Journal of Language and Linguistics

PHALLIC POWER AND THE POLITICS OF INFERTILITY IN THE AFRICAN LITERARY IMAGINATION: READING AYỌ̀BÁMI ADÉBÁYỌ̀’S STAY WITH ME AND FLORA NWAPA’S ONE IS ENOUGH

Ophilia A. ABIANJI-MENANG — 2026-06-26

Male infertility remains a largely invisible yet significant reproductive health challenge in many African societies especially in Nigeria, where patriarchal norms equate masculinity with virility and disproportionately assign the burden of childlessness to women. While existing scholarship has largely emphasized the feminization of infertility, less attention has been paid to how male infertility destabilizes dominant constructions of masculinity and exposes the fragility of phallic power. Addressing this gap, this study examines the representation of male infertility and its socio-cultural implications in Adébáyọ’s Stay with Me and Nwapa’s One is Enough within the broader African literary imagination. Adopting a qualitative interpretive methodology grounded in close textual reading and thematic analysis, the study draws on spatial theory, particularly the works of Lefebvre (1991) and Soja (1996), to analyse how domestic, ritual, and communal spaces function as sites of patriarchal surveillance and control. These spaces render women’s reproductive bodies hyper-visible while simultaneously concealing male infertility within zones of silence and denial. Complementing this spatial framework, African feminist perspectives—especially Kolawole’s (1997) African womanism and Nnaemeka’s (2004) nego-feminism—provide critical tools for examining negotiation, dialogic engagement, and the reconfiguration of shared reproductive responsibility. The analysis reveals that Akin’s concealed impotence and the erasure of Obiora’s reproductive accountability exemplify how patriarchal ideologies sustain male privilege while displacing the social and psychological burden of infertility onto women. By interrogating the narrative strategies through which male infertility is masked, displaced, and silenced, this study argues that phallic power operates not merely as a symbol of virility but as a structural and spatialized mechanism of authority. The study also demonstrates that African literature offers a critical discursive space for exposing the contradictions of patriarchal masculinity and for reimagining infertility as a shared, dialogic, and socially accountable experience.

IDEOLOGY AND POWER NEGOTIATION IN #ENDSARS AND #ENDBADGOVERNANCE PROTESTS IN NIGERIA

Victoria BALA — 2026-06-26

The flexibility of Nigerian socio-political environment makes it a fertile ground for interrogating the nexus between ideology, power, and protest texts as responses to bad governance system. Nigeria, Africa’s most populous nation, has a history of authoritarianism, corruption, and democratic fragility. The impetuses of protesters are usually fuelled by these vices that constantly stare us in the eye. The major thrust of this study is to analyse ideology and power negotiation of #EndSARS and #EndBadGovernance protests in Nigeria. The methodology for the study is drawn from social media protest texts generated during the #EndSARS (2020) and #EndBadGovernance (2024) movements in Nigeria. Precisely, 14 Protest Test were selected, and tagged as “PT” in the analysis. Critical Discourse Analysis is deployed as the theoretical framework for the study, particularly Norman Fairclough’s three-dimensional model and Wodak’s Discourse-Historical Approach. The findings of the study reveal how linguistic choices in digitally mediated texts function as instruments of resistance, ideological construction, and power contestation. Findings further reveal that protest texts deploy strategic polarisation, intertextual references, religious allusions, humour, and evaluative language to construct the state as oppressive and citizens as morally legitimate agents of change. The analysis further demonstrates that digital protest discourse operates as an arena of ideological struggle, where competing narratives of patriotism, legitimacy, justice, and governance are negotiated. The study concludes that social media protest texts are discursive instruments that reshape public consciousness and reconfigure power relations in contemporary Nigeria

