GENDER ROLES ON STAGE: AN EXAMINATION OF SOME SELECTED NIGERIAN CHILDREN’S PLAYS

Abstract

This study examines the limited scholarships on how Nigerian children’s plays represent and negotiate gender roles. It investigates how gender stereotypes are perpetrated or reinforced. It aims to show how gender roles are constructed and contested in two Nigerian children’s plays using Judith Butler’s gender performative theory. The study employs qualitative textual analysis of Ukala’sThe Tortoise and the Leopard and Osofisan’sThe Moon and the Cape. The plays were analysed for characterization and thematic contents. Findings reveal that both plays make gender roles visible, challenge traditional stereotypes of masculinity and femininity and present alternatives based on cooperation and role reversal. The study concludes that children’s plays can disrupt gender binaries among young Nigerian audiences. It is therefore recommended that playwrights should write more gender-balanced children’s plays, that Drama teachers should always follow performance with discussions, that parents and communities should balance children’s story diet, and that the Federal Ministry of Education should sponsor the production of more gender-neutral plays.