Linguistic Strategies and Power Negotiation in Spousal Conflicts in ‘The Justice Court’

This study examined power dynamics in spousal discourse within a Nigerian media courtroom context, addressing the gap in research on how everyday marital conflicts function as sites of discursive power negotiation. The specific objectives of the study were to identify the linguistic strategies used to assert control in spousal conflicts and to analyse how couples negotiated power relations through language. The study was grounded in Norman Fairclough’s Critical Discourse Analysis, which provided a framework for interpreting language as a social practice shaped by power and ideology. A qualitative methodology was adopted, involving the purposive selection of two episodes of The Justice Court obtained from YouTube. The episodes were repeatedly viewed and transcribed verbatim to ensure analytical accuracy. The study found that spouses employed linguistic strategies such as repetition, modality, possessive pronouns, reported speech, and rhetorical questions to assert dominance or resist subordination. It also found that power was not fixed but dynamically negotiated through interaction. Furthermore, the study revealed that language served as a key resource for constructing gender roles, authority, and identity in conflict situations. The study concluded that spousal discourse functioned as a critical site for the enactment and contestation of power. The study contributed to existing knowledge by demonstrating how media representations of marital disputes reflect broader socio-cultural ideologies and expand discourse studies within the Nigerian context