CULTURE AS THE FIFTH LANGUAGE SKILL: REFRAMING SECOND LANGUAGE TEACHING IN THE ERA OF GLOBAL ENGLISHES

Felicia UZOECHI — 2026-06-26

The inseparable relationship between language and culture has long been recognised in second language acquisition research. However, contemporary developments in English as an International Language, multilingualism, and intercultural communication have renewed debates on the extent to which cultural knowledge should be integrated into English language teaching. This paper examines the role of culture in second language teaching and learning, with particular emphasis on English language education. Drawing on contemporary literature in applied linguistics, intercultural communicative competence, and English as a Lingua Franca, the paper argues that linguistic competence alone is insufficient for meaningful communication without an understanding of the cultural contexts that shape language use. The discussion explores the influence of culture on vocabulary development, listening comprehension, speaking proficiency, and reading comprehension, demonstrating that cultural knowledge enhances learners' ability to interpret meanings, negotiate intercultural interactions, and communicate appropriately in diverse contexts. The paper further examines pedagogical strategies for integrating cultural learning into second language classrooms through culturally responsive teaching, authentic materials, intercultural tasks, and reflective learning activities. While acknowledging the increasing globalisation of English and the multilingual realities of contemporary societies, the paper maintains that effective language instruction should not promote cultural assimilation but rather foster intercultural awareness, critical cultural understanding, and respect for cultural diversity. It concludes that integrating culture into second language instruction contributes significantly to communicative competence, learner engagement, and intercultural effectiveness. Consequently, language educators should adopt pedagogical approaches that balance learners' local cultural identities with exposure to diverse cultural perspectives, thereby preparing students to participate successfully in increasingly interconnected global communication environments.

A CRITICAL STYLISTIC ANALYSIS OF SELECTED DEMOCRATICALLY ELECTED GOVERNORS’ HANDING OVER SPEECHES IN GOMBE STATE

Henrietta Awagboya EKPOKI — 2026-06-26

This study dwelt on a Critical Stylistic Analysis of selected democratically elected Governors’ handing-over speeches in Gombe State where it examined how language is strategically used to form or shape political reality in handing-over speeches. Political handover addresses are often seen as routine ceremonial speech; however, they are ideologically loaded texts that reflect power relations, governance accounts, and continuity strategies. The problem that motivates this study was the tendency to treat such speeches as neutral, thereby overlooking the linguistic mechanisms through which leaders legitimize their administrations and influence public perception. Consequently, this study investigates how language choices in two selected speeches, Text 1 (Danjuma Goje, May 29, 2011) and Text 2 (Ibrahim H. Dankwambo, May 29, 2019), represent and shape reality beyond surface meanings. The study was anchored on Critical Stylistics as proposed by Jeffries (2010), which provided analytical tools for revealing ideological meanings in texts. A qualitative descriptive methodology was adopted, with data purposively selected and analyzed concurrently using textual-conceptual functions such as naming and describing, exemplifying and enumerating, implying and assuming, prioritising, and modality. The findings revealed that both speakers employ inclusive deixis, evaluative language, and extensive enumeration to form a positive image of governance, while challenges are minimized through strategic prioritisation. Additionally, modality and presupposition were used to project certainty and ensure continuity of leadership. The study finally concluded that handing-over speeches are discursive tools for asserting authority, forming collective perception, and sustaining political ideology.

META DISCOURSE MARKERS IN 2023 PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION PETITION COURT JUDGMENT

Bitrus ISHAYA — 2026-06-26

This paper carried out a study on meta-discourse markers in the 2023 judgment of the Presidential Election Petition Court where it examined how linguistic resources are used in judicial discourse to form meaning, authority, and persuasion. Legal judgments, particularly those arising from electoral disputes, are not merely repositories of legal reasoning but are rhetorically structured texts that inform public perception. But despite the significance of such texts, existing studies on Nigerian electoral adjudication have focused on legal and political dimensions with limited attention to the linguistic features that guide interpretation and judicial stance. This study is motivated by the need to bridge this gap by exploring the role of meta-discourse markers in the judgment. The study was anchored on Hyland’s (2005) meta-discourse model, complemented by Systemic Functional Linguistics (Halliday & Matthiessen, 2014) and Appraisal Theory (Martin & White, 2005), which together provide a framework for the analysis. As a qualitative research, data were purposively drawn from the officially published 2023 Presidential Election Petition Court judgment and analysed through the identification, classification, and interpretation of meta-discourse markers. Findings revealed a dominance of interactive markers such as transitions, frame markers, and evidentials, which enhance coherence and structure legal reasoning, while interactional markers were used to assert authority and project institutional voice. The study concluded that meta-discourse markers are essential rhetorical tools in judicial communication which aid in interpretation.

