Ideology and Narrative Technique in Kaine Agary’sYellow-Yellow: A Critical Stylistic Approach

Cite this article as: Akpere, G. E. (2026). Ideology and narrative technique in Kaine Agary'sYellow-Yellow: A critical stylistic approach. Sokoto Journal of Linguistics and Communication Studies (SOJOLICS), 2(2), 412-419. https://doi.org/10.36349/sojolics.2026.v02i02.038

By

Akpere, Geraldine Erhieyovwe

Delta State Polytechnic, Otefe-Oghara,

geraldineakpere@gmail.com

+2347037632366

Abstract

This study examines environmental exploitation and its socio-economic consequences in Kaine Agary’s Yellow-Yellow (2006) using Lesley Jeffries’s Critical Stylistics, particularly the tool of Presenting Others’ Speech and Thought. It analyses ten selected excerpts to show how speech and thought presentation shapes meaning and guides reader interpretation of life in the Niger Delta. Findings reveal that Agary uses shifts in speech modes to contrast suffering with institutional neglect, highlighting environmental injustice and marginalisation. The study demonstrates that these linguistic choices are ideologically driven and position readers toward critical awareness of power imbalances and ecological degradation.

Keywords: Ideology, environmental exploitation, Critical Stylistics, speech and thought presentation, narrative technique, Lesley Jeffries

1.   Introduction

Environmental exploitation in the Niger Delta has generated far-reaching ecological and socio-economic challenges, attracting considerable attention from scholars and creative writers. Kaine Agary’s Yellow-Yellow (2006) explores these realities through the experiences of characters whose lives are shaped by environmental degradation and social marginalisation. While existing studies have examined the novel from ecocritical and socio-political perspectives, limited attention has been paid to how its linguistic and narrative choices construct these concerns. This study therefore investigates how speech and thought presentation in the novel contributes to the representation of environmental exploitation and its socio-economic consequences using Lesley Jeffries’s Critical Stylistics.

2.   Literature Review

It is widely recognised that meaning is constructed through language in both literary and non-literary texts (Bamgbose, 1995, p. 27). Daramola (2019) similarly notes that language functions as a meaning-making system shaped by context, participants, and culture. In literary studies, this supports the view that literature reflects social realities through linguistic representation (Taufik, 2017; Muzakki, 2011; Nurhamidah et al., 2019). However, such representation is not neutral, as stylistic choices influence how these realities are presented and interpreted. Akhter (2020) therefore argues that literature both reflects and shapes social perception through ideological use of language.

Critical Stylistics extends traditional stylistic inquiry by examining how textual patterns encode ideological meanings and construct social reality (Jeffries, 2010). Unlike traditional stylistics, which focuses on describing textual features, it interrogates how such features shape ideology. It integrates stylistics and Critical Discourse Analysis to uncover how language encodes power and meaning in texts (Al-Zubaidi & Al-Mamoori, 2023). Among its tools, Presenting Others’ Speech and Thought is particularly relevant, as it shows how reported speech and thought position voices, construct credibility, and guide interpretation through direct, indirect, and free indirect discourse.

Jeffries (2010) categorises speech and thought presentation into five main types: direct, free indirect, indirect, narrator’s report, and narrator’s report of act, each with speech and thought variants such as Direct Speech (DS), Direct Thought (DT), Free Indirect Speech (FIS), Free Indirect Thought (FIT), Indirect Speech (IS), and Indirect Thought (IT). Kaine Agary’s Yellow-Yellow (2006), set in the Niger Delta, follows Zilayefa and depicts how environmental degradation and oil exploitation shape poverty, survival struggles, and social decay. Critics generally agree that the novel foregrounds the destructive consequences of environmental exploitation (Oseghale, 2019; Adewunmi, 2022; Ubah et al., 2024). This study therefore examines how speech and thought presentation constructs these ideological meanings in the novel.

3.   Methodology

This study adopts a qualitative research design in analysing the representation of environmental exploitation and its socio-economic consequences in Kaine Agary’sYellow-Yellow (2006). Data for the study consist of ten purposively selected excerpts drawn from different parts of the novel based on their relevance to issues of environmental degradation and socio-economic realities in the Niger Delta. Using textual analysis, the excerpts were examined through Lesley Jeffries’s Critical Stylistics, specifically the textual-conceptual function Presenting Others’ Speech and Thought. The excerpts were coded according to various forms of speech and thought presentation, including Direct Speech, Free Indirect Speech, Indirect Speech, Narrator’s Report of Speech, Narrator’s Report of Speech Act, Direct Thought, Free Indirect Thought, Indirect Thought, Narrator’s Report of Thought, and Narrator’s Report of Thought Act, to facilitate a systematic analysis of how linguistic choices construct meanings related to environmental exploitation and its socio-economic impact.

