Awka Journal of Linguistics and Languages
Awka journal of Linguistics and Languages (AJILL) is published annually by the Department of Linguistics, Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka. The first volume was published in 2005. The journal accepts articles on any area in linguistics and languages. The articles undergo rigorous blind peer review processes and editing before they are finally accepted for publication. Manuscripts should be typed with Times New Roman Point 12, double line spacing and not more than 15 pages. The accepted style of documentation is the Linguistic Society of America's (LSA) style. AJILL has over the years published papers written in languages other than English. The journal therefore accepts papers written in French, Igbo and other Nigerian Languages provided the English translation of the abstract is included. Articles published or submitted elsewhere for consideration should not be submitted to AJILL for publication.
Department of Linguistics Nnamdi Azikiwe University Awka, Nigeria
Graphic devices as signallers of meaning in Osundare’s Dialogue with my country
This paper focuses on graphic signs as signallers of meaning in Osundare’s ‘Dialogue with my country’. It has been observed that Osundare’s literary work mirrors Nigeria’s social and economic challenges of grave concern, as well as political issues of national importance. Therefore, the study examines how the essayist has employed language replete with a host of graphic markers to achieve his intentions pertaining to the essays’ thematic thrusts and forms. The data for analysis constitute the following essays from ‘Dialogue with my country’:“Tears for my country”, “Murderers be not proud”, “Truth of my politics”, “Abominations”, “When government steals”, “Leave the lawmakers alone”, “The unthinkable”, “Mad times” and “Scars of the season (I and II)”. The selected essays were analysed based on the principles of Halliday’s systemic functional linguistics (SFL). The analysis reveals that the following graphic symbols: capitalisation; italicisation and punctuations (i.e. exclamation, question mark, ellipsis dots; and the comma etc.,) are generously foregrounded and artistically deployed to communicate social meaning. Also, it is observed that the use of graphological devices prominent in the selected essays exhibits Osundare’s artistic potentials, his freedom in compositional pattern as well as highlights the meanings he makes with these devices. It therefore shows that a writer’s manipulation of these devices can either obscure or reveal meaning.
Copyright (c) 2016 Awka Journal of Linguistics and Languages
A contrastive analysis of English and Igbo syllable structures and its teaching implications
This work investigated the differences in the syllable structures of English and Igbo languages, and their pedagogic implications. This was achieved by administering an oral interview test on Twenty five (25) respondents randomly selected from Comprehensive Development Secondary School Owerri. A passage was given to them to read, and emphasis was on auditory perception of sounds in relation to the English syllable structure. From the passage, ten (10) tasks (words), which comprise initial and final consonant clusters of two to four, were singled out for observation. It was found out that consonant clusters, whether initial or final, present a major learning difficulty to Igbo secondary school learners in their internalization of the English syllable structure. This was evident from the result obtained which is 7%. It is interesting to note that as the clusters increase from two, three to four, so the level of difficulty in pronouncing the words. That is why number 6 task /stju:dnts/, which has the highest number of clusters (three initial and four final), constituted the highest level of difficulty. The behaviorist theoretical framework which emphasizes learning through habit formation brought about by imitation, reinforcement and repetition as propounded by scholars like Skinner, Corder, etc. was adopted. The research concluded that English language teachers in Igbo land and elsewhere should engage in a Contrastive Linguistic Analysis (CLA) in order to improve on their teaching. Secondly, the Government and other stakeholders in education should encourage the production of pedagogical grammar books, which are based on a thorough CLA of the Native Languages (NLs) and the Target Languages (TLs). This will not only improve pedagogy, but help English as Second Language Learners (ESL) learners/teachers to overcome most teaching and learning difficulties.
The varieties and features of Nigerian English today
The domestication and nativization of spoken English in a multi-ethnic and multi-linguistic environment like Nigeria has given rise to the varieties of Nigerian English as affected by mother tongue interference notwithstanding the effort that is being made towards preserving and advancing the Standard English. This paper discusses the extant position of English as a world language and its advent in Nigeria. It goes on to examine the status as well as the constitutional provisions of it in Nigeria. These varieties of Nigerian English and the common features are discussed. Thus, Nigerian English is today one of the Englishes existing as a result of the interaction between the foreign English and the local languages in Nigeria. This paper concludes that these varieties of Nigerian English has come to stay and is now part and parcel of the Nigerian people and so should be integrated into the education and other sectors of the Nigerian society.
This article studies the morphological variations between Idemili and ?n?cha dialects of the Igbo language. The dialects are classified as the East Niger Group of Dialects (ENGD), Nwaozuzu (2008). The article identifies the morphological variations of affixes in Idemili and ?n?cha dialects under perfective, past tense, present participle, present progressive and negative constructions. As the authors are indigenous speakers of Igbo, the method of participatory observation and audio recording of data from different age groups of the native speakers of the Idemili and ?n?cha varieties were used for data collection; while descriptive analysis was applied for data analysis. From the findings, Idemili uses the affix ‘-na’ to indicate perfective marker, while ?n?cha uses ‘-go’. In indicating past tense, Idemili and ?n?cha use the same past tense marker ‘-l?’ or ‘-li’ as the case may be. Moreover, Idemili uses ‘-h?’ to indicate negation while ?n?cha uses ‘-r?’ for negation. Idemili and ?n?cha use ‘-ba’ to indicate present progressive construction. It is also observed that both dialects also use 'e-' and 'a-' respectively in portraying present participle. The article has established that notwithstanding that Idemili and ?n?cha dialects belong to one group of dialects, they have some differences in their morphological processes.
