Browsing by Author "Miriti, Gervasio"

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Face threatening acts employed in miraa business discourse by traders of Igembe and Somali origin.
(2014-07) Kobia, John M.; Miriti, Gervasio
The prime concern of this study was to analyse the Face Threatening Acts (FTAs) employed by miraa traders, from Igembe and Somali origin, in their discourse. The researches were given the impetus to undertake this study because of the uniqueness exhibited in miraa traders’ discourse. The study aimed at establishing the FTAs depicted in their discourse and was guided by the Politeness Theory by Levinson and Brown (1987) to form the basis of its theoretical framework. The study was carried out at Muringene Market and in Maua town. It employed the social networks approach to identify participants. The purposive sampling procedure was used. Data was collected by tape-recording negotiations as miraa traders went on with their businesses and through non-participants observation. Data analysis was largely Qualitative but summarized using descriptive statistics and presented using a table. The study found out that miraa traders make use of several FTAs but with significant variation in relation to their frequency of occurrence. The most occurring FTA was that of insults leading to the conclusion that miraa traders are abusive.
Marking Identity through Language in Social Media Discourse by Chuka University Students
(ARC, 2019-08) Miriti, Gervasio; Dr. Karuri, Mary
Interaction via social media has gained popularity owing to the technological advancements that have affected the manner in which people communicate in the contemporary world. This paper is geared towards shedding light on the ways in which language is exploited by the University students to mark their identities through language in their social media discourse. Studies on social media discourse have largely been done in monolingual situations where texts written in one/single language have been analyzed. It was, therefore, necessary to carry out a study in multilingual situation where texts written in English, Kiswahili, Sheng (a Kenyan Pidgin) and local languages are analyzed. The study employed social identity theory in analyzing the data. Descriptive research design and qualitative technique were employed for data analysis. Both snowball and purposive sampling procedures were used. The study reveals that students mark their identities by converging in their messages through the use of special jargon, multimodality, and, simple syntactic structures. It was concluded that the students mark their identities by using language in a similar manner.
Politeness Strategies Employed by Chuka University Students in their Social Media Discourse
(ARC, 2019-08) Miriti, Gervasio; Dr. K. Ireri, Humphrey
This article sheds light on the politeness strategies employed by Chuka University students in their social media discourse using WhatsApp interaction platform. The four broad categories of politeness strategies (Positive politeness, Negative politeness, Bald on record and Off- record strategies) as spelt by Brown and Levison in their Politeness Theory were analysed using the data collected from the university students conversations via their WhatsApp platforms. This study employed a qualitative research technique and a descriptive research design. It utilized the snowball and purposive sampling procedures. Upon the collection of the data, content analysis was done in order to analyse the politeness strategies inherent in the discourse. The study revealed that university students strive to maintain cordial relationships by use of positive politeness, and they normally avoid imposing on each other by use of negative politeness strategies. Sometimes students use Off-record strategies in order to avoid being accused of committing a Face Threatening Act (FTA), which is likely to ruin their relationships.
Social Media Discourse of Chuka University Students on Whatsapp Platforms
(2019-09) Miriti, Gervasio
Social media influences the way people communicate with one another and it is gaining popularity owing to the technological milestones made in the world of communication. As people communicate via social media interaction platforms, language naturally and inevitably experiences some changes. Therefore, there was a need to undertake a linguistic study to account for such changes and developments in language use. The main concern of this study was to analyse the university students’ social media discourse. The discourse analysed sprang from WhatsApp interaction platform. The WhatsApp groups utilized were those formed by Chuka University students in Tharaka Nithi County, Kenya. Particularly, the following objectives guided the study: analysing the politeness strategies used in social media discourse, describing the unique features of language inherent in the university students’ social media discourse and explaining how identities are marked in the social media discourse. The study employed an eclectic approach whereby three theories; Genre Theory by Macken et al, Social Identity Theory by Tasfel and Politeness Theory by Brown and Levinson were used in analysing data. Genre theory was used to examine the distinctive features of language, Social Identity Theory analysed the data on how linguistic identities are marked through language in social media while Politeness Theory shed light on politeness strategies used in the social media discourse Some of the features that the study sought to analyse included phonological and morphological conditioned word formations, the nature of sentences, code switching and mixing, how paralinguistic and suprasegmental features are represented in social media discourse. A descriptive research design and the qualitative technique was employed to analyse data. Both Snowball and purposive sampling procedures were used. Snowballing was used to establish the WhatsApp groups that were used by the students, while purposive sampling procedure was used to selectively collect texts from WhatsApp groups. The texts that were purposively selected were those that showed politeness strategies, indicated how the university students created identities and those with linguistic features that characterized university students’ social media discourse. The researcher collected a total of 116 texts and this sample was adequate for this study. The rationale for choosing WhatsApp was the fact that there was a paucity of linguistic studies based on this interaction platform despite its popularity. This document contains seven chapters; chapter one, two and three which comprise the introduction, the review of related literature and research methodology respectively. Chapter four presents the features of language at the phonological, morphological, syntactic and semantic levels. The study findings revealed that social media discourse is a hybrid between written and spoken discourse that uses language in a distinctive manner and it is characterized by such features as phonographic, semasiographic, logographic, prosodic, paralinguistic, word formation processes, code switching and mixing and these features are depicted in a peculiar manner. Chapter Five entails the creation of identities by the university students. The study findings in chapter revealed that identities are created by using a special register/ jargon, multimodality, and through indexicality. Chapter Six deals with politeness in social media and the findings indicated that four categories of politeness strategies as postulated in the politeness theory were manifested in social media discourse of the university students. Chapter seven provides the summary of the findings, conclusions and recommendations. This study sheds light on the language usage and its dynamics. It will hopefully enrich knowledge on the various tenets of the three theories used: Genre Theory, Politeness Theory and the Social Identity Theory.