4.   Theoretical Framework

This study is anchored on Lesley Jeffries’s Critical Stylistics, a theory developed to investigate how ideology is embedded in language. Jeffries (2010) developed the framework to bridge the gap between traditional stylistics, which focuses on textual description, and Critical Discourse Analysis, which is concerned with ideology and power. The theory assumes that language is not neutral; rather, it shapes how readers perceive people, events, and social realities. Thus, textual choices are viewed as ideological choices that influence meaning and interpretation (Jeffries & McIntyre, 2010).

A key feature of Critical Stylistics is its use of textual-conceptual functions, which provide systematic tools for analysing how meanings are constructed in texts. This study adopts the function Presenting Others’ Speech and Thought, which examines the different ways narrators represent characters’ speech, thoughts, and perceptions. According to Jeffries (2010), the choice between direct, indirect, and narrator-mediated forms of presentation is ideologically significant because it determines the degree of prominence, authority, and credibility given to particular voices. Al-Zubaidi and Al-Mamoori (2023) therefore argue that the framework is effective in uncovering implicit meanings and assumptions embedded in discourse.

The relevance of this theory to the present study lies in its ability to reveal how linguistic choices construct social realities within literary texts. By analysing the presentation of speech and thought in Yellow-Yellow, the framework makes it possible to examine how experiences of environmental exploitation and socio-economic hardship are represented and interpreted. Critical Stylistics therefore provides a suitable analytical lens for uncovering the ideological meanings embedded in the novel's portrayal of environmental degradation and its consequences in the Niger Delta.

5.   Data Presentation and Analysis

S/N	Type	Chapter	Example	Explanation	Ideological Effect
1	Direct Speech (DS)	Ch. 8	“Abeg, let us talk about better things… these people… will not send me to my grave with hypertension.”	Expresses frustration and emotional stress caused by socio-environmental conditions.	Constructs environmental and socio-political space as psychologically oppressive, showing how everyday discourse reflects systemic stress.
2	Free Indirect Speech (FIS)	Ch. 4	“I had so desperately believed that he would take me away with him…”	Merges narrator and character voice to show illusion of escape and constrained reality.	Reveals ideology of entrapment, where aspirations are shaped and limited by socio-economic deprivation.
3	Indirect Speech (IS)	Ch. 2	“The word around the village was that the police had caught and killed them…”	Shows reliance on rumours due to weak institutional communication systems.	Constructs state institutions as unreliable, reinforcing mistrust and marginalisation of rural communities.
4	Narrator’s Report of Speech (NRS)	Ch. 2	“My mother used to tell me that I would be better than her.”	Reflects maternal hope shaped by socio-economic hardship.	Projects ideology of upward mobility as fragile and aspirational under structural inequality.
5	Narrator’s Report of Speech Act (NRSA)	Ch. 4	“He willingly gave me the vessels that took me into new villages…”	Symbolises education/books as a means of escape from hardship.	Constructs education as symbolic capital for escape, highlighting unequal access to empowerment resources.
6	Direct Thought (DT)	Ch. 2	“I just wanted to leave the village. The sameness of life… would kill me…”	Reveals inner desire for escape from environmental and social stagnation.	Reflects internalised ideology of rural deprivation as suffocating and unlivable.
7	Free Indirect Thought (FIT)	Ch. 2	“Perchance in saving me, she hoped to save herself.”	Reflects intergenerational hope for liberation from economic hardship.	Shows ideology of survival transfer, where personal salvation is tied to family escape from deprivation.
8	Indirect Thought (IT)	Ch. 3	“I started to consider options that had never crossed my mind before…”	Shows moral conflict and desperation shaped by poverty and deprivation.	Reveals ideology of economic pressure driving moral instability and alternative survival strategies.
9	Narrator’s Report of Thought (NRT)	Ch. 1	“And so it was that, in a single day, my mother lost her main source of sustenance.”	Summarises awareness of environmental destruction and its economic impact.	Frames environmental degradation as direct economic violence against livelihoods.
10	Narrator’s Report of Thought Act (NRTA)	Ch. 1	“Not unlike the way she and others… had gradually lost the creatures of the river to oil spills…”	Represents collective realization of environmental degradation affecting livelihood.	Constructs ecological destruction as normalized systemic loss, embedding ideology of environmental exploitation.

 

6.   Discussion of Findings

The analysis of speech and thought presentation in Kaine Agary’sYellow-Yellow reveals that linguistic choices are not merely narrative techniques but ideological instruments through which environmental injustice and socio-economic marginalisation are constructed and reinforced. Across the ten extracts, it is evident that different forms of speech and thought presentation consistently mediate the reader’s access to experience in ways that foreground the harsh realities of life in the Niger Delta. Rather than simply reporting events, the narrative strategically positions voices of authority, vulnerability, and resistance, thereby shaping how readers interpret the socio-environmental context of the text. This aligns with Jeffries’ (2010) position that textual choices are inherently ideological, as they influence how reality is represented and understood.

