LANGUAGE IN INDIA

Strength for Today and Bright Hope for Tomorrow

Volume 20:11 November 2020
ISSN 1930-2940

Editors:
         Sam Mohanlal, Ph.D.
         B. Mallikarjun, Ph.D.
         A. R. Fatihi, Ph.D.
         G. Baskaran, Ph.D.
         T. Deivasigamani, Ph.D.
         Pammi Pavan Kumar, Ph.D.
         Soibam Rebika Devi, M.Sc., Ph.D.

Managing Editor & Publisher: M. S. Thirumalai, Ph.D.

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Language, Action Negotiation in Lassa Fever Health Discourse in Nigeria

Patience Obiageri Solomon-Etefia and Samuel Edem

Abstract

The progressively worse health condition in Nigeria increased the need for appropriate health information that the people can understand, and the case of the Lassa fever endemic disease is not an exception. This study, from a pragmatic perspective, examines language, action, negotiation in Lassa fever health discourse. This study aims at three goals. First, it underscores ‘speech act theory’ as a pragma-communication model that accentuates language, action negotiation. Secondly, it substantiates the significance of the model in the creation of shared understanding and coordination as well as contextual representation of texts that are pragmatically exploited by the text producer to exert some perlocutionary effects on the reader of such texts. Thirdly, it situates the place of the speech act theory in the explication of health discourses by interrogating its relevance in such context. A total number of nineteen texts were purposively selected from five banners through a qualitative design. The study employs Searle’s model of speech acts as a pragmatic framework complemented by Halliday’s systemic functional linguistics (social semiotic model). Research such as this will contribute not only to the understanding of the speech act model but has fundamental communicative implications to the functional status of health discourse in particular.

Keywords: Nigeria, Lassa fever, health discourse, speech act theory, pragmatics, perlocutionary.

1. Introduction

Language is a system of communication, and communication, in turn, is seen as a tool in the hands of speakers or writers in solving problems. Language, according to Odebumi (2016: 3), is a distinctively human endowment that has empowered the human race with expressivity. Expressivity in this sense authenticates that peculiarity which characterizes the human race from other creatures, thus, language accredits humans to communicate their thoughts as well as engage in interactive or shared association. This definition substantiates Malmkjær (1991: 141) perception of language as an “instrument through which people can enter into communicative relations with one another.” To Halliday (1978:39), language evolves as the systems of "meaning potential" or a “social semiotics” (a resource for meaning), which influences what the speaker can do with language, in a particular social context. With it, humans negotiate, construct, and change the nature of social experience. By this, language becomes a fundamental phenomenon for the communication or expression of ideas, knowledge, and intentions amongst human beings.

The knowledge of language use is the knowledge of how to use it effectively. This implies channelling it to do what one wants to do with the appropriate context . This is pragmatics in its totality as this present study intends to unveil. A writer uses language to achieve his aim, this infers that the hearer, in turn, is expected to understand and interpret the message or utterance of the writer in a particular way (Edem, 2018: 99). This negotiating commitment validates the production of a written or spoken text as a social process which entwines the interaction between the writer and the reader. Thus, the significance of language in health discourses cannot be overemphasized as the present study tries to explicate in language, action, negotiation in Lassa fever health discourse.

This is only the beginning part of the article. PLEASE CLICK HERE TO READ THE ENTIRE ARTICLE IN PRINTER-FRIENDLY VERSION.

Patience Obiageri Solomon-Etefia
Department of Linguistics Studies
University of Benin
patience.solomon-etefia@uniben

Samuel Edem
Department of English
Nigeria Police Academy, Wudil, Kano State dmsamuel19@gmail.com
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