Point-n-Kill: Label Metaphors in Heterosexual Peer Networks in Nigeria

Male and female partners in heterosexual peer networks in Calabar metropolis, Cross River State, south-eastern Nigeria, use reciprocal label metaphors to characterize each other in negative (or positive) ways. This article explores how sexual metaphors, banters, and teasing are used to satirize youn...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Society (New Brunswick) 2023-11, Vol.61 (5), p.597-609
Main Author: Mensah, Eyo O.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Consensual sex
Descriptive Linguistics
Ethnography
Focus Groups
Gender differences
Hegemony
Heterosexuality
Heterosexuals
Ideology
Influence
Interpersonal Relationship
Interviews
Labeling
Metaphor
Morality
Original Article
Peer relationships
Peers
Political Science
Power
Predominantly White Institutions
Sexual behavior
Sexual Orientation
Sexuality
Social aspects
Social Influences
Social science research
Social Sciences
Sociology
Subversion
Teasing
Youth
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Summary:Male and female partners in heterosexual peer networks in Calabar metropolis, Cross River State, south-eastern Nigeria, use reciprocal label metaphors to characterize each other in negative (or positive) ways. This article explores how sexual metaphors, banters, and teasing are used to satirize young people’s heterosexual behaviors and practices to develop consensual sexual morality. The study is anchored on Charteris-Black’s ( 2004 ) critical metaphor analysis (CMA) which highlights the social influence of ideology and asymmetry power relations which are communicated by metaphors from semantic, pragmatic, and cognitive dimensions. Drawing on ethnographic qualitative data sourced through focus group and semi-structured interviews with 30 participants who were purposively sampled, I argue that categories of metaphors used in labeling the significant other provide platforms where sexuality and intimate bonds and relations are (re)imagined and (re)constructed in the context of the lived experiences of young sexual actors. The study concludes that reciprocal labeling of sexual partners among the sampled population in this study facilitates the enthronement of hegemonic ideologies and heterosexual capital such as the reproduction of male power, as well as the subversion of such power and control through female agency. In this way, label metaphors provide prominent social instruments of regulation of peer sexual behavior and in bridging the gender divide.
ISSN:0147-2011
1936-4725
DOI:10.1007/s12115-024-00972-y