Contextualising Widowhood Suffering: A Pragmatic-Stylistic Study of Cultural Rituals in Sola Adebowale's Lonely Days

This paper explores how linguistic and contextual sources help indicate the socio-cultural aspects of widowhood and mourning practices in the Nigerian society. Earlier linguistic research works in the area of pragmatic-stylistics have extensively used the works of critical stylistics (Jeffries, 2010) and pragmatic acts theory (Mey, 2001) to analyse the role of language in expressing and strengthening the power relations, gender inequalities, and religious values in the context of grieving interactions. However, the role of these linguistic resources in the functioning of the literary depictions of widowhood rituals, especially in terms of cultural oppression and resistance, has not been given much focus. To address this gap by qualitative descriptive research design, this study examines dialogues and narrative extracts of Lonely Days by Adebowale to identify the communicative and stylistic practices of enacting and contesting the practices of mourning. The results indicate that the language of mourning Adebowale uses is not simply an expression of mourning but a contextual performativity as an intermediary between the continuation of cultures and the suffering of human beings. The paper concludes that linguistic behaviour while in widowhood rituals functions as a negotiating point of cultural power in that the stylistic form and pragmatic intent work together to unveil the disparity between tradition and human dignity.