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ABSTRACT
The study examined how impoliteness was deployed by the candidates in selected Nigerian gubernatorial election debates (2020-2022) to show the correlation between impoliteness and conflict. The objectives of the study were to determine the use of bald-on-record impoliteness strategies in the election debates and how they are used; recognize and describe the use of positive impoliteness strategies during the debates; and explain the use of negative impoliteness strategies to cause conflict and disagreement by candidates in the election debates. The data for the research consisted of encounters taken from Arise News Channel and Channels Television on YouTube. These debates for the gubernatorial elections that took place in Ekiti, Osun, Anambra, Edo and Ondo were broadcast live on 12th June 2022, 6th July 2022, 1st November 2021, 13th September 2020 and 7th October 2021 respectively. These debate sessions were purposively selected based on the grounds that they were the most recent election debates held in Nigeria from 2020-2022. The three types of linguistic impoliteness proposed by Jonathan Culpeper were discussed in this study. They are bald on record, positive impoliteness and negative impoliteness. The data were split into thirty-one excerpts containing impolite utterances. The collected data were textually analyzed using Jonathan Culpeper’s framework impoliteness strategies. The findings for the study were that bald-on-record impoliteness was realized through various output strategies such as i direct negative criticism, negative references and reprimanding. Ignore, snub the others positive face wants, fail to acknowledge the other’s presence, exclude the other from an activity, disassociate from the other, deny association are positive impoliteness strategies used by the candidates in the election debates; and the output strategies of negative impoliteness included impolite interruption of an interlocutors’ speech, threats issued to a conversation partner, asking unpalatable questions, dismissing of ones’ contribution in a conversation and associating the other with a negative aspect.
