A Critical Linguistic Study of Language Variation and

Ideological Differences in Media Discourse in Nigeria

Innocent Chiluwa, Department of English & Literary Studies, Covenant
University, Ota.

Abstract
Quite a number of studies on media discourse in Nigeria, have dwelt on issues
relating to textuality and meaning of news reports. Very few of these works
show the ideological role of language in media discourse. This paper strongly
demonstrates that news discourse is a product of social processes and that a
strong connection exists between language and ideology. The Guardian and The
Punch - two Nigerian newspapers – are chosen for this study. Data comprise
news headlines, from these papers, reported during the first quarter of 2004, a
period when some major social crises erupted in some parts of the country.
Analysis of data is based on the combination of Halliday’s systemic model and
critical discourse analysis which view language as social semiotic and social
practice. The study shows that linguistic variation in the headline of the
newspapers under study is not just a function of choice of syntactic forms but
also that they represent the paper’s perception of events that has some
ideological imprints, especially in the Nigerian crisis situations.

Introduction
Critical Discourse Analysis upon which this work is based is a type of
Analysis of Discourse which contributes to social and cultural research
by examining how language functions in specific social contexts.
Attention is paid to language behaviours by examining discourse texts
that have actually occurred in specific contexts and identifying how
language use in any text is reflective of social identities, social relations
and systems of culture and beliefs. Fairclough (1989) argues that
language is a social practice and a part of social processes and as such the
ideological nature of language should be one of the major concerns of
social or linguistic analysis.
In his paper, “What the papers say: Linguistic Variation and
Ideological Differences”, Tony Trew (1979) demonstrates that people and
institutions and especially the mass media perceive social realities
differently and this clearly finds expression in language use. According
to him, when people talk of “not speaking the same language” even
when they are speaking the same English or French, the “difference” in
question is about differences in thought, perception or ideology, which
manifest in a systematic and often peculiar configuration of linguistic
items. He argues “when social norms are infringed or the legitimacy of
88 Innocent Chiluwa

the institutions of control is challenged, there is commonly a response in

the media that tends to show most visibly the existence and effects of
specific – and often different ways of perceiving things.” Fowler
(1979:118). Freeman et. al (1986) showed that the vocabulary and
grammar of news headlines and news reports combine to reveal a
distinctive point of view, which implies at least some selective perception
or bias.
The two studies above are among the few on news headlines (See
also Meecheroen et.al, 1998) carried out on foreign newspapers at
different times. The present study applies both the Systemic Functional
approach and Critical Discourse Analysis to study:

(i) How ideology is reflected in the language use of the Nigerian

mass media and
(ii) How such a study gives some specific insights to the ideological
nature and social functions of language, especially in the Nigerian
crisis situations.

The study examines specifically, news headlines and their overlines of

two popular Nigerian newspapers namely The Guardian and The Punch.

Media Discourse, Ideology and Critical Linguistics

Media discourse in this study refers to language use in the mass
media. It mainly concerns the interactive process that goes on between
journalists and the general public. Like any other form of language use,
media discourse is a social practice and this study argues that journalists
and the readers are the main actors in news discourse and not a social
interaction among journalists (Scollon, 1998). Media discourse takes
advantage of the socio-cultural and historical relationship that exists
between people and society and the role of language in constructing this
relationship in ensuring a constant social interaction. In other words,
news discourse mediates social interaction and readers are participants in
this practice.
My use of ‘media discourse’ in this paper specifically refers to new
headlines (and their overlines) of some selected publications of The
Guardian and The Punch newspapers during the first quarter of 2004. This
period is important to this study because of the number of social crises
around the country at this time. The headlines in the data are those that
actually reflect ‘crisis situations.’ A news headline is a title of a news
story that encapsulates the entire contents of the news, while the overline
is a brief explanatory note that usually goes with the headline, e.g.
 Critical Linguistic Study of Language Variation 89

NLC RULES OUT FRESH TALKS (the headline)

Government moves to stop Strike (the overline).

