“Elections” or “Selections”? Blogging and Twittering the Nigerian 2007 General Elections

This article examines the linguistic construction of textual messages in the use of blogs and Twitter in the Nigerian 2007 electoral cycle comprising the April 2007 general elections and rerun elections in April, May, and August 2009. A qualitative approach of discourse analysis is used to present a...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Bulletin of science, technology & society technology & society, 2010-12, Vol.30 (6), p.398-414
Main Author: Ifukor, Presley
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Citizen Participation
Communication
Computer Mediated Communication
Democratic Values
Discourse Analysis
Elections
Electronic Publishing
Empowerment
Foreign Countries
Governance
Government and politics
Information technology
Mass Media Role
Mass Media Use
Network Analysis
Nigeria
Political Attitudes
Social change
Social Networks
Web Sites
Weblogs
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Summary:This article examines the linguistic construction of textual messages in the use of blogs and Twitter in the Nigerian 2007 electoral cycle comprising the April 2007 general elections and rerun elections in April, May, and August 2009. A qualitative approach of discourse analysis is used to present a variety of discursive acts that blogging and microblogging afford social media users during the electoral cycle. The data are culled from 245 blog posts and 923 tweets. The thesis of the study is that citizens’ access to social media electronically empowers the electorates to be actively involved in democratic governance. Electronic empowerment is a direct result of access to social media (and mobile telephony) by more citizens who constitute the electorates. This encourages more public discussions about politics and makes the democratic process more dynamic than in the pre—social media era. An analysis of the data shows that there is a dialectical relationship between social media discourse and the process of political empowerment.
ISSN:0270-4676
1552-4183
DOI:10.1177/0270467610380008