Images of Women under the Shadow of Cultural Prejudice in Male Communication

This study explores the concepts of language, gender/power relations, social and discriminatory registers from the perspective of subalternity in cultural communication in Nigeria. It pivots on the cultural experiences of women’s subjugation through the use of proverbs and idioms – and, on which basis, they suffer different forms of infringement of their human rights. The subaltern approach is deployed to link power relations to male communication, which offers a framework for the understanding of sexist and discriminatory language against women in the traditional context. The data used in the analysis of these gender-based issues are proverbs, collected from the communal bank of the Idoma people, and as communal property, no single individual or author can lay claim to them. The study concludes that the abusive or derogatory language, which poses threat to the respect of others, especially women should be avoided. The study, in its final analysis, envisages an all-inclusive society which is established in the tradition of socio-liberal conventions, built on the ideology of women’s liberation as in the light of the subaltern resistance to male oppression.