A number of researches has been carried out on media language,

most which examine the general structures and stylistic features of
newspaper language (See Crystal and Davy, 1969; Bell, 1991). Fowler
(1991) notes that news is both a product of some institutional processes
as well as ideology of the newspaper which reflect on the language use.
Hartley (1992) and Caldas-Coulthard (1996) examine the social functions
of the news. Osisanwo (2001) concentrates on the structural patterns of
texts in newspaper editorials, while Taiwo (2001) studies the
functionality of language in newspapers. None of these works dwells on
the ideological nature of language as reflected on news headlines.
Studies on news headlines such as Meecheroen et al. (1998) and Taiwo
(2004) are a survey of public understanding and preference for news
headlines. Taiwo’s work is mainly a study of speech variations in news
headlines. None of these studies paid attention to language variation and
ideological differences in the news, which this paper is concerned with.
A work of this nature naturally finds in Critical Discourse Analysis,
a theoretical base which explains the relationship between language as a
social process and ideology which is mediated by language. Critical
discourse analysis shows how language is used to affect people and
confine them in some social and economic conditions as the society
deems fit (Fowler, 1979, Fairclough, 1989). People tend to fit into some
specific patterns of behaviour as part of the socialization process, and
language has a way of reflecting this. According to Fowler and Kress
(1979:185), “world view comes to language users from their relation to
the institutions and the socio-economic structure of their society. It is
facilitated and confirmed for them by a language use which has society’s
ideological impress.” Social groupings and relationships therefore
influence linguistic behaviour of speakers and writers as well as their
non-linguistic cognitive behaviour in a way they are hardly aware of.
Since meaning in language is so inseparable from ideology and both are
determined by social structure, Fowler and Kress argue that linguistics
should be a useful tool for the study of ideological processes.
By ideology is meant the belief, socio-political and cultural
philosophy or convention upon which peoples’ actions or
communicative activities are based (Polynton, 1985; Fairclough, 1989).
90 Innocent Chiluwa

According to Fairclough (1989), ideology is institutionalized and used as

tools in the hands of some people to suppress and dominate others.
Fairclough further argues that ideologies are propagated through
“common sense assumptions” and individuals simply accept them
unquestionably because their society imposes these ideologies on them.
For instance, power and class relations are sustained in social practice
and people are made to accept them as social conventions and common
sense. “The individual is able to act only so far as there are social
conventions to act within” (Fairclough, 1989:23). These social
conventions or ideologies are most effective when they are least visible
because they are embedded in common sense assumptions, expectations
and conventional practices. Conventional practices affect the means of
linguistic expressions; hence any linguistic text carries with it certain
‘implicit assumptions’ about social practices and much of interpretation
of meaning and the supply of some ‘missing link’ of information is done
by means of inferencing since the conventions which the text reflects are
taken for granted.
The critical language study also includes the investigation of some
pragmatic criteria like illocutionary acts and discourse implicatures of
utterance. It studies the details of linguistic structure in the light of the
social and historical situation of the text to display the patterns of belief
and values which are encoded in the language (Fowler 1979).

Theory/Methodology
The Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL) - a function-based approach to
language study, views language as a social behaviour or “semiotic”.
Analysis of linguistic data is based on utterances that have actually
occurred in real social situations. Such a study is to show the purposes
language performs in different social contexts and how meaning, social
processes and attitudes are constructed in a variety of ways.
In characterizing the functional components of grammar, Halliday
(1978) identifies three “meta-functions” namely: the experiential
component – which is the part of grammar concerned with the
expression of experience (ideational function); the grammar of personal
participation i.e. establishing and sustaining relationships and social
roles (interpersonal function) and the creation of text (textual function).
In the clause the experiential component is represented by the
participants, process (verbal elements) and circumstances of transitivity
(circumstances). The grammar of transitivity shows events, states,
processes and their related entities. The Interpersonal function is the
 Critical Linguistic Study of Language Variation 91

grammar of “personal participation” (Fairclough 1992a), which is

represented by mood and modality. These components cover utterances
or linguistic constructs that express the speakers’ attitude towards one
another, their social and economic relationships, their social roles, their
attitude towards their interlocutors and their social actions The textual
function is the construction of texts – verbal, written or attitudinal. Texts
are seen as sets of options – a set of options from a system of option from
among language forms – lexical, grammatical, phonological, etc.
(Fairclough 1995).
Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) adopts a more socio-political
attitude to show how language, through its discursive elements, is
central to the formation of subjectivity and structures of inequality.
Fairclough (1995) adopts Halliday’s metafunctions but adds “identity
function”, i.e. construction of identity and relations as part of the
interpersonal function of language. Both Systemic Functional Linguistics
and Critical Discourse Analysis view language as social constructs
showing how society influences language use. They also share a
common view that discursive events influence the context in which they
occur and the context in turn influences the discursive events. Both
approaches emphasise the cultural and historical dimension of meaning
(Graham 2004).
In the analysis of data, the functions of the grammar of transitivity
(part of the ideational function) of some selected headlines and some
parts of the news reports will be investigated. Grammar of transitivity
reveals how the clause is used to represent actions, events and entities.
Other analytical tools in systemic linguistics that will be applied in the
analysis are the grammar of modality (the interpersonal relations of
speaker and hearer); the manipulation of linguistic materials;
transformations; linguistic ordering; the grammar of classification and
coherence: order and unity of discourse (1979). This will help the analyst
show how ideology influences linguistic structures which reflect the
society in which they operate.

