That there are differences between male and female speech forms has been well established in the literature.The differences in speech are sometimes as a result of the emphasis that each gender places on different aspe...That there are differences between male and female speech forms has been well established in the literature.The differences in speech are sometimes as a result of the emphasis that each gender places on different aspects of the community’s culture or which the community requires that each gender places on different aspects of its culture.This paper examines gender-exclusive speech forms in the Yorùbálanguage alongside gender-preferential speech features with a view to highlight the greater emphasis that Yorùbáwomen place or are expected to place on certain aspects of the Yorùbáculture.Ethnographic method was used for data elicitation.Structured interviews were conducted with 30 purposively selected respondents in selected communities in Kwara,Lagos and Oyo States of Nigeria while participant observation at different periods in these communities between 1983 and 2018 also yielded useful data.A highly significant number of female respondents(93.0%)address their spouses’younger siblings with honourific pronouns regardless of such siblings’ages contrariwise for all male respondents(0.0%).The use of certain expressions by the majority of married Yorùbáwomen(93.0%)to show deference to husbands’relatives who are not older than them,with no corresponding overwhelming use of similar expressions by male respondents(66.7%),not only ironically shows a sharp deviation from the Yorùbáculture which the society embraces,but also,the highly hierarchical nature of the Yorùbásociety in which marriage often confers a superior status on the majority of husbands’relatives.The study shows that gender-exclusive and gender-preferential speech forms are deep-rooted aspects of the Yorùbáculture and that gendered speech style is just,but a means of expressing aspects of that culture.展开更多
文摘That there are differences between male and female speech forms has been well established in the literature.The differences in speech are sometimes as a result of the emphasis that each gender places on different aspects of the community’s culture or which the community requires that each gender places on different aspects of its culture.This paper examines gender-exclusive speech forms in the Yorùbálanguage alongside gender-preferential speech features with a view to highlight the greater emphasis that Yorùbáwomen place or are expected to place on certain aspects of the Yorùbáculture.Ethnographic method was used for data elicitation.Structured interviews were conducted with 30 purposively selected respondents in selected communities in Kwara,Lagos and Oyo States of Nigeria while participant observation at different periods in these communities between 1983 and 2018 also yielded useful data.A highly significant number of female respondents(93.0%)address their spouses’younger siblings with honourific pronouns regardless of such siblings’ages contrariwise for all male respondents(0.0%).The use of certain expressions by the majority of married Yorùbáwomen(93.0%)to show deference to husbands’relatives who are not older than them,with no corresponding overwhelming use of similar expressions by male respondents(66.7%),not only ironically shows a sharp deviation from the Yorùbáculture which the society embraces,but also,the highly hierarchical nature of the Yorùbásociety in which marriage often confers a superior status on the majority of husbands’relatives.The study shows that gender-exclusive and gender-preferential speech forms are deep-rooted aspects of the Yorùbáculture and that gendered speech style is just,but a means of expressing aspects of that culture.
