Within the University’s African Collection are five wooden figures depicting women emerging from these fattening rooms. The figures, and their attached cultural significance, are at the centre of Dr Juliet Gilbert's AHRC-funded project ‘Beyond the Fattening Room’.
Delivered in conjunction with University of Birmingham researchers, local artists and women’s rights organisations, the project seeks to understand the current attitude around women’s healthcare in Calabar, Nigeria, and develop new, culturally rooted approaches to maternal health.
The four-year project will begin with ethnographic fieldwork to understand contemporary women’s lived experiences in Calabar. The fattening room figures will act as catalysts for conversation in interviews with Nigerian women on topics of motherhood and ‘coming of age’.
Speaking on the project at the launch event in Lagos, Dr Gilbert said: “We aim to understand how ideals of womanhood have changed over time and what these shifts mean for women navigating adolescence, motherhood, and modern expectations.
"Working closely with communities in Calabar, we’ll collect women’s stories to shed light on how contemporary pressures—from healthcare access to shifting cultural norms—shape their experiences. Our findings will support local debates around maternal care, and we’ll share them with women’s health organisations in the region.”
Beyond transformations in healthcare, the project aims to change understanding of best practise for African art collections in the UK and beyond amid increasing calls for museums to ‘decolonise’ their collections.Bringing together museum collection management with constructive social research, ‘Beyond the Fattening Room’ presents a real-world example in evaluating how care of an African art collection requires local community engagement.
Clare Mullett, Head of University Collections, said: “This important research will contribute to major international conversations about the future of museum collections. It will offer a practical case study for how UK‑based African art collections can more deeply connect with the communities from which their objects originate.
“The project’s artworks will feature prominently in three public exhibitions across Birmingham and Calabar playing an important role as conversation starters that bridge time and inspire debate.”
