Understanding standpoints on women through a patriarchal voice: A study of Ayinla Omowura’s music

Abstract

ABSTRACT Every society possesses preconceived standpoints on women and womens issues in its enclave and these standpoints manifest in diverse media of communication from time to time. Popular music is one avenue for communicating social realities. This article examines Ayinla Omowura’s song-texts in order to understand how the artist as a patriarchal voice interprets these standpoints. Six songs are critically analysed to consider specific women’s issues and how they were portrayed. Four themes, namely polygamy, prostitution, skin bleaching, and women’s submission, recur in the songs. Also, the artist thrives on the use of invective, curses, proverbs, and aphorisms imbued with metaphors as rhetorical strategies. In all, the artist’s commentaries on women’s affairs in his society reveal a high level of patriarchal hegemony that dominated his time. In his attempt to explain the psychology of women, he accommodates and lends voice to the manufactured consent for continued gender discrimination.