Uncommon Nigerian woman breaks stereotypes in classroom, life

From the day she was born, Stella Williams was destined to be a woman of distinction.

In her home country of Nigeria, girls often marry by the age of 13, move in with their husbands and have babies. If they go to school, they usually study art or humanities. Not many travel the world.

When Williams' mother named her Stella after a cousin's wife, a no-no in Nigerian culture, her nontraditional life began.

Williams was a bookworm who studied science. She didn't marry until she earned her first degree. In her adult life, she has continued to defy tradition by fighting to help Nigerian women break out of their customary roles.

"I am not a normal kind of Nigerian woman," she said recently.

Williams, 59, came to Washington this fall for a yearlong stint as Bellevue Community College's visiting scholar-in-residence. The program is the work of the school's Center for the Liberal Arts, and Williams is the second educator to visit. The first was from Tibet.

Williams, an environmental and economics professor at a Nigerian university, came to BCC on a Fulbright scholarship. She is teaching a daily class that explores global and environmental issues and the principles of conservation, ecology and population dynamics.

"We thought about what program would best thrive with the support and nourishment of a scholar who could internationalize curriculum and introduce new ideas," said Diane Douglas, the liberal-arts center's director. "We decided on the environmental-science program and picked Stella because her expertise on fisheries is so appropriate."

Williams also will guest-lecture in a number of classes, discussing wellness, international business, political science and gender issues. Some of her richest teachings come from sharing cultural first-person experiences and information about life in Nigeria.

"People are curious about religion, politics and adultery," Williams said. "They also wonder why Nigerians are so poor when the country's resources are so rich."

Many Nigerians are faced with poverty and environmental degradation. Williams says resources have been depleted by the central government and big companies. She has spent a lot of time looking at conflict on the Niger River Delta, where she says oil and gas are contracted out to companies that historically have not taken the welfare of the people into account. This has caused strife, but things have started to improve, she said.

Williams hopes the Nigerian states will one day gain control of their land and resources and remove the power from the central government. She is working to help change policies, programs and laws.

Williams is active in many professional bodies related to women and children in agriculture throughout Africa and internationally and serves as a policy adviser on the fisheries trade.

She has done research on gender in terms of fishing and studied how to improve environmental conditions for marine agriculture. She is a member of the European Union Research Group and serves on the board of trustees of the WorldFish Center.

Douglas says that made her a perfect candidate for the Northwest. While at BCC, Williams will participate in a cross-cultural examination of Nigerian fisheries and the Northwest salmon industry.

She will discuss tensions between the traditional fishing industry and commercial interests.

Williams started college at a British university, then got a master's degree in ecology and a doctorate in agricultural economics from Auburn University in Alabama. Her passion for science stemmed from motherly advice.

"My mother was very modern," Williams said. "She worked hard so she could send us to school. She always reminded us we could go as far as we want and encouraged us to study science so we could stay tough and compete with the boys."

Williams also is a Soroptimist — a member of an international women's group working to improve the state of women and children around the world — and is working to revive a group in Bellevue.

In the first two weeks of her class at BCC, Williams had students read and summarize books that focused on environmental issues. After that, each student picked an African country and was asked to study its geography and culture and understand its environmental status.

Students must write in a journal about how they affect their environment at home and how they can impact the community. And each must volunteer — counting salmon, planting in parks, something of that sort. In April, Williams' class will host a global Earth Day program at the college.

Williams uses a similar method of teaching at home in Nigeria.

"I like to activate young minds, not teach them to memorize," she said.

Leslie Fulbright: 206-515-5637 or lfulbright@seattletimes.com