₦airaland Forum

obinna5000: As for BLACK SWAN  , I'll drop my review later today.

WOW!
_{11 days later and no one has posted a review on Black Swan? Even ijaw_girl wey nor let us hear word for here when she watched the film?
I even had to search for this thread only to discover it in the 2nd page of this section. Ok, make I post something so the thread nor go die and it'd come back to the first page. . . . .}

Black Swan is a 2010 Psychological-Dance-Drama directed by Darren Aronofsky and starring Natalie Portman, Mila Kunis, Vincent Cassel and Barabara Hershey.

The movie was a bit creepy & dark with a story that dragged and was boring. It was a test of endurance for me and I was tempted to stop it & watch something else but I kept telling myself it was an ''Oscar nominated movie'' (when I watched it then) so it couldn't be that bad for me to watch it to the end.

Natalie Portman & Vincent Cassel both gave outstanding performances and were really into their roles of the White Swan/Swan Queen and Ballet Dance instructor respectively. The former really got into the character of a psychotic & paranoid dancer while the latter portrayed a no-nonsense womanizing ''perfectionist'' dance instructor to perfection.

In conclusion, Black Swan got the only Oscar it deserved. . .a Best Actress Award for Natalie Portman.

I'll score the film 55%

lalaboi:
^^^^ Unthinkable na bahhhd film. . . Samuel L Jackson murked it!

12large1: u guys just rappin ujah dosen't look anything special he looks like another akpala

You don't get it do you? If performance and playing consistently @ club level is not the no 1 yardstick for inviting players to the National Team(s), what is? Your Assessment?

My point is give everyone (whether playing regularly or not) a chance (unless that particular player had been used before and was found to be shyte).That's what friendlies are for, after all. At least, most of us now know/agree J. Akpala, Dickson Etuhu (despite perhaps being our highest profile DM in Europe based on the league & club he plays for/playing regularly for his club), Michael Odibe etc are shyte cos we've watched them play in our jersey.

Personally, I also think Peter Utaka is shyte despite having scored 2 goals in 3 matches for the S. Eagles & being highly regarded by his club and playing regularly for his clubside. In fact, I was more impressed with the 20 minutes performance of Emmanuel Emenike in the Sierra Leone friendly than with what Peter Utaka has played in all the 3 matches for the S. Eagles.

On the other hand, I think Joel Obi (despite being a bench warmer in Inter) is better than Mikel Obi & is the best thing that has happened to our midfield since Jay Jay and I also rate Nnamdi Oduamadi very highly based on what I saw of him in the U-23 Olympic games qualifier against E. Guinea so I have no problem with Siasia inviting them to the Super Eagles.

Nor be only goals me dey take judge strikers o. . .I look at positional play, ball control, movement on & off the ball, ability to shake off defenders, dummy runs, speed, dribbling, ability to run with ball, aerial prowess, ability to beat defender one on one, goal scoring techniques (e.g shooting, placing, chipping) etc and Anthony Ujah scores very high in most of this IMO.

I mean, Emmanuel Emenike & Peter Utaka didn't do more than Anthony Ujah has done before being invited to the Super Eagles so SiaOne should give Anthony Ujah a chance too. Even if he's not invited to the Super Eagles, he deserves to be invited to the U-23 Olympic team playing the All Africa Games & Olympic Qualifiers at least. What Eguavoen did by inviting Nosa Igiebor for the Olympic Qualifier against Equatorial Guinea and not inviting Anthony Ujah is akin to Portugal inviting Pepe and Carvarlho from Real Madrid for an important match and not inviting C. Ronaldo. 

Who knows if Victor Moses switch to play for Nigeria has come through? If it hasn't, the English F.A is playing games with the NFF and they should wise up fast. . . . . .and has anyone got a link to videos of this Chuks Aneke some peeps are making noise about?

As reported by France Football, Dutch giants PSV Eindhoven are after the signature Nigeria's hottest commodity, Anthony Ujah (20 years). PSV are looking for a replacement for Marcus Berg, who returns to his parent club Hamburg at the end of the season.

Ujah has taken the Norwegian Premier League by storm, with 19 goals in 27 matches, which makes him the most effective goal scorer in the history of Lillestrom. Recently, he was also selected as one of the top African players to play in Norway.

The agent of the former Warri Wolves striker, Sebastian Frapolli, confirmed to France Football magazine that his client is being watched closely by the people of Eindhoven. Ujah exclusively revealed to allnigeriasoccer.com two weeks ago that he is being monitored by PSV scouts.

