View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE provided by University of Birmingham Research Archive, E-theses Repository A Corpus-based Critical Discourse Analysis of Election News in Nigerian Newspapers by Tahir Oladele Adelakun (ID NO: ) A Dissertation submitted to the University of Birmingham in part fulfilment of the requirements for the award of the degree of Master of Philosophy [MPhil] in Corpus Linguistics This dissertation consists of approximately 20, 000 words Supervisors: Lead Supervisor: Professor Susan E. Hunston Co- Supervisor: Dr. Neil Millar Centre for English Language Studies (CELS) Department of English University of Birmingham Edgbaston, Birmingham B15 2TT United Kingdom September 2013 2 University of Birmingham Research Archive e-theses repository This unpublished thesis/dissertation is copyright of the author and/or third parties. The intellectual property rights of the author or third parties in respect of this work are as defined by The Copyright Designs and Patents Act 1988 or as modified by any successor legislation. Any use made of information contained in this thesis/dissertation must be in accordance with that legislation and must be properly acknowledged. Further distribution or reproduction in any format is prohibited without the permission of the copyright holder. Dedication This Dissertation is dedicated to my beloved mother Hajia Sa’ariyy Abike Adelakun And the girls Taofiqiyyah Ayomide Ajoke Aonah Oluwatobi & Barakah Opeyemi [affectionately tagged TAB] 3 Acknowledgement I wish to show gratitude to Almighty Allah for seeing me through the difficult times in terms of the learning environment, the unpredictable weather and financial challenges. I am also very grateful to my supervisors Professor Susan Hunston and Dr Neil Milla who painstakingly read the thesis and make very useful suggestions. I also thank my mum, Alhaja Sa’riyy Abike Adelakun for her prayers, moral and financial support. My gratitude is extended to my friends and colleagues Ahmeida, Yogi, Dr Muhammad Jimoh, Taofeeq Ashir, Bas, Chau Huat, Ibrahim Rufai, Rahees, Zaheed Fettah, Ghulam, Paul, Claire, Dengxian, Phillip Hayab, Sola Makinde, Salis Ibrahim, Benet, Abdur Rahman, Akeel, and my student adviser, Joe Bennet and others too numerous to mention who have contributed in one way or the other to my success. I also wish to thank my friends who have made Birmingham more comfortable for me and my family. They include Sheikh Ibrahim Bhatta, Suleiman Bhatta, Miikail Worcester, Abdul Lateef, Qamar Aderibigbe, Abdul Mu’min, Abdun Nasir, Dr Kadiri, Taofeeq Abdul Kareem and many others. I cannot but thank my lovely daughters too- Taofiqiyyah, Aonah and Barakah for giving the strength to pull on. Last and not the least my wife, Sariah, who has been of great support. Thank you all. 4 TABLE OF CONTENTS Cover Page………….……………………………………………………………………………..…………..…….……………..1 Title Page………………………………………………………….………………………………………………………………….2 Dedication …………………………..………………………………………………………………………………………………3 Acknowledgement……………………………………………………………….………………………………………………4 Table of Contents…………………………………………………………………………..…………………………………….5 List of Tables…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………9 Research Archive………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..13 Abstract………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………14 1.0 Introduction…………………………………………………………………………………………………………….15 1.1 Overview of the chapter …………………………..……………………………………………………….15 1.2 Background: Political situation in Nigeria…………….………………………….…………………15 1.3 Purpose of the Study and Research Questions…………………….……………………….……16 1.4 Outline of the Dissertation …………………………………………………………………….…………17 1.5 Summary of the Chapter………………………………..……………………………….………..........19 2.0 The Nigerian Context……………………………………………………………………………………………….20 2.1 Overview of the chapter…………………………………………………………………………………....20 2.2 Politics in Nigeria: From Independence to date……………………..……………….…….…..20 2.3 The 2011 General Election…………………………………………………….…………………………..21 2.4 Summary of the Chapter………………………………………………………………….……………….23 3.0 The Impact of Corpus Linguistics on Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) and Review of Corpus-based studies of Newspaper Discourse.………….…………………….…….24 3.1 Overview of the chapter …………………………………………………………..……………….……..24 3.2 The Impact of Corpus Linguistics on Critical Discourse Analysis ………………….…….24 3.2.1 Merits of Corpus-based Study of Discourse Analysis………………………29 3.2.2 Criticism of Corpus-Based Discourse Analysis………………………………..30 3.3 Review of Corpus-based studies of newspaper discourse……….………….................32 3.3.1 What is news?....................................................................................32 5 3.3.2 Overview of the research in corpus-based studies of Newspaper discourse……………………………………………………………………………………...33 3.3.3 Studies on newspaper discourse in Nigeria……………………………………37 3.4 The study of Stance ……………………………………………………………………………………..