ISSN 2360-7998
Abstract
Accepted 5th August, 2020
This paper examines feminism and the politics of media English in Nigeria. In an attempt to situate the relationship between language, media and gender, the paper cites some contentious English words regarding gender and gender roles as noted by feminist agitators; the socio-cultural background of gender-sensitive words and what influences their usage; the alternatives to gender sensitive words in the media planks and their limitations, taking into cognizance the global and the Nigerian media and gender context. The paper argued that issues of gender inequality is a dicey global problem that is difficult to define, differing in scope, values and patterns of advocacy according to social and media normative settings. The implication is, even the definition of what constitutes woman’s right and gender inequality cannot be precise, because of the plurality of cultures that host particular languages that express the constituents of respective definitions. Thepaper revealed that even the new digital culture had failed to alter the circumstances of female journalists and writers and the language of media representation is virtually a wholesale migration of male dominated cultural codes prevalent in the conventional media space to the networked media platforms. That is to say, the media as means of mass production and mass consumption of content is not equitable economically, ideologically and culturally. The paper further argued that having a gendered language is still not a guaranty for equitable social gender equality in the context of modern feminism. The papertherefore situated its discussions of gender and linguistic issues within the ambit of Feminist Language Theory.
Keywords: Feminism, Politics, Media English, Gender