HEDGING THE UNSAYABLE: A PRAGMATIC ANALYSIS OF TEACHER DISCOURSE IN FACILITATING INTERETHNIC LITERARY DISCUSSIONS IN NORTHEAST NIGERIAN CLASSROOMS

Vivien BELLO-OSAGIE — 2026-06-29

Teacher discourse about interethnic dialogue in conflict-affected classrooms is rarely examined for its linguistic texture. Using a qualitative interpretive design, this study presents a pragmatic analysis of interview and observational data from nine literature teachers and nine school administrators in Borno, Adamawa, and Taraba States, Northeast Nigeria, collected during a twelve-week literary intervention programme. Using politeness theory and hedging research, the study identifies three recurrent discourse patterns in teacher discourse about facilitating discussion of ethnicity: mitigated invitation, hedged questioning that opens discussion without imposing; deflective avoidance, topic-shift devices that redirect discussion away from face-threatening ground; and negotiated repair, clarification and reformulation that manage face-threatening student contributions in real time. Teachers' capacity to sustain interethnic literary dialogue is inseparable from their command of these pragmatic resources for managing face in high-stakes classroom talk. Implications for language teacher preparation in conflict-affected multilingual contexts are discussed.

FEMALE AUTHORSHIP, HISTORICAL MEMORY AND THE RECOVERY OF MARGINAL MEMORY IN ADICHIE'S HALF OF A YELLOW SUN AND SYLVESTER'S LONG SHADOWS

Grace ADOKWE — 2026-07-12

This study comparatively examines Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's Half of a Yellow Sun and Mnguember Vicky Sylvester's Long Shadows with the aim of exploring how Nigerian fiction authored by women recovers marginalised histories and challenges dominant historical narratives. The study argues that gender shapes not only who narrates war but how: that women writing about conflict consistently foreground civilian suffering, domestic loss, cultural memory, and the endurance of ordinary lives in ways that male-dominated war literature has too often overlooked. The study addresses the problem of historical exclusion in Nigerian historiography, particularly the marginalisation of minority experiences and civilian voices during the military coups of 1966, the Nigerian Civil War (1967–1970), and the Tiv uprisings of 1960–1964. The research is anchored in New Historicist theory, drawing specifically on Greenblatt’s concept of the circulation of social energy — the idea that literary texts participate in reproducing, contesting, and transforming historical understanding — and on the New Historicist insistence that history is a contested field of multiple competing perspectives rather than a single authoritative account. Employing a qualitative comparative textual analysis, the study examines narrative strategies, characterisation, symbolism, oral traditions, irony, and representations of memory and trauma in the two novels. Findings reveal that Half of a Yellow Sun reconstructs the Igbo-Biafran experience through multiperspectival narration, realism, cultural memory, and proverb, thereby exposing the human cost of war often obscured by official accounts. Similarly, Long Shadows recovers the neglected history of the Tiv uprisings through a hybrid narrative structure that combines oral tradition, symbolism, irony, and psychological realism to foreground the experiences of a historically marginalised community. The study further finds that both novels function as counter-historical narratives that preserve suppressed memories, challenge official versions of national history, and amplify voices excluded from dominant discourse. The article concludes that the two texts constitute important literary interventions in Nigeria’s historical memory, demonstrating that female authorship enables a distinctive mode of historical reconstruction — one that centres the domestic, the communal, and the culturally intimate — and that restoring women’s perspectives to the narration of war and political violence is both a scholarly responsibility and a genuine critical enrichment.

