Language, Discourse & Society June 2021 Issue 9(1) (original) (raw)
Related papers
A Move Analysis of the Concluding Sections of Televised Sports News Presentations in Ghana
Language, Discourse & Society, 2021
The study presents an analysis of the concluding sections of televised sports news (TSN), an aspect of a stand-alone sports news broadcast, of selected Ghanaian television stations aimed at exploring their schematic structure. The study uses the genre-based theory from the perspectives of Swales (1990) and Bhatia (1993) to analyze 50 televised sports news from Ghana Television (GTV), Metropolitan Entertainment Television (Metro TV) and TV3 Network Limited (TV3). The findings reveal that this unique genre has five rhetorical moves and the move sequence is characterized by irregular patterns. The results further reveal that the choice of words (language use) in the concluding sections of the TSN is influenced by the distinct communicative purposes of the five moves. Also, Move 4 (Creating Awareness of Impending Sporting Activities) has the largest space in the concluding sections of TSN whilst Move 5 (Well Wishes) occupies the least space. The study has implications for media and communication studies serving as a model to assist novice radio and television sports presenters by facilitating their successful acculturation into the discourse community of sports journalism. The study also has implications for the genre theory in general and sports discourse in particular.
Radio Journal:International Studies in Broadcast & Audio Media, 2019
This study examines news production and newsroom culture in radio stations in Ghana’s Northern Region. It explores the dynamics of news production and delivery in indigenous language newsrooms. Through in-depth interviews with eight indigenous language news presenters and journalists, the study critically explores the intricacies of news production, drawing attention to how news production is contextualized within this society. Through an oral epistemological approach, I argue that news journalists and presenters draw on orature and oral epistemologies to build their news-presenting personas and personalities in a way that positions them as frame sponsors who intentionally set the agenda for news content by unilaterally selecting specific stories to air. This study presents novel ways to conceptualize framing and agenda-setting while demonstrating the usefulness of customizing theory for specific sociocultural contexts. The study presents theoretical and practical implications to bridge the gap between theory and praxis while rethinking news production in Global South contexts such as Ghana.
2018
The study investigates two selected Presidential Inaugural Addresses (PIAs) delivered by John Agyekum Kuffour and John Evans Atta Mills. The objective is to identify the broad thematic outline of the selected PIAs, unravel the ideological positions of Kuffour of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) and Mills of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) expressed covertly and also determine the possible areas of divergence and convergence in ideological standpoints of the two political heads. This is essential because, with the entrenchment of democratic cultures in Africa, the need for a deeper appreciation and application of ideological analysis of linguistic choices of political speakers pertaining to particular social contexts is critical. This study is rooted in CDA approach to discourse analysis based on Fairclough's assumption that, discourse analysis aims at systematically exploring often opaque relationships of causality and determination between; discursive practice/events/texts ...
Representational Discourse in TV News Preludes in Kenya
The International Journal of Humanities & Social Studies
Media is a social and discursive institution which plays the role of regulating and organizing social life as well as producing social knowledge, values, and beliefs through linguistic means (Dijk, 1993a). Since there are many news outlets competing for the same audience, they aim at distinguishing themselves from one another through appealing to the public. What is often overlooked about the news is that the agencies producing them constitute businesses (Fowler, 1991). They too, promote and sell a product (that is the news) to the customers. A critical look at media discourse is necessary, considering that the increasingly influential role of the mass media does not necessarily pave way for more objective reporting. There is pressure that often influences choice of language that satisfies the desires of different social actors within the media. This pressure often manifests itself in the texts that appear in TV news preludes. The views expressed in them may reflect the political ideologies that the owners of the media house subscribe to. Fairclough (1995) observes that the media plays an active role in mediating and constructing discourse. It is therefore unrealistic to suppose that the media is neutral in its rendition of news as they would have their audience believe. The actual position is that the media exercises significant power in the social-political scene and seeks to regulate legitimacy issues. The power the media possesses is symbolic power in the sense that it can only influence its audience through persuasion. As Van Dijk (1995) observes, the media exercises a certain amount of mind control on its audience through its persuasive tact and suggests that mind control by the media is particularly effective when the media users do not realize the nature or the implications of such control. The persuasive power of the media is seen when the audience change their minds on their own free will, as when they accept news reports as true or journalistic opinions as legitimate or correct. News texts have great ideological significance in contemporary societies and this significance is vested in their production and dissemination by the media and their consumption by audiences (Thompson, 1995). It is for this reason that this paper focuses on the discursive strategies employed in news preludes to uncover the stances that point to bias in representation of reality. News preludes orient the story in a specific direction and form the lens through which the rest of the story is viewed. To do this, preludes make use of vocabulary that may be ideologically colored and other features of linguistic structure. The "spin" in the news preludes is meant to influence the way the viewers will view the rest of the news. They are presented in a way that will grab the listeners' attention and keep them glued to the station. Depending on the nature and newsworthiness of a news item, the prelude or the introductory commentary is formulated to express views that may variously reflect ideological stances of the news editors, TV station owners, the government or the political class. Here we find the application of one of the major persuasive to poi, commonly used in advertising, by which the message is validated, aimed at gaining favour of the audience. The discursive strategy of using everyday language mixed up with rhetorical figures of speech, linguistic devices such as word plays is a means of influencing public opinion-a persuasive media function. By implementing methodologies that influence and manipulate
A Critical Discourse Analysis of Language in Ghanaian Newspaper Editorials
2020
The study explores the linguistic devices, approaches and styles in media discourse that are used to stake claims to knowledge, to influence attitudes and to promote critical thinking, among other functional roles of language. The study was equally interested in knowing the outcomes of the choice of these linguistic devices as far as communication is concerned. Linguistic devices such as modality, evaluative adjectives, adverbs, generic phrases, rhetoric and idioms among others, are used to state opinions, make predictions and influence attitudes. The study hypothesises that the study of language can be used in particular ways, so intended by the user, to achieve specific purposes. Eight different newspapers: The Daily Graphic, The Ghanaian Times, The Mirror, The Crusading Guide, The Insight, The Independent, The Catholic Standard and The Daily Guide, editorial excerpts were culled and used for the study of language use in newspaper editorials. The styles used and the reasons behind...