PSV Eindhoven would have to compete with Stade Rennes, Lille, Toulouse, Anderlecht, Sporting Lisbon, FC Groningen, Osasuna, Hamburg and Sunderland for Ujah's signature. The youngster, allnigeriasoccer.com can exclusively reveal, WILL leave Lillestrom in the summer market.

ola olabiy:

O ga oo. A mod? Helep yasef

Prof Ola, na so we see am o

Hmmm, I just had to dig up this thread to post this. I know DK (and this thread) has a bias for those in Science, Medicine & the Engineering fields but I think this woman; Yetunde Antonia Schleicher is simply amazing.

Remember the 5 Yoruba speaking ''Oyinbo'' Americans presently living in Ibadan & studying Yoruba at U.I? Well, she's the coordinator of the language exchange programme that brought them to Nigeria. One of them; the author of this biography (Caraline ''Titilayo'' Harshman) has her videos all over youtube so you may want to check her out. . . . .

It's more of a biography than an academic profile but it'll do. . . . . .Ileke-Idi and all the ''yorubacentric'' Nairalanders go trip

To Give Your Life For Your Language
by Cara Harshman
http://401.journalism.wisc.edu/profiles/antonia-schleicher-a-woman-who-gives-her-life-for-her-language/profile-narrative/

[/b]Before she said her first word or stood up on her own, Antonia Schleicher had a fan club. This was not your typical fan club. The members did not come together out of shared interest or obsession for this infant girl. They did it to save her life.

Born in southwestern Nigeria, Schleicher entered the world so sickly that her parents thought she might die young. To seek a cure, they did what any other family in the town would do. They took her to the traditional diviner, the healer, the babalawo in Yoruba, her first language.

The diviner said Antonia–then known by her Yoruba name, Yetunde–had an affinity to the spiritual world. He said she was a leader in that world and warned her parents that they must establish a club for her and make her the leader or else the spirits would pull her back into their world.

Her parents obeyed the diviner’s prediction and held ceremonies for her every year until she told them she had had enough. At the ripe age of 11, like most children in Nigeria, it was time for Yetunde to start high school.

Since those years, Schleicher’s successes have been abundant. At 56-years-old, five-feet tall and a recent American citizen, she is living out the babalawo’s prophecy, regardless of the fact she does not believe in such divine things.

“Even though I don’t believe in things like that, it’s amazing; all my life, even when I don’t campaign for leadership, I will be selected,” Schleicher says, sitting comfortably on her rolling chair in her 14th floor office looking out on the University of Wisconsin-Madison campus. Since starting out as an assistant professor of African languages and literature here in 1989, she has filled enough leadership roles in the realm of international African language pedagogy for five people.

It was while writing her master’s thesis in linguistics at the University of Ibadan in 1981, that Schleicher seized the opportunity to study in the United States. At 29 years old Schleicher left Nigeria for the first time and arrived at the University of Kansas, planning to study for 10 months on a cultural exchange program. She became so enamored with the U.S. and its education system that she decided to pursue a career here teaching Yoruba. Since then, her life in America has developed into something far beyond what she planned.

Schleicher is the founder and executive director of the National African Language Resource Center, the executive director of the National Council of Less Commonly Taught Languages, the executive director of the African Language Teachers Association, on the board of directors at the Joint National Council of Languages and now a tenured professor of African languages and literature.[/b]

Add wife and mother of two to the list.

“She can’t sit still,” Charles, her American husband of 21 years, says. “She’s just not really in control of that. She has to be doing something all the time.”

Above anything else, Schleicher says she is constantly listening.

Before she started at UW-Madison, the language organizations she leads now either did not exist or were floundering, in dire need of revival. Over the years she saw a need for them, created them and made them powerful. As Charles puts it, “she really likes to see weak things become strong.”

“I always tell my staff that I only see myself as a visionary,” Schleicher says in her gentle, eloquent English accent, influenced with hints of British from Britain’s 60-year colonial occupation of Nigeria. Her English is lyrical. Since Yoruba language has three tones–low, mid and high–Yoruba people accentuate English syllables with the same singsong intonation.

“When I go for meetings, I listen to what people are saying, like ‘Oh, we don’t have this; oh, I wish we had this in my program.’ Then I’m thinking, OK how can this be done?” she says.

Complaints she heard from African language teachers about the lack of teaching materials and professional development in the field inspired her to apply for a federal grant through the Department of Education. In 1999, the department awarded her the funds to start the first National African Language Resource Center in the United States.

The center operates in a Madison campus building out of six small offices off of a tiny stretch of hallway barely wide enough for two people to pass. It has trained more than 200 African languages instructors and developed teaching materials for more than 40 African languages.

“She builds institutions,” says Dustin Cowell, chair of the African languages and literature department at UW-Madison.

For her small stature, Schleicher has a tenacious presence in a room. She is always well dressed, switching off wearing traditional Yoruba skirts and blouses with bright fabrics, and tailored Western style suits. The black scarf around her head keeps her warm and hides her hair if she does not have time to have it braided. When she laughs in her joyous, full-bodied, hysterical laugh, which is often, students cannot help but laugh with her.

