WOMEN EMPOWERMENT AND DISCURSIVE STRATEGIES: FEMINIST POSTSTRUCTURALIST DISCOURSE ANALYSIS OF BBC 100 WOMEN

Abstract

Language and gender has always been an area of interest for the researchers and the students of language studies. The present study focuses on selected interviews of one hundred of the most inspirational women across the world in 2015 named by the BBC which seeks to better represent women in the BBC's international news output. The present study brings out the stories of those women who are often overlooked but determined to mark their identities in the world. In this paper only five interviews-based video footages of women representing different category, like, Teenagers ‘good girls’ film makers, Entrepreneurs, Nurses, Vintage Ladies, and Other inspirations, are selected through random sampling. The study aims at finding out the identical representation of such women through their language performativity in respective discourse. By applying the methodology of Feminist Poststructuralist Discourse Analysis, the study aims at throwing light on issues faced by women more necessarily variant practices to solve these issues. The study further seeks to find the women’s issues working in different fields by analyzing the spoken interviews in qualitative way. The present study also oversees as to how these women are defying stereotypes in the world. The analysis leads to observe the women’s strategy of using emphatic language which results in making their position strong.