LANGUAGE AND THE COMBAT OF CORRUPTION IN NIGERIA: A TEXT LINGUISTICS ANALYSIS OF PRESIDENT BUHAHI’S SPEECH AT ANTI-CORRUPTION SUMMIT IN LONDON

Abstract

This study investigates the role of language in the communication and interpretation of intentions in situations by examining language content of the selected speech. In this article, library research was used as a means of collecting required data and information because it is a qualitative research. Therefore, President Buhahi’s Speech at Anti-Corruption Summit was selected and analysed through the use of Informativity and Situationality as aspects of Standards of Textuality postulated by Beaugrande and Dressler (1992). Corruption as a global phenomenon intelligible only in its social context, is an anti­social behaviour conferring improper benefits contrary to legal and moral norms (Aluko, 2009). This implies illegitimate use of power/position to benefit a private interest. The analysis was done by investigating how the text serves the communicative aim within the said framework. It was discovered that the experience and the linguistic performance of the writer are in conformity with the expected standards of a text. The key finding is that the text transferred new information and is relevant to the social situation of fighting corruption. The conclusion is that what linguists and scholars postulate in theories is practically obtainable when writers, as language users, use the theories.