Cowell has acted as chair of the department three separate times over the course of Schleicher’s career at UW-Madison. He has also observed first hand her role as a catalyst of African language learning on campus and worldwide.

While teaching Yoruba language at Yale University for two years before she applied for a job at UW, Schleicher wrote the textbooks that defined the curriculum for introductory level Yoruba language classes. Six Yoruba graduate students from Nigeria currently use these books to teach about 30 UW-Madison undergrads.

Seven of these students are leaving for Nigeria in June to spend a full year studying Yoruba at the University of Ibadan, Schleicher’s alma mater. This program, The Language Flagship, is the first of its kind for Yoruba and Swahili and another program Schleicher has been instrumental in building.

The international scope and richness of the African language teaching network Schleicher has orchestrated from the ground up is a testament to her innate tendency to take on many tasks, the trait she identifies as her biggest weakness.

“Many times I take on too much. I don’t know when to say no,” she says.

Schleicher is known to stay up all night either in her home office or at one of her two campus offices, finishing projects to meet deadlines. The amount of work she undertakes is not only overwhelming for her at some times, but it also keeps her from spending time at home with her daughter Carla, 20, and son Anthony, 17.

“I wish that when they were younger I had more time,” she says. “My husband is the one who goes to their games and everything. I feel jealous of him for that because I really would have loved to be home with the kids.”

When Carla and Anthony were babies, Charles was at home working on his dissertation while Schleicher was in the first years of her assistant professorship at UW-Madison.

“I was young enough that I don’t remember but my dad says that I would ask him if my mom loved me anymore,” Carla, a junior at University of Minnesota says. “I used to think that maybe she wasn’t around because she didn’t like me.”

As Carla got older, she says her mom was home more and completely made up for not being around when she was younger. “When I was ten and eleven she made more effort to spend more time alone with me. She kind of felt like she needed to make up for when she wasn’t there when I was younger,” Carla says.

Working with her mom in the NALRC office last summer, Carla was really able to understand the success her mom has achieved and strides she has made for African language pedagogy.

About 25 million people worldwide speak Yoruba–most of them in southwestern Nigeria. And now thanks to Schleicher, more and more college students from the United States too.

Kevin Barry, a UW sophomore from Neenah, Wis., is one of them.

Barry and his fellow classmates see Schleicher as their Yoruba professor who strives to help them improve their language skills.

“Every time I take a (language) proficiency test with Professor Schleicher, she always stops afterwards and has a conversation… she always says ‘What can I do to help you do better?’” Barry says.

As the first group of students to go through the African language Flagship program, they also see the business side of her that works tirelessly, flying to and from Nigeria multiple times each semester to establish it as an official study abroad program.

Her fervent dedication to providing opportunities and resources for her students won her a 2010 Chancellor’s Distinguished Teaching Award.

“It’s really a big deal to her to develop people,” Charles says. “One of the most deeply satisfying things for her is to find people who are weak and help them overcome those weaknesses and develop their strengths.”

Charles recalls a time they were just newlyweds living in Madison when Antonia befriended a Jamaican woman she met on the bus. This woman opened up to Schleicher and shared her stories of child abuse, her psychotic mother, lack of education and severe emotional and psychological stress. When Schleicher met her, she was living in a women’s homeless shelter.

With time and tough love, Schleicher worked with her to revive her mind to be healthy and sound. Now working a job and living in her own condo, this woman is one of the many people Schleicher has touched and empowered in her lifetime.

It is almost a guarantee that every higher education African language teacher in the world has heard Schleicher’s name before. She credits herself for uniting the small, scattered African language programs that existed in the U.S. in the mid-1990s and professionalizing them into a nationwide effort to improve African language pedagogies.

Today, her efforts reach far beyond U.S. borders.

ALTA and NCOLTCL are on their 14th and 13th year respectively hosting international language conferences. Schleicher and her staff organize top African language professors from universities in the U.S., South Africa, Turkey, Nigeria, Kenya, Thailand and Canada to gather every year to discuss issues pertinent to language pedagogies.

“Professor Schleicher is a workaholic,” says Akinsola Ogundeji, a lecturer for Yoruba language classes who just finished his thesis evaluating 10 elementary Yoruba language textbooks. “I don’t think I can catch up with her. I don’t know how much she is able to sleep within the 24 hours in a day. I don’t know how much time she has for her family.”

Schleicher does have remorse for not being home and with her children more, but she says it helps that Charles and she share the same belief that parenting is not just a woman’s role.

“He doesn’t see himself as being less of a man for doing his role as a father,” Schleicher says. “I still play my role at home as a woman, as the wife.”

Amid her professional responsibilities, Schleicher still prioritizes and enjoys cleaning her home, doing laundry, buying groceries and cooking.

