Home⇛Journal of Interdisciplinary Perspectives⇛vol. 4 no. 8 (2026)

Rule-Breaking or Be(k)coming: Language and Identity in Dogshow Divas

Madel M. Catre | Christine Jill Sedoriosa | Jovanny G. Villalon | Febbie Faith S. Ramos

Discipline: Linguistics

 

Abstract:

Although Swardspeak's morphology and lexical creativity have been sufficiently studied, the strategic competence with which it is practiced, specifically its speakers' deliberate breaking of conversational rules and expectations, is underexplored in contemporary digital media forms. As such, this study investigated how violations of the Gricean Cooperative Principles index identity in Swardspeak conversations between Baus Rufo and Mark Averilla in two episodes of their video podcast, Dogshow Divas. As a qualitative-dominant (QUAL-quan) mixed-methods study, it largely employed the pragma-discourse approach in its examination of Gricean conversational maxim violations and their roles as strategic conversational strategies and speaker identity construction on approximately 110 minutes of audio data. A frequency count was used to numerically support qualitative interpretations. Results show that Gricean maxims were violated a total of 247 times, with the maxim of manner (n=96) having been flouted the most and quantity (n=34) the least. Further, the spontaneous violations were strategically committed to produce humor mostly through exaggeration, wordplay, and sarcasm. Finally, the investigation reveals that such violations reinforce speakers' identity mostly through the projection of mock confidence, shared cultural knowledge, and consequently strengthened in- group solidarity within the LGBTQ+ discourse community. The findings demonstrate that maxim violations are not surface deviations from conversational cooperation; they function as strategic tools to effectively channel information, establish presence, and affirm identity. Thus, recognizing maxim violations as part of speakers' or learners' identity- building highlights the need for diverse and gender-sensitive learning spaces that allow learners and digital consumers to exercise this communicative resource.



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