Sweet Medicine

This episode turns to fear, the other core concept of this project. Participants discuss what is fear to you? What does it feel like in your mind and body? What does it signal to you? What do you do with it? And their conversations brought up reflections on self-identity, resilience, boundaries and control. 

The 'Does Your God Sleep?' project explores young Nigerians’ relationship with fear and God through a series of discussions with various individuals over the course of two days in 2023 (and so the contents of this podcast do not necessarily represent their current opinions). The seven episodes are a product of an event where an intimate space was designed for inquiry and reflection on spirituality and community. 

If you’re listening and you’d love to share your own answers to/thoughts on the questions, please write or record your response and share it to [email protected] ! 

Watch on YouTube:

https://youtu.be/jRfMnrG5G1g 

Get the Restful anthology: https://restful.ng/products/restful-anthology-print

Websites: 

https://www.studiostyles.org

https://immaculataabba.com

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

At the beginning of this episode, Peter shares overhearing someone say- whatever the outcome is, if you believe that God is consistent, God is consistent. So you’re going to be fine or not fine. But the outcome of the election should not have a bearing on the nature of your God, unless He’s not a God, [correction] unless He’s not God. 

“Unless He’s not a God. [correction] unless He’s not God” captures the essence of this episode’s question. 

In this episode, the participants used anecdotes and metaphors tire, maybe because it’s a dicey question. It was an important question for me to ask because one of the crucial pillars of religious conflict is the question of territory. Where does your God cover? Would my prayers for you touch you, especially if they aren’t your prayers for yourself? Is my God also your God and you’re simply living in ignorance and so, doing God wrong? Is there truly enough space in the sky for my God to be my God and yours yours? If the idea of God that it is supreme, what does it mean for a thing to be supreme? I have my own personal answers on this matter but as with this entire project, these aren’t yes or no questions, this space right here is not about what is right and wrong but about knowing what we’re working with. 

The conversations explored the relationship between faith, civic and personal responsibility, free will, and the nature of God's sovereignty. 

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The 'Does Your God Sleep?' project explores young Nigerians’ relationship with fear and God through a series of discussions with various individuals over the course of two days in 2023 (and so the contents of this podcast do not necessarily represent their current opinions). The seven episodes are a product of an event where an intimate space was designed for inquiry and reflection on spirituality and community. 

If you’re listening and you’d love to share your own answers to/thoughts on the questions, please write or record your response and share it to [email protected] ! 

Watch on YouTube:

https://youtu.be/jRfMnrG5G1g 

Get the Restful anthology: https://restful.ng/products/restful-anthology-print

Websites: 

https://www.studiostyles.org

https://immaculataabba.com

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, the participants answer the titular question: Does Your God Sleep?

Responses showed their perspectives on divine agency and presence and how they think of their God in terms of human scale and activity.

The 'Does Your God Sleep?' project explores young Nigerians’ relationship with fear and God through a series of discussions with various individuals over the course of two days in 2023 (and so the contents of this podcast do not necessarily represent their current opinions). The seven episodes are a product of an event where an intimate space was designed for inquiry and reflection on spirituality and community. 

If you’re listening and you’d love to share your own answers to/thoughts on the questions, please write or record your response and share it to [email protected] ! 

Watch on YouTube:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8F2cCUtHKfA&list=PL4b3wzw3wISAMXVt0TkOLGGn-7cumDyQz&index=1 

Get the Restful anthology: https://restful.ng/products/restful-anthology-print

Websites: 

https://www.studiostyles.org

https://immaculataabba.com

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, the participants share who or what God is to them. Responses varied from Abrahamic teachings to technology and one’s self reflecting a diversity of foundational beliefs and experiences the participants use in navigating life. 

The 'Does Your God Sleep?' project explores young Nigerians’ relationship with fear and God through a series of discussions with various individuals over the course of two days in 2023 (and so the contents of this podcast do not necessarily represent their current opinions). The seven episodes are a product of an event where an intimate space was designed for inquiry and reflection on spirituality and community.

If you’re listening and you’d love to share your answers to/thoughts on the questions, please write or record your response and share it to [email protected] ! 

Watch on YouTube:

https://youtu.be/jRfMnrG5G1g 

Get the Restful anthology: https://restful.ng/products/restful-anthology-print

My website: 

https://www.studiostyles.org

https://immaculataabba.com

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Introducing the 'Does Your God Sleep?' project which explores young Nigerians’ relationship with fear and God through a series of discussions with various individuals over the course of two days in 2023. It is organised under seven questions: Who or what is God to you? Does your God sleep? Is your God's influence limited to you and your territory? What is fear to you? Do you fear God? What role does fear play in society as you see it? And does your God fear what you fear?

