Global Journal of Human-Social Science, A: Arts and Humanities, Volume 22 Issue 5

© 2022 Global Journals Volume XXII Issue V Version I 9 ( ) Global Journal of Human Social Science - Year 2022 A A Social Ecological Reading of Kaine Agary’s Yellow Yellow unborn baby. In her confused state, she realizes that Admiral only took advantage of her and affirms it when she says “I could not bear the shame of being seen as one of the poor little girls taken advantage of by her sugar daddy” (p. 163). Hence, she resolves to abort the pregnancy. She becomes disillusion and laments that there are so many other teenage girls like her who face similar situation as hers on daily basis. She avers that: There were other people around me whose fathers were a mystery to them, just like mine was to me. Men who had strayed from their “happily” married lives and fathered some of them; men in high society who had no problem sleeping with their lower-class mothers but remembered their social status when they got someone pregnant. (p. 174) Besides the exploitation of teenage girls, Agary also highlights the exploitation of the Niger Delta by the oil companies and the security agencies, as well as the crisis in the region that is fueled by claims of ethnic domination and oppression, which are some of the basic reasons for most of the ecological crisis today as perceived by Bookchin. The Ijaw and Itsekiri ethnic nations have been locked in battle for years over domination. The battles are mostly bloody as people from both sides lose their lives over claims of repelling ethnic dominance by the other ethnic group. There is no gainsaying that what fuels the crisis is majorly based on who controls the resources of the region, “who owned the land? Who were the tenants? Who deceived whom? In what year?” (p. 157). Based on these claims over the control of the region’s natural resources, the two parties have continually locked horns in fierce battles for a very long time spanning over decades, and that leaves the region vulnerable as a war-prone region. Consequent upon these constant break-down of order, the government deploys military personnel to the region in order to curtail the region’s restiveness and also to enable increased production for the oil companies. Outside the line of their duty, the military men become instrument of oppression in the hands of the oil workers against those who dare to question the deplorable state of the communities. These are some of the issues that the Ijaw youth group brought to the attention of Admiral. In a meeting with Admiral, They talked about how the oil companies were using the Nigerian armed forces as their private security details to terrorise and sometimes kill innocent villagers who question the inequality of their situation – living in squalor while barrels of oil pumped out of their land provided the luxury that surrounded the oil workers and the elite of Nigeria. (p. 158) According to Bookchin, it is the unchallenged exploitation of humans by humans that provided the avenue to further brutally extend the exploitation to non- human members of the environment without recourse of any form. The fact that human exploitation is unchallenged gives room for a further brutal exploitation of non-humans. The fact that the capitalists of the society exploit Bibi, Zilayefa and Emem freely and unchallenged give them the effrontery to exploit the environment as well. That is why the oil companies will pollute the land, water, air and in the process destroy and kill all the living beings within the environment and yet, feel unperturbed. That is why the oil spill in Zilayefa’s community can spread out “covering more land and drowning small animals in its path” (p. 4) and also pollute the air as Zilayefa confirms that “it was strong – so strong it made my head hurt and turned my stomach” (p. 4). On the other hand, Sergio travels all over the world especially to rural communities like Zilayefa’s in search of economic trees to cut down for commercial purposes not minding the negative effects of such action on the environment. He informs Zilayefa that “they were interested in logging timber from the forest” (p. 22) in her community and that is the reason he came. These brutal exploitation and destruction of non-human members of the environment is what Bookchin is interested in addressing and as such comes up with the believe that the brutal exploitation transcends beyond economic reasons but deeply rooted in the social crisis that permeates all over the world. IV. C onclusion The organized and supervised unequal distribution of wealth is what is majorly responsible for the inequality that pervades the Nigerian society. It has been institutionalized and has continued to strengthen social and class difference in the country. These inequalities, exploitation, and class difference is what Murray Bookchin (2006) decries as the major causes of ecological crisis that plagues most of the world today. This is because for him, exploitation, inequality, class distinction and other forms of exploitative domination first started with and among humans before it was extended to non-humans. The exploitation of non- humans as represented in Kaine Agary’s (2006) Yellow Yellow is an extention of the exploitation of humans and an expression of the capitalist zeal to subdue the earth. According to Bookchin, the exploitation of non-humans cannot stop unless there is an end to the exploitation of humans. The critical reading of Kaine Agary’s Yellow Yellow validates part of Bookchin’s claims that our ecological crisis emanates from social crisis as espoused in Social Ecology and Communalism . In that regard, some of these social issues are highlighted here so as to ascertain how they are precursors to the exploitation of the ultimate subalterns – the non-human members of the ecology. The novel has a feminist undertone in that it highlights different facets of exploitations as it affects women, especially those of mixed race in the Niger Delta. It also tells of how some of them have managed to meander through all their