Corpus
The corpus comprises three pairs of news headlines and their
overlines, which have been purposively selected for this study. Where
necessary some parts of the news report have been referred to for clarity.
The selection of data is also based on the significance of the period the
news in question covered, i.e. first quarter of 2004 - a time of socio-
political tension occasioned by industrial action and political
92 Innocent Chiluwa

assassinations in Nigeria. The data reflect social processes and events

which language is part of. The data are as follows:

(i) NLC RULES OUT FRESH TALK

Government moves to stop strike (The Punch)

Labour Declares Total Strike, Plans Protests in Phases

Police seek dialogue for violence free rallies (The Guardian) (January
19, 2004)

(ii) Gunmen Kill Kogi State Electoral Chief, Police Arrest PDP Leader
(The Guardian)

KOGI STATE ELECTORAL BOSS KILLED

- PDP Chief, two others Arrested
- Obasanjo meets Police Chiefs (The Punch)
(March 8, 2004)

(iii) Politicians Spend N1bn on Bulletproof Cars (The Punch) (Main

headline)

Politicians, Businessmen Scramble for Bulletproof Vehicles

…To train drivers abroad (The Guardian) (March 15, 2004)

At the breakdown of talk between the Nigeria Labour Congress

(NLC) and the Federal government on the price of fuel in the country,
Labour declared a nation wide strike with effect from Wednesday 21st
January 2004. Labour was protesting the deregulation of the down
stream oil sector and the N1.50 fuel tax. Appearing as the The Guardian’s
and The Punch’s main headlines on Monday 19th January 2004:

(i) NLC RULES OUT FRESH TALK

- Government moves to stop strike (Punch)

(ii) LABOUR DECLARES TOTAL STRIKE, PLANS PROSTEST IN

PHASES
- Police seek dialogue for violence free rallies (The
Guardian)
 Critical Linguistic Study of Language Variation 93

The first striking difference between the two reports is the focus of
each report. The Punch (hence forth Punch) reports that agreement with
labour was unlikely, even though there was the possibility to restrain
them, as “government moves to stop strike”. The finite verb or process
“moves” indicates that government is an entity (or agent) that moves as a
united force against labour. The Guardian (hence forth Guardian) says that
talk had broken down, that strike was already declared and that the police
was seeking non-violent rallies. Both headlines are simple clauses,
reported in the active voice. Punch is silent on the activity of the police.
Depending on their points of view, Punch takes sides with the
government. From the report, the government anticipates a probable truce
with a recalcitrant Labour.
Government moving to stop strike through some legal means
suggests a position akin to being defensive. Government is portrayed as a
persecuted agency that moves to prevent an ill-conceived action likely to
cause disaffection and breach of public peace. That Labour “rules out
fresh talk” projects it in the light of a tendency parallel to belligerence,
intransigence and lawlessness. The phrasal verb “rules out” presupposes
the tendency not to listen to legitimate counsel and, where restraint is not
possible, the patient government is compelled to seek redress at the
Appeal court. Further reports by Punch are all about government
activities and the efforts of the government to stop the NLC.

The Federal Government could pull a last minute joker to

checkmate the strike by the Nigeria labour Congress scheduled to
start midnight on Tuesday…Government’s desperate moves to
stop the strike came as labour declares on Sunday in Lagos that it
was unlikely that the dispute would be resolved by any fresh talks.

Labour is portrayed as the aggressor and the government, a victim.

Guardian reports the activities of the NLC, and goes further to report
NLC’s explanation for its decision as people oriented. It quotes the
Labour president as saying: “we have to determine when to stop and
refuel and when to continue the struggle until we get our government to
listen to the plights of Nigerians…a democratic project will collapse, if
Nigerians fail to rise up to collectively say to President Obasanjo ‘enough
is enough’. Further reports were on the planned phases of the strike and
the activities of the police to ensure violence free actions. Labour is
94 Innocent Chiluwa

