Speech acts and gender ideology in selected yoruba song lyrics
Abstract:Women’s representation in Yoruba musical discourse reflects entrenched ideological structures that reinforce gender hierarchies and normalise patriarchal expectations. Although Àpàlà and Fuji music are popularly celebrated as cultural heritage and entertainment, they also serve as pragmatic sites where gender identities are constructed, regulated, and legitimised through language. Despite the growing body of scholarship on Yoruba musical traditions, limited attention has been paid to the illocutionary mechanisms through which gendered meanings are enacted and sustained in song lyrics. This study investigates how speech acts encode gender ideology in selected Yoruba musical texts, focusing on directives, insults, praises, and evaluative statements that shape cultural perceptions of women’s roles and identities. Guided by Austin and Searle’s Speech Act Theory, the study analyses four purposively selected songs: Àyìnlá Ọmọwúrà’s Agídí ò ṣe ló ilé ọkọ and Ọ̀rọ̀ kan jẹ mí lógún, and Abass Àkàndé Òbésèrè’s Àsàkásà and Freedom Compilation. The analysis reveals that illocutionary acts, especially directives and hostile expressives, function as mechanisms of power and social regulation. In Ọmọwúrà’s Àpàlà, directives routinely position women as subordinates who must obey, serve, and conform to established moral codes, while insults and negative evaluations construct them as troublesome, irrational, or morally suspect. In Òbésèrè’s Fuji, praise expressions, though ostensibly positive, primarily valorise women for physical attractiveness, sexual desirability, emotional devotion, and compliance with male-defined ideals. Across the songs, evaluative statements frame femininity within restrictive moral and aesthetic binaries that privilege male authority. The study concludes that Yoruba song lyrics operate as ideological texts where speech acts serve as tools for reinforcing, rationalising, and reproducing gender inequality. By foregrounding how directives, insults, praises, and evaluations perform cultural power, the research demonstrates that everyday musical expressions continue to shape and sustain patriarchal constructions of femininity within Yoruba society.
Download File [ 0.27 MB ]