DISCOURSE AND RESISTANCE: AN IDEOLOGICAL DISCOURSE ANALYSIS OF READERS’ COMMENTS ON VICTIMS’ NARRATIVES IN STELLA DIMOKO KORKUS’ DOMESTIC VIOLENCE DIARY - PART ONE

Adetutu Aragbuwa, George Adekunle Ojo

Abstract


Scholars have researched resistance discourses across varied contexts; however, resistance discourses to domestic violence against women (DVAW) still remain under-researched in (critical) discourse analytical studies. In view of this paucity, the present paper seeks to explore women’s discursive resistance to male oppression and power abuse in the domestic sphere by eliciting the discourse structures deployed by readers in their online feedback comments on victims’ narratives of domestic violence (DV), culled from Stella Dimoko Korkus’ Domestic Violence Diary – Part One. This is with a view to analysing the commenters’ ideological stances on DVAW. The data, which comprise one hundred and seventy-two (172) readers’ comments, are subjected to qualitative analysis using some aspects of van Dijk’s socio-cognitive ideological approach. The findings reveal that the readers’ comments are replete with instances of discourse structures such as: polarisation; positive self-presentation and negative other-presentation (achieved via lexicalisation and implication); victimisation; evidentiality; number game; metaphor; and consensus. Functionally, these discourse structures underscore resistance ideologies; and illustrate some sub-ideologies of resistance, namely: the oppressed versus the oppressor; positive in-group presentation versus negative out-group presentation; the captive versus the captor; combativity; empathy; and solidarity. These findings establish that the commenters’ discursive interactive patterns are dominantly controlled by women’s growing resistance to male domination. The study thus foregrounds the potentiality of Stella Dimoko Korkus’ Domestic Violence Diary weblog as a site for promoting the movement for female discursive resistance to male oppression.

 

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discourse, ideology, resistance, weblogging, domestic violence against women

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References


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DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.46827/ejals.v4i2.328

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