Gbasgbos and Wotowoto: Impoliteness reciprocity in Big Brother Naija

Big Brother Naija is a Nigerian reality TV show where contestants, known as housemates, live together for ten weeks, competing for the grand prize of over 100 million naira (US$74,300). Despite the emergence of research on this aspect of pop culture, the impolite use of language in the show is relatively unexplored. Following the call to explore the workings of impoliteness reciprocity in non-British cultures and L2 interactions, this study examines impoliteness reciprocity in the 2023 All Stars edition of Big Brother Naija through the analytical lens of the Principle of Impoliteness Reciprocity. The analysis of data collected from YouTube videos reveals that impoliteness reciprocity manifests in the forms of matching, mismatching downshift and mismatching upshift. Given the culture-specific ideologies of the Nigerian online context, matching and mismatching upshift were contextualised using the Nigerian concepts of gbasgbos and wotowoto to analyse interactional aggression in Nigerian pop culture. The findings demonstrate that moral order, power, context and the desire to win the show impact impoliteness reciprocity. The study contributes to the literature on Big Brother Naija as pop culture and extends the application of the principle of impoliteness reciprocity to a non-Western, highly performative context.