Emotional women and promiscuous men: Language use as discursive stances of wives on cheating husbands

Abstract

This paper investigates the dimensions of emotive language used by women to situate their stances on cheating husbands in Calabar, Southern Nigeria. The data for the study were generated by means of non-participant observation and semi-structured interviews, aided by audiotape recording and field notes. One hundred married women constitute the representative sample from whom the data were elicited. Findings show that the participants used emotional language to establish different stances in discourses on adulterous acts of their husbands. The participants’ stances are construed to be nuanced in religious, punitive, revengeful, sociobiological, reconciliatory and legal considerations. Participants’ choices were influenced by the women’s religious, gendered and sociocultural orientations, educational background and level of exposure, family and social pressure, personal safety and psychological state. These differentials connect the appraisal patterns with the consequences of each stance which should also serves as expository guide on the rational for such decisions by women on cheating spouses. The emotive outbursts by the participants stress the need for men to be faithful to their wives to sustain mutual happiness and peaceful marriages.

Language use in the construction of memory: A study of T-shirts inscriptions of graduating students

“…This is in addition to the high number of students who were consulted but seemed uninterested in the exercise. As Uwen et al [61] suggest, the study of this nature is also limited by the individual, sociocultural and ethnoreligious beliefs of the participants which could provide restraints to divulging certain information. The limitations, however, do not in any sense invalidate the findings which have provided genuine clues on the (implied) meanings of the inscriptions and semiotic impulses, and the motivations that informed the production.…”

Language use as stancetaking on motivations for romantic relationships among female undergraduates

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Emotive language as construction of situational aggression among drivers at gridlock scenes in Nigeria

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