(International Journal of Language and Linguistics, Center for Promotion of Ideas, USA www.ijllnet.com, 2015-03) Odebode, Idowu
Studies on Ahmed Yerima have focused on the literary aspect of his texts to the exclusion of the linguistic
perspective. The present study is designed to fill this gap by employing a pragmatic approach to the study of Ade
Ire, by the playwright. Data were taken from the primary text which served as our major corpus. The Speech Act
theory was deployed to showcase the illocutionary functions of language in the text while the VARIES model was
used to explicate language use in the extra-textual context of the play. The study indicated that the informing act
has the highest frequency among the speech acts deployed while informality has the highest frequency in the
VARIES model.