portrayed as a victim, the government as an oppressor and the planned

strike as a last resort to achieve social equity.
An ideology that equates the master-servant relationship with that
of the ruler and the ruled in a democratic state has the tendency to
attribute illegal power to the government. Government is perceived as
the ultimate power and any legitimate resistance is viewed as
confrontation. The Punch is sympathetic to the government’s position
and expects an unconditional cooperation from the NLC in the
circumstance. And where this is not the case, the government has the
right to apply both legal and unconstitutional means of crushing the
resistance. Notice the phrasal verb “rules out”; NLC rules out (rather
peremptorily) and government “moves to stop”. “Rules out” implies
obstinacy, stubbornness and intransigence, therefore justifying
government’s moves to stop it. There is the air of stalemate – a struggle
between two opposing forces. The government, portrayed as being in a
rather weaker position, is justified to crush the rebellion. The implication
of this ideological conviction is that the government has the right to stop
oppositions, which is actually the people’s collective yearning for good
governance. Again this implies that the government doesn’t seem to see
the NLC as fairly representing the Nigerian worker, which legitimizes
government’s intervention.
The Guardian’s report that Labour “declares”, “plans” protest in
phases implies that the protest involves the general public; it is people
oriented. To “declare” means, “to say something officially or publicly”
(Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary). It presupposes that the NLC
addresses the Nigerian worker. “Plans” is a mental process which in this
context also involves people. Here The Guardian projects the NLC as a
people oriented institution, capable of planned actions for a just course.
Also, it implies that Labour has the right to question unpopular
government policy as well as resist forces of oppression. To Punch, the
idea is that NLC and the planned strike are aberrations to the socio-
economic policy of government, and government should resist any form
of intimidation. Government is perceived as the master. The Guardian
presents the NLC as the people’s spokesman and strike is the only
available option to correct social aberrations.
Let’s look at the second headline:

GUNMEN KILL KOGI STATE ELECTORAL CHIEF, POLICE

ARREST PDP LEADER (Guardian)
 Critical Linguistic Study of Language Variation 95

KOGI STATE ELCTORAL BOSS KILLED

- PDP Chief, two other arrested
- Obasanjo meets Police Chief (The Punch)

Guardian reports in the active voice in the two parts of the headline.
Thus, the agent (gunmen) performs the action or process (kill) on the
affected participant (Kogi state electoral chief). On the second part of the
headline, the active voice puts the “police” (agent) in the focal position. It
performs an action “arrest” on the “PDP leader” (affected participant).
The Punch reports in the passive form. Significantly, the agent of the
killing is deleted and the affected participant is brought to a focal point.
The idea that he was killed is placed in a subordinate position. The
linguistic structure of the headline presupposes that the attention of the
reader is focused on “Kogi state electoral boss”. Other information on
the headline is contained in the overline “PDP chief, two others arrested”
– still in the passive structure; the agent “police” is dropped. “Obasanjo
meets police chiefs” – the active form places “Obasanjo” in the public
view. Guardian identifies the killers as “gunmen.” It reports:

Another high profile assassination was yesterday recorded in the

country with the killing of the chairman of the Kogi state
Independent Electoral Commission, Chief Philip Olorunnipa. He
was shot dead, at about 3 a.m. at his residence in Aduno Kabba
area of the state by suspected assassins.

The action of “kill” in the first part of the headline legitimizes the
“arrest” in the second part. Thus, “police arrest” is sequel to “gunmen
kill”. In each part of the headline, Guardian follows the same linguistic
sequence of ordering of the events – a syntactic agent (gunmen/police) +
a transitive verb representing a transactive process (kill/arrest) and an
affected participant (Kogi state electoral chief/PDP leader). In the first
part of the headline, “gunmen” implies the instrument of the process i.e.
gun, since “kill” is a function of the gunmen. An ideological
characterization of the instrument of political killings is mediated, that is,
most political killings are assassinations by gun shooting. Social events
that re-echo and confirm what people feel and experience mould
people’s perception. The Nigerian socio-political climate consistently
favours this perception that politicians are usually murdered by gun
trotting men and we can see that media reports systematically represent
this ideological perception.
96 Innocent Chiluwa

Punch deletes the agent of “killed,” presupposing that the Kogi state
electoral chief could have been killed by any other means other than
shooting. The headline writer probably considers the caliber of the
victim more important than the fact that he was killed; hence, the
prominent position the electoral boss occupies on the headline. It follows
the same sequence in the remaining parts of the headline: (i) “PDP chief,
two others arrested” (ii) “Obasanjo meets police chiefs”. (i) follows the
passive structure, where “PDP chief” is placed at the focal position. (ii) is
written in the active form, but again “Obasanjo” occupies a central
position. This systematic ordering of social processes is anchored to how
Punch perceives social events and what linguistic items they choose to
represent the ideology of the newspaper.