Dinner is her special time of the day. Depending on the day of the week, Schleicher and Charles might be at church or Anthony at Eagle Scouts and Carla away at University of Minnesota. They might not eat together, but like a traditional Yoruba household, Schleicher will always keep a stew or meal in the fridge.

When they are all home for dinner, the hundreds of e-mails, meeting agendas, phone calls and constant questions from her staff take the back burner. Charles is standing around the kitchen while she cooks, talking about the latest news and occasionally running quick errands around the house to fetch extra ingredients she runs out of. Anthony might also be in the kitchen, adding humor to the conversation or at the kitchen table working in his sketchbook.

After dinner and a cup of her favorite ginger tea with 100 percent pure honey she brings back from every trip to Nigeria, she’s back to work, sorting out the latest task.

“All I know is that before I go to bed every night, I’m always thinking of all the things that I still haven’t done that I wanted to do,” she says as her computer chimes, telling her she has a new e-mail. “And I know I’m involved in a lot of things.”

marutimon:
The Norwegian league started off this weekend and one of the highlights of the first round was the anhilation of Stabaek at home by Lillestrom. The final score was 0:7 for the guests.

What is however more intriguing is that all 7 goals were scored by Nigerians. 20-year old phenomenon striker Anthony Ujah walloped in four goals, whilst 20 year old attacking midfielder Emmanuel Igiebor added a brace. The damage was finalized by 17-year old midfielder Ohi Omoijuanfo, who is supposed to be one of the hottest talents in Norway. Plus he has two passports (Norwegian and Nigerian), so whoever is quicker will get the boy. BTW Omoijuanfo signed for the club 2 days ago,

Ujah is apparently heading to a big European club in the summer, while Igiebor has been likened to Wilson Oruma.

Norway Tippeligaen
Stabæk Fotball - Lillestrom 0:7
14' Anthony Ujah (Lillestrom) (0:1)
26' Anthony Ujah (Lillestrom) (0:2)
43' Emmanuel Nosakhare Igiebor (Lillestrom) (0:3)
47' Emmanuel Nosakhare Igiebor (Lillestrom) (0:4)
63' Anthony Ujah (Lillestrom) (0:5)
69' Anthony Ujah (Lillestrom) (0:6)
78' Ohi Omoijuanfo (Lillestrom) (0:7)

When was the last time you had Nigerians score 7 goals in one game in Europe? Has that ever happened?
Or when was the last time a Nigerian scored 4 goals in one game?
I really think Siasia should scout, as the talent isn't always in plain sight!

Highlights below
Goal nr 2 for Ujah should be contender for goal of the week in Europe:
http://www.tv2sporten.no/fotball/tippeligaen/stabak/ujah-herjer-med-stabaek-3447673.html

medjai: Last time out, it was Nnamdi Oduamadi he called up, a player that has only made one sub appearance for AC Milan all season and still plays for AC Milan reserves. Now, it's Aneke that hardly even gets to play for Arsenal reserves. It seems Siaone is hell bent on calling up just about anybody that plays in Europe.

Dis Guy: for real same goes for Joel Obi, so much hype

Dis Guy: Nah Adebayo Akinfenwa should be next! - top notch mate, absolute top notch

Adebayo Akinfewa ke?

That guy is the most skilless and incompetent forward I've seen in a long time. Sidney Sam on the other hand is pure Gold. It'd be a big coup if Siasia can get him to play for Nigeria.

Only reason I'm pissed with Siasia is he hasn't him invited Ideye Brown of Sochaux and Anthony Ujah of Lillestrom (who's definitely Nigeria's best player in Scandinavia). It was marutimon on the Goals from Nigerians All Over The World thread who first brought him to my attention and he's very good.

knowAll: Now I have a problem with this judgement. Not that I'm not happy with M. Abacha finally losing the chance to milk Kano state dry like his family did to Nigeria but worried about the judgement seeming inconsistency with the provisions of the Electoral Act 2011 as amended. I am aware that the Electoral act says all candidates for elective positions must emerge through primary elections. Now this judgement is saying that the names submitted by party board of trustees are the authentic names and thereby not reckoning with the winner of the primary elections. It says the board of trustees of the party have final says on who the candidates of the party is. How does this reconcile with the fact that candidates must emerge through primaries? Or am I the one missing something here?

Please somebody should help analyze this judgement.

MzDarksin: errmmm. I have no idea what you are talking about.
I was just laughing at the previous comment

GenBuhari: Why accept these election results? have you forgotten these online polls?

https://www.nairaland.com/nigeria/topic-585935.0.html

We need to give Buhari full support in challenging the elections results.

This GeneralBuhari dude is not only unintelligent but also funny

I can imagine him being on the legal team of Buhari/Bakare @ the Appeal Court or Supreme Court and tendering Nairaland opinion poll as evidence of election rigging by the PDP.

Clown oshi!