If not for my Hustling Spirit: Youth Apprenticeships and the Complexity of Empowerment in Southeast Nigeria

This thesis examines how young people pursue socioeconomic independence and livelihood security—often framed as empowerment—through apprenticeships. It focuses primarily on trade apprenticeships in Igboland, southeastern Nigeria, which are deeply rooted in the historical modes of Igbo economic production and redistribution. Drawing on ten months of ethnographic fieldwork in the market city of Onitsha, this study explores how youth navigate apprenticeship amidst shifting political and market realities, including rapid financial hardship, increased transnational trade, and the rise of digital economies that enable new forms of extraction and accumulation. This thesis makes several key arguments and contributions. First, it examines the concept of the hustling spirit, a popular phrase among Nigerian youth, and links it to the Igbo philosophy of Igba mbo (loosely translated as resilience), demonstrating how it shapes market logic for both apprentices and other Onitsha youth. Second, challenging the notion that the Igbo apprenticeship system is in crisis due to modernity, this study traces evolving economic realities to position apprenticeships as productive spaces and temporalities of negotiation and transformation within Igbo society. Third, it analyses how private and public bodies employ the language of empowerment to justify interventions aimed at promoting Igbo apprenticeship, arguing that such initiatives—often driven by neoliberal ideals of success—tend to reproduce rather than resolve structural problems affecting the market ecosystem. Furthermore, this research examines cyberfraud apprenticeship as a burgeoning alternative increasingly pursued by youth disillusioned with trade apprenticeships. A critical intervention of this study lies in its examination of dependency relations within apprenticeship settings, revealing a dynamic of suffering and opportunity that youth actively mobilise as they navigate their aspirations.

Name thesis:degree_name

Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.)

Level thesis:degree_level

Doctoral

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Anthropology

Grantor dc:publisher

Carleton University

Year dc:date.issued

2025

Author dc:creator

• Nwoke, Chikezirim Chima

Statement dc:rights

• Copyright © 2025 the author(s). Theses may be used for non-commercial research, educational, or related academic purposes only. Such uses include personal study, distribution to students, research and scholarship. Theses may only be shared by linking to the Carleton University Institutional Repository and no part may be copied without proper attribution to the author; no part may be used for commercial purposes directly or indirectly via a for-profit platform; no adaptation or derivative works are permitted without consent from the copyright owner.

Language dc:language.iso

en

DOI

10.22215/etd/2025-16610

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:carleton.scholaris.ca:20.500.14718/43977