Another high profile assassination was yesterday recorded in the

country with the killing of the chairman of the Kogi state INEC
chairman…he was shot dead

Although the first line of the report says “shot dead” it concludes the
sentence with “list of those killed in recent times”. Notice that “those”
comes before “killed”. It is safe to conclude therefore that Punch values
people’s statuses and social roles more than what affects them as
individuals, following the perception that people should be treated on
the basis of their socio-economic roles and statuses. Comparing Guardian
and Punch on account of abstract linguistic changes and choices of
sequence of events we see the following:

AgentProcess Affected Circumstance

Guardian Gunmen Kill (active) Kogi State electoral chief shooting

Police arrest (active) PDP leader -

Punch - killed (passive) Kogi state electoral boss -

- arrested (passive) PDP chief, two other -
Obasanjo meets (active) Police chiefs -

The Punch highlights affected participants rather than actors (agents)

and the process is in passive form. The Guardian reports agents as
performers of action and instruments of the processes and the affected
participants. It is also deducible that Guardian favours the ideology of
personal responsibility to actions. Individuals are morally responsible to
 Critical Linguistic Study of Language Variation 97

their actions; hence, Guardian highlights who does what and the
circumstances in which actions are performed.
The last headline is about the Nigerian politician’s penchant for
bulletproof cars, widely publicized by the local newspapers on the 15th of
March 2004:

Politicians, Businessmen Scramble for Bullet-proof Cars - To

train drivers abroad (The Guardian)

POLITICIANS SPEND N1BN ON BULLETPROOF CARS (The

Punch)

This story forms Punch’s main headline, while the Guardian makes it a
second headline with the lettering less bold than the main one.
Guardian’s headline is a clause, with double agents: “politicians”,
“businessmen”; “and” is dropped. The verb phrase is made up of a
process “scramble” and a prepositional phrase “for bulletproof vehicles”
(goal). Additional information on the headline says, “to train drivers
abroad.” The Punch’s headline has one agent (politicians), a process
(spend), a participant (N1bn) and a prepositional phrase “on bulletproof
cars” (purpose). Both headlines are reported in the active form. But
notice the difference:

Agent Process Participant Purpose/Circumstance

Guardian Politicians,
Businessmen scramble - for bulletproof vehicles

Punch Politicians spend N1bn on bulletproof cars

Guardian includes “businessmen” as a syntactic agent and

“scramble” as process. The use of “scramble” i.e. scamper, struggle or
compete with others instead of just “spend” is to mediate the usual
competitive attitude of politicians and to represent the particular mode of
behaviour characteristic of a people, i.e. Nigerian politicians. “Scramble”
as a psychological attribute of politicians is however an assumed one, but
it does mediate the social perception of politics and politicians as they are
linked ideologically with this kind of subjective social tendency. One can
assume that Nigerian politicians are generally associated with opulence,
flamboyance, dissipation and disorder. Notice that “businessmen” is not
98 Innocent Chiluwa

included in the headline of Punch, which seems to lessen the impact of

this attribute of politicians. This is in order to push the ideological
perception to where it really belongs. With this social perception, it is not
surprising that politicians spend N1billion on cars. In Nigeria, politics is
viewed simply as money, contracts, lootings, etc; hence, politicians are
unsafe, they outdo each other, and assassinate each other; it is logical
therefore that they scramble for bulletproof cars. This type of reporting
is constantly maintained in order to sustain this ideology. Punch gives the
exact sum of money spent on cars alone, while Guardian retains the
tempo of the Nigerian mentality and idealism. It says “vehicles”, Punch
says “cars”. A vehicle is anything from cars to buses or trucks or lorries.
So, the use of “vehicles” instead of “cars” is significant in order to assert
the ideological perception of opulence and dissipation. Then, it adds “to
train drivers abroad” as a continuation of the process which begins with
scrambling and spending. It is clear therefore that language choice in
news discourse follows a systematic selecting and sorting of linguistic
items, which have the ideological imprints of the newspaper or of the
society.

Conclusion
This paper has demonstrated that news discourse is a product of social
processes. Social events are reported and mediated by the linguistic
resources available to a news reporter, so that linguistic choices are
determined not only by the events but also by the ideology of the
newspaper. The Guardian and The Punch are two widely read Nigerian
newspapers and my choice of their headlines, as data is purely on the
basis of their social relevance. Analysis of data has shown that linguistic
variation in news discourse is not just a function of choice of syntactic
forms but that of the fact that they represent the paper’s perception of
events and social attitude. This is to enable us see that linguistic and
ideological differences are part of social processes and that linguistic
structure is not only influenced by social structure but is also actually,
part of social structure. In other words, language mediates social
experiences, events and ideologies and that the patterns of social
structures and ideologies are visible in language use.
 Critical Linguistic Study of Language Variation 99

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