Analysing Gender and Power in Nollywood English: A Corpus Study of Dialogue Patterns in Selected English-Language Films

This study conducts a corpus-based analysis of gender and power in the English-language dialogue of Nollywood films, systematically examining how linguistic patterns in film discourse construct and reproduce gender power asymmetries in ways that are both reflective and formative of Nigerian social norms. While critical discourse analysis of Nollywood has produced valuable qualitative studies, large-scale corpus-based investigation of dialogue patterns across multiple films offers an empirical dimension that can identify structural rather than incidental features of gendered language in popular Nigerian cinema. A corpus of dialogue transcriptions was compiled from 30 English-language Nollywood films released between 2019 and 2023, stratified to include domestic drama, thriller, and comedy genres. Corpus analytical tools, including frequency analysis, keyword analysis, and concordance examination, were applied to examine differences in the language attributed to male and female characters. Analysis focuses on directive speech acts, epistemic modality, hedging, interruption markers, and topic control indicators. Findings demonstrate that male characters in the corpus use significantly more directives and bare imperatives than female characters, who employ substantially more hedged and mitigated request forms. Female characters' speech is more frequently interrupted or recontextualised by male dialogue partners in the succeeding turn. Comedy genre films show the greatest deviation from this pattern, with female comic characters exhibiting more assertive speech act profiles. Keywords: corpus linguistics, Nollywood, gender and language, discourse analysis, Nigerian cinema.