Direct Speech, as seen in Extract 1, foregrounds emotional immediacy and subjective distress, allowing characters to openly articulate frustration with socio-political conditions. The expression of hypertension as a consequence of societal stress symbolically links environmental degradation with physical and psychological suffering. Ideologically, this presentation constructs the environment not merely as a backdrop but as an active force of oppression affecting human health and wellbeing. In this way, direct speech amplifies individual voice, but this voice is embedded within a wider structure of environmental injustice. Free Indirect Speech (Extract 2) operates more subtly by merging narrator and character perspectives, thereby blurring boundaries between lived experience and narrative commentary. The illusion of escape in Extract 2 reveals ideological entrapment, where aspirations for mobility are constantly undermined by socio-economic constraints. This blending of voices creates a psychological depth that exposes the internalisation of limitation, suggesting that environmental degradation does not only affect external conditions but also shapes imagination and desire. In this sense, free indirect speech becomes a tool for illustrating how ideology penetrates consciousness, reinforcing feelings of inevitability and constrained mobility.

Indirect Speech (Extract 3) introduces a layer of narrative distance, which is ideologically significant because it filters events through reported discourse. The circulation of rumours about police killings highlights institutional failure and the absence of trustworthy communication systems, thereby constructing a reality of uncertainty and fear. By reporting rather than directly quoting these utterances, the narrative reinforces the power imbalance between authoritative institutions and marginalised communities, suggesting that institutional voices dominate discourse while community voices are mediated and weakened. Narrator’s Report of Speech (Extract 4) further consolidates ideological meaning by summarising spoken discourse, often stripping it of emotional immediacy. The mother’s hope that her daughter would be better than her reflects generational aspiration shaped by socio-economic hardship. This summary constructs hope as both resilient and fragile within conditions of structural inequality. Ideologically, it suggests that aspirations for social mobility continue to exist despite persistent socio-economic deprivation in the Niger Delta.

Narrator’s Report of Speech Act (Extract 5) shifts attention from what is said to what is done, emphasising actions as symbolic representations of ideological meaning. The act of giving books represents education as a potential means of escape from environmental hardship, positioning knowledge as a liberating force. This narrative act constructs ideology at the level of behaviour, suggesting that opportunities for advancement are mediated by environmental and economic constraints.

Turning to thought representation, Direct Thought (Extract 6) provides unmediated access to the protagonist's inner desire for escape. This immediacy intensifies the ideological effect by revealing how environmental stagnation produces psychological suffocation. The village is not merely a physical space but a site of constraint that shapes cognitive and emotional states. Direct thought therefore exposes the internalisation of deprivation as a lived psychological experience. Free Indirect Thought (Extract 7) deepens this ideological layering by merging narrator and character consciousness, suggesting that survival itself is imagined as collective salvation. The mother's hope becomes a symbolic representation of generational struggle, reinforcing the idea that individual futures are inseparable from environmental conditions. This presentation reveals how personal aspirations are shaped by wider socio-economic realities.

Indirect Thought (Extract 8) further demonstrates how ideology operates through mediated cognition. The contemplation of previously unthinkable options signals moral and social destabilisation caused by poverty. The distance created by indirect thought highlights how desperation is not spontaneous but socially constructed, emerging from sustained deprivation. It therefore reinforces the relationship between environmental hardship and the difficult choices imposed by economic realities. Narrator’s Report of Thought (Extract 9) compresses awareness of environmental destruction into a concise narrative statement, reinforcing the inevitability of loss. By summarising the mother's loss of her means of livelihood, the narrative presents environmental degradation as a direct source of economic hardship. This form of thought representation foregrounds the far-reaching consequences of ecological destruction on everyday existence. Narrator’s Report of Thought Act (Extract 10) generalises collective awareness of ecological devastation affecting livelihoods. By referring to the gradual loss of the river's resources through oil spills, the narrative presents environmental destruction as a shared and normalised experience within the community. Together, these forms present environmental degradation as both experienced and cognitively internalised, shaping how individuals and communities interpret their realities.

In effect, the findings demonstrate that speech and thought presentation in Yellow-Yellow functions as a powerful ideological mechanism through which environmental degradation, poverty, and social marginalisation are constructed. The alternation between directness, mediation, and summarisation is not stylistically neutral; rather, it shapes reader alignment with suffering, resilience, and constrained hope. The narrative thus constructs a layered ideological reality in which environmental exploitation is shown to permeate not only physical spaces but also language, thought, and perception.

7.   Conclusion

This study concludes that the various forms of speech and thought presentation in Kaine Agary’sYellow-Yellow play significant roles in conveying the novel’s ideological concerns surrounding environmental degradation and its socio-economic consequences in the Niger Delta. Through the strategic use of Direct Speech, Free Indirect Speech, Indirect Speech, and the different narrator-reporting modes, the narrative constructs and reinforces the lived realities of individuals and communities affected by environmental exploitation. These techniques collectively highlight the emotional, psychological, and social dimensions of suffering while foregrounding issues of marginalisation, inequality, and limited opportunity. Succinctly, the analysis demonstrates that Agary’s narrative choices are not merely stylistic but function as ideological tools that shape reader perception and deepen understanding of the text’s central concerns.

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