TRAUMA BOND AND BLACK WOMEN IN (BLONDE) WIGS: A STUDY OF SELECTED POEMS BY UNA MARSON, OKOT P’BITEK AND DOROTHEA SMARTT

Ethel Joffi MOLUA — 2026-07-14

In postcolonial literature, the concept of a trauma bond serves as a powerful psychological and narcissistic allegory for the complex, deeply dysfunctional relationship between the postcolonial subject and the lingering structures of colonial power. This work, which explores the hair dialogue between Una Marson, Okot p’Bitek, and Dorothea Smartt, forms an intergenerational critique of how imperialism tries to influence the black body. By contrasting Western hair aesthetics with Black hair aesthetics, these writers expose hair styling as a deeply cultural act. Through their poems, we can track a profound trajectory from trauma bonding to Western aesthetics and then to the politics of ancestral reclamation of the African pride. Grounded in the theory of deconstruction, identity is not static; it evolves according to the spaces in which the black woman occupies. In the poems under study, it is sadly ironic that by defying stereotypes the black woman who is trauma bonded to western ideologies mimics Western ideals which do not quite conform to traditional African settings. This becomes problematic because preference is given to narcissistic white supremacist ideals of beauty and culture and there is a breakdown of black traditional feminine aesthetics. The hypothesis postulates that using the metaphor of (blonde) wigs on black women, the natural and authentic becomes “primitive” thereby; subjecting black aesthetics to a binary position of powerlessness conformed to pre-existing patterns of stereotypes. Black women lose ideals and quintessence of their identity when they fail to divorce themselves from cultural practices that do not conform to black ideals of aesthetics.

SILENCE AS A PERLOCUTIONARY TOOL: A SPEECH ACT ANALYSIS OF PRESIDENT BOLA AHMED TINUBU’S NON-RESPONSE TO THE #ENDBADGOVERNANCE PROTESTS

Josephine JOSHUA — 2026-06-30

In political pragmatics, silence is an "ostensive" act that carries profound communicative weight, often acting as a zero-signifier in high-stakes governance. This study examines the pragmatics of "Executive Silence" using President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s non-response during the initial 72 hours of the August 2024 #EndBadGovernance protests in Nigeria. Drawing on Speech Act Theory (Austin, 1962; Searle, 1969), the study treats this period of silence not as a communicative void, but as an Indirect Speech Act with a specific illocutionary force of "strategic containment." The corpus comprises a chronological timeline of the 2024 protests, official presidential media briefs, and meta-discourse from Nigerian dailies and civil society communiqués. Utilizing Qualitative Discourse Analysis, the study evaluates how the President’s silence functioned as a perlocutionary tool to influence protest momentum. Crucially, the paper evaluates this silence against SDG 16 (Peace and Strong Institutions) and SDG 17 (Partnerships for the Goals). It argues that while silence can be a tool for administrative brinkmanship, it fundamentally weakens the "Social Contract" partnership between the state and civil society. The analysis suggests that the pragmatics of silence, when overextended, creates an information vacuum that undermines the transparent, multi-stakeholder cooperation essential for sustainable development in a burgeoning democracy.

ANALYSIS OF SPEECH ACTS IN SPOUSAL CONFLICTS IN SELECTED NIGERIAN COMEDY SKITS

Josephine JOSHUA — 2026-06-30

Beyond the words deployed in conversations are their semantic realisations which determine the actions and inactions of interlocutors. At the base of domestic conflicts in Nigeria is the semantic value attached to the words used in exchanges during such conflicts. It is against this background that this study set out to interrogate the speech acts in selected Nigerian comedy skits spousal violence. To actualise this, four Facebook comedy skits were randomly surfed and subjected to analysis based on insights from J.L. Austin’s Speech Act Theory. It was found that Expositives (affirming, postulating, arguing, and challenging), Behabitives (challenging, criticising, and apologising) as well as Exercitives (ordering, warning, affirming) being the preponderant acts in the corpus. The study concludes that the identified speech acts align with the dictates of the discourse genre of domestic (intimate) violence, which the corpus represents. It is hoped that in examining the speech acts in domestic violence as done in this study, ESL and ESP instructors will gain more pedagogical resources which can empower discursive interventions to broker peaceful linguistic deployments among Nigerian couples.