Abstract
This paper explores discursive strategies Nigerian victims of rape deploy in narrating their traumatic experiences. Data for the study comprise purposively selected online narratives of two major Nigerian rape victims circulated on Pulse.ng and Nairaland in 2018 and 2019 respectively. The data are analysed qualitatively using van Leeuwen’s social actors’ model, a framework that describes how participants of social practices are represented in discourse. The analysis reveals that the rape survivors deployed different mechanisms of representation of social actors, such as nomination, categorisation, beneficialisation, and honorification in their narratives to assert themselves, construct power, expose perpetrators and contest specific institutionalised forces that suppress them. These are done to challenge repressive traditions thus, breaking the culture of silence and revealing the dynamic nature rape discourse is assuming in Nigeria. The paper concludes that the discursive strategies highlighted in the selected narratives evince self-representations of rape victimhood.
Published Version
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