The seven episodes are a product of an event where an intimate space was designed for inquiry and reflection on spirituality and community. And it is the prototype for a research practice I hope to continue.

Come with an open mind.

Knowledge creates options.

Watch the videos on YouTube, out every Sunday at noon: https://youtu.be/jRfMnrG5G1g

Website: immaculataabba.com or studiostyles.org

Newsletter: studiostyles.substack.com (Culture Pays)

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hello, Immaculata here. A quick summary of what I’ve been up to so far this year: the Culture Pay Survey aimed at understanding the financial struggles of cultural workers in Nigeria; working on my vision for a public humanities library; and publishing the Restful anthology. 

Culture Pay Report 2025 PDF: https://tinyurl.com/culturepayreport

Link to buy a copy of Restful: https://restful.ng/products/restful-anthology-print

A guide for printing art books in Lagos: https://tinyurl.com/printingartbooks 

My printing journey: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eDu375mECGY&list=PL4b3wzw3wISCFYt2t-60tn9GO7U-rHqqe

Chapters

00:00 Introduction and Personal Reflections

01:39 Cultural Work and the Culture Pay Survey

04:12 The Vision for a Public Humanities Library

07:01 Publishing Restful

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

For my final guest episode, I’m with the researcher and designer Oluwakemi Agbato who lives by the question: “How can we make good things to live with?” And explores that question through her research and design studio, Studio GB and her jewellery brand RENIKEJI. This conversation was full of passion on both sides for how history continues to live with us in the objects around us.

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04:41 James Baldwin on Suffering and Achieving One’s Own Authority

15:06 The Rich History of Nigerian Silk

19:34 The 1960 Nigeria Exhibition

22:16 “It becomes real, you’re the one pursuing knowledge, knowledge is not pursuing you.”

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Website: sweetmedicine.me 

Newsletter: studiostyles.substack.com.

Instagram: @ss.studiostyles

Support Sweet Medicine: https://flutterwave.com/donate/olt4tbjytsjr

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Today’s conversation is with Mobolaji Otuyelu, the founder of two startups—a kitchenware company AGBO ILÉ and Ọjà Wellness Foods, a beverage company. As an entrepreneur focused on black innovation and social change, Mobolaji is also deeply involved with the Federation of Informal Workers’ Organisations of Nigeria (FIWON), where she collaborates on member-led initiatives to provide tangible support like health insurance, mortgage opportunities, and pension schemes for informal workers. In this conversation we discuss the ties between economic development and healing—the two need each other—, the gift of now and the power of the contemporary.

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04:02 FIWON: A Model for Informal Workers

08:48 Resourcefulness in Nigerian Entrepreneurship

16:15 Healing Through Money and Economic Capital

25:34 The Gift of Now/Culture is Dynamic

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Mentioned in the episode:

https://www.mondragon-corporation.com/en/

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Website: sweetmedicine.me 

Newsletter: studiostyles.substack.com.

Instagram: @ss.studiostyles

Support Sweet Medicine: https://flutterwave.com/donate/olt4tbjytsjr

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Consider joining or supporting Kwanda

From the founder of Kwanda, Jermaine Craig: "I'm focused on making the world a more generous place. I'm interested in the potential of the collective, not the individual. I want to get future philanthropists started earlier by gathering as 'Micro Philanthropists'. A blocker to generosity is a lack of transparency and trust, so I'm building Kwanda. This platform brings diasporans together to pool capital and fund local-led projects in Africa. The platform is financially transparent and allows members to decide how funds are spent."

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

I've spent the past seven weeks discussing why social healing, why the humanities when people are starving, what do we do with History, what are Nigerian nervous conditions, what kind of society is Nigeria and why was Nigeria made in the first place. I set up these questions to give a sense of what the problem is, and how the centuries before now led us here.

With all this information, how can we work towards these resilient, compassionate and responsible futures? My suggestions: take ownership and pay attention to our bodies.

This episode includes an excerpt from this talk, What Kids Can't Do: Youth, Historical Agency, and Authority, by Abosede George (Associate Professor of History, Barnard College and Columbia University) at Wolf Humanities Center's 2020-21 Forum on Choice, March 17, 2021. 

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03:21 Is agency all that matters? Abosede George on foregrounding other dimensions of being human

10:04 Connection comes with risk of loss and failure, connect anyway

12:47 My body’s my buddy / Body go tell you

18:24 Denying our self-sovereignty

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Website: sweetmedicine.me 

Newsletter: studiostyles.substack.com.

Instagram: @ss.studiostyles

Support Sweet Medicine: https://flutterwave.com/donate/olt4tbjytsjr

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.