Search

This article analyses media frames employed by the Nigerian media in reporting events of the COVID-19 pandemic. It determines the linguistic choices that shaped the intentions of the media and how they aligned with the timing and effectiveness that impacted the thoughts and actions expressed by Nigerians. Agenda setting theory, framing theory and speech act theory elucidated the media practice of consciously selecting words or expressions for creating frames of news reports to achieve their desired intentions of controlling public perceptions of events regardless of the authenticity. This study adopted a mixed-method research methodology. Data were obtained from Nigerian online media reports on COVID-19, and also from a questionnaire to collect quantifiable data from 500 respondents in Nsukka metropolis in Nigeria using cluster and purposive random sampling techniques. We adopted Austin's speech act (1962) and Bateson's (1972) framing theories as theoretical frameworks to analyse our data. We observed the domination of frames involving assertive, declarative and directive speech acts in the Nigerian media reports to create a 'death-sentence' image about COVID-19 and to evoke greater belief in their stories, and fear among the public. However, with unfolding events not matching the media frames, Nigerians began to doubt the media and the government. This development showed that such media frames had outlived their effectiveness and needed to change to retain the public's attention after their 'optimum effectiveness duration' had expired. The failure to change them made the public develop their counter-frames. The study, therefore, advocates a constant change of news frames to retain public attention and a review of Bateson's framing theory to reflect societal and environmental impacts on frame effectiveness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present paper discusses the occurrence, structure, and complexity of the postmodifier in the Nigerian English noun phrase (NP) showing tendencies for structural simplification. It also compares its findings with patterns in British, Ghanaian, Singaporean, Honk Kong varieties. The paper shows how variables representing syntactic function, register, and weight shed light on specific contexts where we might or might not find (1) NP with or without a postmodifier (2) a clausal or phrasal postmodifier, and (3) a simple or a complex postmodifier. In addition, the paper shows that the extent of variation among different varieties of English is dependent on variables crucial to the construction choices being investigated. For instance, in (1), a postmodifier is realised while no postmodifier is realised in (2). (1) My car which I just bought last week has been stolen, and (2) My car has been stolen.The NP in (1) is structurally complex because it realises the clausal type of post modifier, 'which I just bought last week'. Meanwhile in (2), the NP (the car) lacks a postmodifier. In other words, the occurrence viz-a-viz non-occurrence of a postmodifier contributes to the overall structural and semantic complexity of the entire noun phrases, irrespective of the syntactic positions of the NP. Quantitative analyses of 8897 NPs indicate that in Nigerian NPs, a postmodifier is more unlikely to occur (61%) than not (39%). Further analyses show that prepositional phrase (57%), rather than clause (32%) or adjective (9%) or adverbials (2%), is the most preferred structural postmodifier type. It is also shown that realised postmodifiers are more likely to be structured in two-to-four words (51%) than four-words above. As for the predictive strength of variables studied, syntactic function is found to edge register in asserting influence and explaining different scenarios and contexts where we might or might not find a postmodifier, together with its structural type and weight. In other words, register, which is reputed as a significant indicator of structural variation (Biber, 2007; De Haan, 1993; Schilk and Schaub, 2016) is outweighed by syntactic function. The study further attests that significant structural simplification is largely present in the postmodifier structure of the Nigerian English noun phrase. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]