……37 3.5 The basis of this study………………………………………………………………………………….…….38 3.6 Summary of the Chapter.……………………………………………………………………………..……40 4.0 Methodology and Exploratory Analysis……………………………………………………………………41 4.1 Overview of the Chapter …………………………..………………………………………………………41 4.2 Methodology………………………………………………………………………..……………………………41 4.2.1 Research Aims………………………………………….…………………………….……41 4.2.2 Data Source ……………………………. ……………………….…..…..……………….42 4.2.3 Selecting the Search Terms ……………………………………….…………………42 4.2.4 Creating The Nigerian Election Corpus (NIGEC).…………..……………….43 4.2.5 Research Questions…….………………………………………………..……………..45 4.2.6 Corpus Tools………….………………..…………………………..………………………46 4.2.7 Selecting Items for analysis……………………………………..……………………47 4.2.8 Analysis of the Data……………………………………………..……………………...48 4.3 Exploratory Analysis……………………………………………………………………………………………….…….………48 4.3.1 Overview……………………………………………..……………………..……….………48 4.3.2 Creating the Keyword Lists……………………………………………………………48 4.3.3 Analysis of the Keyword List…………………………………………………………51 4.4 Summary of the Chapter……………………………………………………………………………………52 5.0 A Keyword Analysis of Election news in Northern and Southern Nigerian Newspapers………………………………………………………………………………………………………….…54 5.1 Overview of the Chapter…………………………………………………………………………………...54 5.2 Analysis of the Keyword List………………………………………………………………………….…..57 5.3 Observations in the Categorisation of the Keywords…………….……………………………59 5.4 Types of Evidence for Stance…………………………………………………………………………..…62 5.5 Analysis of Concordance Lines of selected Keywords………………………………………...64 5.5.1 The political parties and groups in the Daily Trust and The Nation………………………………………………………………………………………….65 5.5.2 Analysis of political parties and groups keywords: CPC………………..67 5.5.3 Analysis of politicians keywords: buhari ………………………………………72 6 5.5.4 Analysis of Places keywords: kano…………………..……………………………76 5.5.5 Analysis of Security keywords: crisis…..………….………………………….…77 5.5.6 Analysis of Legal Matters keywords: petition……..…………………..……83 5.6 Summary of the Chapter…………………………………………..………………………..….…………89 6.0 Analysis of Differences/ Similarities in News reports Before and After the Election……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………90 6.1 Overview of the chapter………………………………………………………………………………….…90 6.2 The Diachronic Sub corpora…………………………………………………………………………..…..90 6.3 Keywords in Before and After the Election Sub Corpora……………………….……………93 6.4 Categorisation of Keywords in Before and After the Election Sub Corpora.……….94 6.5 Analysis of selected Keywords……………………………………………………………………………96 6.5.1 Analysis of performance in BEFORE and AFTER election sub corpora………………………………………………………………………………………..98 6.5.1.1 Discussion of concordance for performance in Before the election…………….…………………………………………………………………100 6.5.2 Analysis of Jonathan in Before and After election sub corpora………………………………………………………………………………………101 6.5.2.1 Discussion of concordance lines for Jonathan in after the election………………….……………………………………………………………103 6.6 Summary of the Chapter………………………………………………………………………………….105 7.0 Conclusion……………………………………………………………………………………………………….......106 7.1 Overview of the chapter…………………………………………………….……………………………106 7.2 Research questions answered..…………………………………….…………………………………106 7.3 Main Findings…………………………………………………………………………………………………..109 7.4 Contribution of the study and Suggestions for Future Studies….………………………109 REFERENCES………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….111 APPENDICES……………………………………………………………………………….…………………………………115 Appendix A: Concordance lines for Jonathan in Before Election sub corpus……….…………….115 Appendix B: Concordance lines for Jonathan in After Election sub corpus…………………………115 Appendix C: Concordance lines for PDP in Before Election sub corpus………………………………118 Appendix D: Concordance lines for CPC in Before Election sub corpus……………..................119 7 Appendix E: Concordance lines for Buhari in Before Election sub corpus………………………....120 Appendix F: Concordance for performance in before the election…………………………………….121 Appendix G: Concordance for performance in after the election sub corpus…………………….121 Appendix H: Concordance Lines For Petition in After The Election Sub-Corpus……..............122 8 LIST OF TABLES LIST OF TABLES Table 1: The distribution of major parties and their ethnic and geographical affiliations….…22 Table 2: showing suggested stages in carrying out corpus-based critical discourse analysis..28 Table 3: Showing the distribution of the data collected from the two newspapers on monthly basis…………………………………………………………………………………………………...44 Table 4: Top 100 keywords from NIGEC compared with BE06 ……………………………………………51