Tracking ideology in Nigerian newspaper representation of the 2015 and 2016 pro-Biafra protests

Abstract

This study examines the ideological inclinations of the discourse surrounding the 2015 and 2016 Biaffa protests as represented in selected Nigerian newspapers. Data for the study were news reports purposively selected from four widely circulated Nigerian national dailies: The Punch, The Nation, The Sun and Vanguard newspapers, which reported the protests. The period covered was between 2015 and 2016, a period when the protests were prominently reported in the country. Ruth Wodak's Discourse Historical approach to Critical Discourse Analysis and M.A.K Halliday's Transitivity model of Systemic Functional Linguistics served as the theoretical framework of the study. The data were subjected to critical discourse analysis. Findings reveal six underlying ideologies in the representation of the protests; namely separatist, pacifist, liberatiomst, dissentist, schist and repressionist.