Singing Conflict into Peace: Women’s Political Agency, Satire, and Social Criticism in Aghem Ufueng Performance

This paper examines how women use satire and social criticism in Ufueng performance to respond to conflict and promote peace in Aghem, North West Region of Cameroon. Ufueng, a women’s Nyanga dance, is more than a form of cultural entertainment; it provides women with a public space to speak about problems affecting their families and community. The paper focuses on two Ufueng texts, “Farmer-grazier Problem” and “Social Criticism,” songs which address land conflict, political interests, violence, mourning, and the demands placed on women to perform during moments of communal suffering. Drawing on Feminist Peace Theory and Performance Theory, the study reads these songs as forms of political speech through which women expose social problems, question authority, express collective suffering, and call attention to the conditions that produce conflict. The analysis shows that satire and social criticism allow the performers to confront sensitive issues in a culturally recognized form while encouraging reflection on communal responsibility and peaceful coexistence. The paper argues that Ufueng expands the understanding of women’s peacebuilding beyond formal political institutions by showing how performance can become a space for criticism, negotiation, and political agency. It concludes that women’s Ufueng performances represent an important indigenous form of peacebuilding in which singing, mourning, satire, and social criticism become ways of speaking about conflict and imagining possibilities for peace.

Ufueng; Aghem; Women’s Political Agency; Peacebuilding; Satire; Social Criticism; Oral Literature; Performance; Conflict Resolution; Cameroon.

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