Genderlect as discourse in Yoruba movies

Joseph Babasola Osoba

Joseph Babasola Osoba - Federal University Ndufu-Alike, Ikwo

Sola Grace Oluwamusanmi

Sola Grace Oluwamusanmi - University of Lagos


Abstract

This paper offers an analysis of gender discourse of Yoruba male and female movie characters. The Yoruba speech community is one of the three major ethnic groups in Nigeria. Their genderlect is examined and investigated in terms of their use of minimal responses, intensifiers, hedges, tag questions, polite and taboo words. The techniques of Media Monitoring and purposive sampling were employed to obtain relevant data. Randomly, four Yoruba movies were selected from which forty eight scenes were analyzed. From each movie twelve scenes, comprising single gender interaction and mixed gender interactions were considered. Social constructivism theory combined with the relevant aspects of Discourse Analysis was employed for the data analysis. In addition, a Chi-square analysis was done. The findings show significant differences between the gender groups in the use of hedges, intensifiers, minimal responses, taboos and euphemistic or polite words. The findings also corroborate the constructionist assumptions regarding gender-bound language taking context into consideration. Thus we conclude that the differences in the usage of male and female movie characters are determined, as empirically evidenced, by several sociolinguistic, psycholinguistic and discourse features within the context of situation or interaction in the Yoruba milieu.

Schlagworte:

Genderlect, Yoruba, discourse, hedges, intensifiers, minimal responses, taboo

Adegbija, E. E. 1989. A Comparative Study of Politeness Phenomena in Nigerian English, Yoruba and Ogori. MultiLingual, 8(1): 57-80.

Atolagbe, A. A. 2010. A Discourse Analysis of the Use of English in Politics: a Study of aspects of Abacha’s and Obasanjo’s Speeches. An unpublished Ph.D Thesis submitted to the University of Lagos.

Aitchison, J. 1998. The Media are Ruining English. London: Penguin.

Biagi, S. 2005. Media/Impact: an Introduction to Mass Media. 7th ed. Canada: Wadsworth.

Bonvillain, N. 1993. Language, Culture and Communication: The Meaning of Messages. New Jersey: Prentice Hall.

Blench, R. 2010. “The Linguistic Geography of Nigeria and its Implications for Pre-history”. In: Philip Allsworth Jones (ed.) West African Archeology: New Developments, New Perspectives. BAR International Series. Oxford: Archaeopress, 161-170.

Bleichenbacher, L. 2008. Multilingualism in the Movies: Hollywood Characters and Their Language Choices. Tubingen: Narr Francke Attempto Verlag.

Brown, G. & G. Yule. 1983. Discourse Analysis. Cambridge University Press.

Bryman, A. 2008. Social Research Methods. 3rd ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Cameron, D. (ed.). 2004. Women in their Speech Communities. London: Longman.

Cameron, D. 2006. Language and Sexual Politics. Abingdon: Routledge.

Carli, L.L. 1989. Gender Differences in Interaction Style and Influence. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 56: 565-76.

Coates, J. (ed.).1998. Language and Gender: A Reader. Oxford: Blackwell.

Coates, J. (ed.). 1986. Women, Men and Language: A Sociolinguistic Account of Gender Differences in Language. London: Longman.

Coupland, N. 2007. Style: Language Variation and Identity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Cobos, M. 2009. Sexism in the English Language. London: Sage.

Crawford, M. 1995. Talking Difference: On Gender and Language. London: Sage.

Crawford, M. 1997. Talking Difference On Gender And Language. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications Inc. Print.

Coulthard, M. 1977. An Introduction to Discourse Analysis. London and New York: Longman.

De Beaugrande, R. 1993. “Register in Discourse Studies: a Concept in Search of a Theory”. In: Mohsen Ghadessy (ed.). Register Analysis: Theory and Practice. London: Pinter, 7-25.

Dubois, B. L. & Crouch, I. 1975. The question of tag questions in women’s speech. Language in Society 4: 289-94.

Fasold, R.W. 1989. Variation theory and language learning. Applied sociolinguistics. New York: Academic Press.

Fasold, R. 1990. Sociolinguistics of Language. Oxford: Blackwell.

