Nigerian Women Language Use in Home Videos versus Performance Songs: A Critical Discourse Analysis

Abstract

This study investigated Nigerian women discourses in home videos in conjunction with their live performance song texts to establish that certain portrayals about Nigerian women in the home videos are true reflections of their life style. There have been varied responses to what is created and served to the general public by the Nigerian film industry with respect to certain beliefs about Nigerian women. Most of these studies concluded on the note that most Nigerian women distance themselves from the home videos portrayals- tagging such as‘media constructions'. The study gathered fourteen song texts (seven from Igbo and seven from Yoruba cultures)in conjunction with excerpts from five Nigerian home videos as data. This was analysed using Fairclough's (2003) three-dimensional method of Critical Discourse Analysis which involves identification and description of social problems through the structure and linguistic features of texts and the interdiscursivity of the text production. The study concludes that some of the portrayals about Nigerian women in the home videos are not mere media constructions but authentic information about the way Nigerian women treat each other and one another. There is clear evidence from the study that fertile women exert aggressive behaviours on the infertile women. Additionally, hegemonic proclivity is also a reality among Nigerian women. Hence, unhealthy relationships characterise the women discourses, especially, between mothers-in law and daughters-in law.