POLITENESS STRATEGIES IN MALE AND FEMALE SPEECH: A STUDY OF NIGERIAN PIDGIN

During the past five decades, scholars in sociolinguistics have argued that women are more polite than men. This study contributes to the literature by investigating gender and politeness in Nigerian Pidgin. The study, which is qualitative in design, adopts Brown and Levinson’s (1987) politeness theory and Judith Butler’s (1990) theory of gender performativity. The data for this study is taken from six service encounter settings, collected by means of a tape recorder. The results reveal the following: Firstly, positive politeness strategies are preferred over negative politeness strategies and that females use more politeness strategies than males. Secondly, that in performing gender, the male and female participants display certain gender norms which are in accordance with the traditionally dichotomous gendered expectations and thirdly, that the participants often break the stereotypical norms of appropriate masculine/feminine behaviour by using the speech styles of the opposite gender.