Vol 5 No 1 (2024)

Published: 2024-01-03

Abstract views: 315   PDF downloads: 92  
2024-02-15
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Pages 203-215

A pragmalinguistic analysis of Im/Politeness in selected Nigerian Open Letters

blankpage Rasaq Atanda Ajadi, Faosat Biola Olagunju

This study examines the pragmatic and linguistic aspects of politeness and impoliteness in Nigerian open letters. Its objectives are to: examine how linguistic choices indicate [im]politeness and investigate how common ground influences the expression of im/politeness in the selected open letters. The study employed the qualitative research method while it deployed the purposive sampling technique to select three open letters written to two sitting presidents in the Fourth Republic between 1999 and 2015. The letters are Wole Soyinka’s ‘You're Rambo on the loose’, Umar Abubakar Dangiwa’s ‘The Devil Is It’ and Olusegun Obasanjo’s Before it is Too Late’. The recipients of the letters were Olusegun Obasanjo and Goodluck Ebele Jonathan. Only the letters that centred on political matters and the state of the nation were considered in this study. The study uses the pragmalinguistic framework of Geoffrey Leech (2014) to analyse how im/politeness is grammticalised in the selected open letters. The analysis showed that iterative lexemes such as ‘never’, more, many and routine iterative lexemes are deployed to activate face threatening acts to attack the recipient’s face. From the analysis, it was revealed that the use of the iterative verb ‘repeat’ presupposes the writers’ misalignments with the recipient’s allegation of breaching the maxim of quality, i.e., fabricating lies; the adverb ‘more’ reveals a determination to debunk the allegation of mediocrity, etc. The study concludes that the open letters grammaticalise im/politeness in such a way that an understanding of the political narrative background prompting the writing of the letters is indispensable.

Abstract views: 358   PDF downloads: 123  
2024-01-03
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Pages 192-202

An examination of the strategic logic of nonviolent resistance in Fela's Afrobeat

blankpage Noah Opeyemi Balogun, Temidayo David Oladipo

This study explores Fela Anikulapo Kuti, arguably Africa’s most iconic resistant artist of the twentieth century by analysing the strategic logic of Nonviolence in his responses to numerous violent attacks by the repressive and oppressive regimes of the post independent Africa, nay Nigeria. Using the conceptual tool of music as social process and philosophical tool of critical and constructive analysis, the study combines documentary data in Fela’s Afrobeat and Key Informant Interview, in order to demonstrate the strategic logic of nonviolence in conflict engagement and transformation in Fela. The study argues that Afrobeat is a musical philosophy shaped by disregard for human rights and gross irresponsibility on the part of government that have manifested in Africa/Nigeria’s underdevelopment since the Union Jack was lowered in 1960s. The study avers that chose to be part of politics of revolution by using his music to exude protest and persuasion, non-cooperation and intervention against injustice that has created the many problems of man and social reality. The study concludes that Fela won against the oppressed post-colonial African leaders as he was the public conscience of the oppressed Africans who have continued to win despite being repressed.