2014
The sacrifices of my family, both immediate and extended, cannot go without mention, particularly my mother, Caroline. They endured my absence, prayed for my success and kept the family together during those difficult times that I was away. I am equally grateful to great friends and colleagues who in various ways inspired me toward the success of this project. I particularly mention soon-to-be Dr Rose Wangui, whom I will never forget since she has been a pillar of support. I also acknowledge David Wright of the School of English, University of leeds, Joseph Frempong Manso and many others, all of whom I cannot mention here. My colleagues at SMC-Toussaint, Christiaan, Mandy, Yi, Ella and all ICS staffin diverse ways contributed to the success of the study and I say a big thank you. This research could not have succeeded without the help of ten research assistants who devoted their time and energy to help collect primary data. To
Pɔhim Zuɣu: Understanding Indigenous Language News Audiences in Ghana
African Journalism Studies , 2021
Although there is scant audience research in media studies, audiences continue to be key drivers in the political economy of media in Africa and elsewhere. The study explores the dynamics of indigenous language news audiences’ listening habits, how their information-seeking habits are shaped by personal values and the ways in which their participation in civic engagement reinforces their media consumption habits. The study focuses on Dagbanli and Gonja news audiences living in Ghana’s Northern and Savannah Regions. The objective of the study is to explore the way that Dagbanli and Gonja news audiences use the news they receive by parsing out these uses within this sociocultural context. Through in-depth interviews, the listening habits and civic engagements of news audiences are brought to the fore. Through a uses and gratifications approach, I argue that indigenous language news audiences are active agentive consumers whose habits are shaped by contextual factors, personal and social values. The findings of the study demonstrate that the news shapes the political behaviour and voting decisions of audiences. The study also finds that many audiences use the news as an avenue for learning more about education, agriculture, the environment and pervading conversations in the public sphere.
CORPUS: GHANA MUST GO TOPIC: A READING OF CONFLICTS IN GHANA MUST GO
The study of conflicts in African migrant literature requires a critical analysis of the narrative used to represent struggles, obstacles in the text. Selasi is so aware that her narration makes the portrayal of rivalry between characters, psychological troubles and rejection of identity that are indicative of the presence of conflicts in her Ghana Must Go. Thus, if the depiction of conflicts through the use of indicators of struggle show the manifestation of oppositions in the novel, we should also notice that these conflicts are physical as well as mental.
Decolonization of indigenous language media practice in Ghana: Myth or reality?
Arụmarụka: Journal of Conversational Thinking
The marginalization of Ghanaian indigenous languages from the media space ceased in the 1990s when the airwaves were liberalized. This was not only a ground-breaking experience for diversification but also a way of getting the majority of the population informed, especially through radio, which is a comparatively accessible medium. However, indigenous language use for radio news broadcasts has come under intense criticism for the extensive use of embellishments like proverbs, which are believed to digress from foreign and acceptable news standards. Using content analysis of Ghanaian media policy documents, sampled news recordings from selected private FM radio stations, and semi-structured interviews with selected news professionals, this paper argues that Ghanaian indigenous language communication forms include embellishments and their accurate use presupposes an immense understanding of the language. Hence, indigenous languages cannot be adapted and appreciated wholesomely in the ...
The Covid-19 pandemic in Ghana: exploring the discourse strategies in president Nana Addo's speeches
Humanities and Social Sciences Communications, 2023
Communication during a crisis can affect crisis management and health outcomes. Only a few studies in Africa have examined political leaders' speeches on Covid-19 pandemic preventive and restrictive lockdown measures. The purpose of this study is to examine the discourse strategies employed in President Nana Addo's speeches delivered to Ghanaians on the measures taken to combat the coronavirus. The first ten speeches of Nana Addo since the inception of Covid-19 were selected, coded, and examined using content thematic analysis. The analysis of these speeches identified five main themes to capture the discourse strategies which President Nana Addo used. The strategies captured in the thematic analysis included framing Covid-19 as a war, encouraging nationalism and patriotism, showing appreciation and gratitude, threatening sanctions, and using religious values. These strategies were reinforced by using religious, moralizing, and national identity legitimation discourses to justify measures the government had put in place to minimize the impact of Covid-19 and improve healthcare response. Also, the historical, social, and political contexts of Ghana and elsewhere were invoked in Nana Addo's speeches to legitimize the government's response to Covid-19. In conclusion, we highlight the implications of these strategies on crisis communication and management.