of contribution to a field, usually in a field different from the one you would normally have been promoted a professor. People can be appointed professors regardless of how they acquired their experience that qualifies them. An anecdote to illustrate this was of a famous Muslim jurist in northern Nigeria whose books on Islamic Studies we all read, and whose corpus was assessed and was found appointable as a professor, even though he was not even in the academic circles. 

In this regard, examples of cases of a single person having two professorships included John Holdren, a professor of Environmental Science (School of Science) and Public Policy (School of Government). At Harvard University, John Holdren was part of the Kennedy School of Government and the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, reflecting his work on climate policy. Another is Noam Chomsky, who is best known for his work in linguistics but also made significant contributions to philosophy and cognitive science. He held joint appointments in Linguistics and Philosophy at MIT. Edward O. Wilson, known as the “father of sociobiology” (and whose books I studied as an M.A. student at the University of London) was a professor of both Biology and Social Sciences at Harvard, bridging evolutionary biology and human sociology. Cornel West held professorships in both Religion and African American Studies at Princeton University and later at Harvard University, often integrating philosophy and political theory into his work. Kwame Anthony Appiah, a philosopher known for his work in African and African American Studies, has held dual appointments in Philosophy and African Studies, including roles at Princeton and NYU.

Subsequently, Bayero University did the due diligence and sifted my publications and paper presentations from 2001 to 2012 (which came up to 32 book chapters/book/journal articles, and 57 conference presentations) and requested for evaluation of these publication for the possible appointment to the rank of professor of Media and Cultural Communication. Based on the external assessment of these selected publications, Prof. Abubakar Adamu Rashid informed me of the positive outcome in January 2013. I was thus appointed professor of Media and Cultural Communication from October 2012. The icing on the cake? I was transferred from the Department of Science Education (where I was the HOD) to the Department of Mass Communication with effect from the date of my second professorship. And that was how the second professorship came about! 

I was hugely welcomed in the Department of Mass Communication by all the staff, as well as the Dean of the Faculty of Social & Management Sciences (the parent faculty of Department of Mass Communication at the time), Prof. Adamu Idris Tanko, who also strongly supported my appointment to the position, and who demonstrated his excitement about me joining the Faculty and even arranged a reception. In the Department of Mass Communication, I was given the largest most furnished office in the Department! Talk about royal reception!!

As I did with my first professorship, I sought to immediately present my professorial inaugural lecture in the new area immediately I was announced. And as in 2001, I had to wait, although this time for only a year, before I was given the opportunity to present the Inaugural Lecture, my second, on July 9, 2014. It was titled “Imperialism from Below: Media Contra-flows and the Emergence of Metrosexual Hausa Visual Culture.” It was the 15th in the University. 

With this recap, I celebrate the anniversary of these twenty years of my apotheosis—transformation—by reciting the Prophet Sulaiman (AS) Prayer: "My Lord, enable me to be grateful for Your favor which You have bestowed upon me and upon my parents and to do righteousness of which You approve. And admit me by Your mercy into [the ranks of] Your righteous servants." (Surah Nami: 27:19). 

Alhamdulillah. Tamat/Fin/Coda. \End. 

BTW, some have indicated this should be part of my biography. It is, as indicated by Muhsin Ibrahim when I first got back on Facebook. A book, in sha Allah, is on the way for public presentation on Saturday April 25, 2026, when I exit from the University on retirement. The cover (although could change!) is reproduced again below. The title, “From the Cradle to the Saddle” was suggested by Fatuhu Mustapha, who actually came up with the idea of the book  and is one of the editors. Thanks to everyone for the show of love and support. Allah Ya sakawa kowa da alhairi. Allah Ya ba mu wucewa lafiya. 

Illus. Poster of my first international lecture at the University of Cologne, Germany, November 15, 2004, and draft cover of the biography/memoir