Hymes, D. 1964. Language in Culture and Society. New York: Harper and Row.

Olateju, M.A. 1998. Discourse Analysis: Analysing Discourse in the ESL Classroom. Lagos: Crossland Educational Services.

Hall, S. (ed). 1997. Representation: Cultural representations and signifying practices. London: SAGE, Open University Press.

Holmes, J. 1986. “Functions of ‘you know’ in women’s and men’s speech”. Language in Society 15 (1): 1-21.

Holmes, J. 1993. An Introduction to Sociolinguistics. London, UK: Longman.

Jespersen, O. 1922. Language: Its Nature, Development and Origin. London: Allen & Unwin.

Johnstone, B. 2008. Discourse Analysis 2nd ed. USA: Wiley-Blackwell.

Kasomo, D. 2006. Research Methods in Humanities and Education. Egerton: Egerton University Press.

Keller, E.F & Erzberger. 1983. [2004]. Reflections on Gender and Science. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.

Hartman, M.1976. “A descriptive study of the language of men and women born in Maine around 1900 as it reflects the Lakoff’s hypothesis in Language and Woman’s Place”. In: B.L. Dubois & I. Crouch (Eds). The Sociology of Languages of American Women. San Antonio, TX: Trinity University Press.

Kraemer, H. C., & Jacklin, C. N. 1979. Statistical analysis of dyadic social behavior. Psychological Bulletin 86: 217-224.

Labov, W. 1966. The Social Stratification of English in New York City. Washington, DC: Center for Applied Linguistics.

Lakoff, R. 1975. Language and Woman’s Place. New York: Harper and Row.

Lakoff, R. 2004. Language and Woman’s Place: Text and Commentaries. Revised and expanded edition. Ed. by M. Bucholtz. Oxford/New York: Oxford Universtity Press.

Leitch, V. B. (ed.) 2001. The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism. New York: W. W. Norton & Co.

Maltz, D. & Borker, R. 1982. “A Cultural Approach to Male/ Female Miscommunication”. In: J. Gumperz (ed.) Language and social identity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 196–216.

McMillan, J. A., Clifton, A.K. et al. 1977. Effects of Speech style and sex of Speaker on person perception. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 37: 1293-1303.

Mulac, A. & Lundell, T. L. 1986. Linguistic contributors to the gender linked language effect. Journal of Language and Social Psychology 5: 81-101.

Mulac, A. & Lundell, T. L. 1994. Effects of gender-linked language differences in adults’ written discourse: multivariate tests of language effects, Language and Communication, 14: 299-309.

Poole, M.E. 1979. Social class, sex, and linguistic coding, Language and Speech 22: 221-240.

Schiffrin, D. 1994. Approaches to Discourse Analysis. Cambridge MA: Blackwell.

Tannen, D. 1994. Gender and Discourse. New York: Oxford University Press.

Tannen, D. 1990 [2001]. You Just Don’t Understand: Women and Men in Conversation. New York: Quill.

Tannen, D. 2005. Conversational Style: Analyzing Talk Among Friends. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Trudgill, P. 1974. “The Social Differentiation of English in Norwich”. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Trudgill, P. 2000. An Introduction to Language and Society. London/New York: Penguin.

Uchida, A. 1992. “When Difference Is Dominance: A Critique of the Anti-Power-Based Cultural Approach to Gender Differences”. Language in Society 21: 547-568.

Wardaugh, R. 1986. [1991]. An Introduction to Sociolinguistics. London: Blackwell.

White, A. 2003. A Module Five Assignment Sociolinguistics/ ELT Management. University of Birmingham, England, MA – TEFL/TESL Program.


Veröffentlicht
2016-03-30


Osoba, J. B. und Oluwamusanmi, S. G. (2016) „Genderlect as discourse in Yoruba movies“, Crossroads. A Journal of English Studies, (12), S. 31–47. doi: 10.15290/cr.2016.12.1.03.

Joseph Babasola Osoba 
Joseph Babasola Osoba - Federal University Ndufu-Alike, Ikwo
Sola Grace Oluwamusanmi 
Sola Grace Oluwamusanmi - University of Lagos