Poetry as language and ideological tool for environmental agitation: A stylistic study of Tanure Ojaide and Benji Egede’s poetry
Previous studies on Tanure Ojaide and Benji Egede’s poetry have concentrated on literary and linguistic features without paying adequate attention on the roles of linguistic-stylistic features that are crucial for the interpretation and description of their poetic discourse. This paper, therefore, examines poetry as language and ideological tool for environmental agitation in Tanure Ojaide’s The Endless Song, The Beauty I Have Seen and Benji Egede’s Testament of Hope and Songs of Fuellessness. The study reveals that poetry is a language and as well an ideological weapon aimed at unfolding the socio-political decadent of their time. From the poetic analysis, the study highlights the nature of discourse in the selected poetry in relation to social contexts, projecting what is communicated and how it is communicated. The theoretical approach adopted for this study is Halliday’s Systemic Functional Linguistic model which is concerned with the identification, description and explanation of textual features in a given discourse situation.
L’idéologie de la femme noire dans La Marmite de Koka Mbala de Guy Menga et Trois prétendants…un mari d’Oyono Mbia
La présentation de la femme noire dans les œuvres romanesques africaines apparait d’être un thème qui occupe beaucoup d’écrivains. C’est une question qui se porte sur la place de la femme dans la société de la race noire suite à l’entendement de la l’infériorité de la femme vis-à-vis l’homme dans la société. Ceci suscite beaucoup de débats parmi les chercheurs voyant les points de vus variés qu’ils tiennent à l’égard du sujet. En nous tirant des exemples de certaines œuvres littéraires de la base africaine particulièrement La Marmite de Koka Mbala de Guy Menga et Trois prétendants…un mari d’Oyono Mbia, cette communication vise à critiquer et dénoncer la place de la femme dans la société où la subjectivité, la domination, l’exploitation abusive et la marginalisation sont toutes encouragées. Cependant, par la voie de cette critique, nous voyons une nouvelle prise de conscience chez la femme africaine. Une femme combattant qui se combatte contre les croyances fausses croyances de la culture qui servent comme tremplin de sa domination et de tout ce qui empêche son développement dans la société.
Indigenous musical instruments: Media of communication in Nigerian culture
This paper is aimed at giving an insight into some of the Nigerian musical instruments, their classifications, musical functions, mode of construction as well as their relevance as media of communication. The yearning in people’s hearts in recent times for the preservation of the Nigerian rich cultural heritage led to this research. Many indigenous Nigerian musical instruments communicate in languages which performers or dancers understand. This is to say that indigenous instruments such as the ‘qja’ (Igbo flute) and ‘iya-ilu’ (Yoruba talking drum) speak non verbal languages which only the performers understand; some of these instruments such as ‘qja’ (Igbo flute), and ‘iya ilu’ (Yoruba talking drum) sing praises to heroes and great achievers in the community which are clearly understood by the recipients. This research was conducted through library research and participatory observation. It is designed to enlighten the audience on the role of these indigenous musical instruments a means of communication in Nigerian culture, and the method of constructing them. It is believed that this work will add to the compendium of knowledge on Nigerian culture as well as enlighten the teaming unemployed Nigerian youths on how to construct these instruments and make a living out of this.
The Ukwuani language/dialect question: Linguistic and socio-political perspectives
One of the challenges facing Nigeria today as a multilingual nation is language-dialect classification controversy. The controversy is encouraged by the application of both political and linguistic criteria in the classification of linguistic varieties with none dominating the other. Many Nigerian languages today are endangered as a result of non-identification or wrong classification. Ukwuani is a linguistic variety spoken, mainly, by people of Ukwuani Local Government Area of Delta State, south-south Nigeria. While some scholars like Blench and Dendo (2004: v) classify Ukwuani as a language of Igboid group, others like Nwaozuzu (2008: 12) classify Ukwuani as a dialect of Igbo. Moreover, a debate on the true classification of Ukwuani has been interestingly going-on on Nairaland Forum for a couple of years now. In view of the above controversies on the true position of Ukwuani, and bearing in mind the linguistic, socio-economic and political implications of getting it right in the placement of a linguistic variety, especially as one of the antidotes to language endangerment, this paper tries to ascertain the true position of Ukwuani using every linguistic and socio-cultural criterion for language and dialect classification to test the supposed true identity of Ukwuani. It is discovered that Ukwuani is a language with its own peculiarities; not a dialect.
Copyright (c) 2015 Awka Journal of Linguistics and Languages
Linguists have continued to examine different aspects of reading over the years and suggest ideas on how it is or should be done and the factors involved if it is to be done effectively. Reading is a complex activity relating to thought and cognition in a complex way, involving “the use of complex skills if what is read is to be meaningful to the reader” (Jackson and Stockwell, 2011: 146). Part of what linguists have tried to suggest is the role that language plays in reading. This paper takes a look at what some experts have said about the relationship between language and reading, reading as a psycholinguistic process, sociolinguistic factors in the reading process and the top-down, bottom-up and interactive models of the reading process. Models provide the patterns that reading should take and process describes what happens when a reader is interacting with a text in order to derive meaning. The paper concludes that the interactive model is preferred to the other two because it reveals more appropriately what happens or should happen when a reader reads effectively.
Enhancing teaching and learning of the Igbo language through information communication technology (ICT)
Language, undoubtedly, is a crucial tool for communication and interaction in the globe. As the world develops from one level to another so also has man continued to develop new ideas and new ways of living and doing things. When these new ideas and ways are introduced effectively, they aid in enhancing both the individual and societal progress and development. Today, the world is globalizing in all the facets of human endeavours, be it commerce and industries, in education, in politics, in economics, in religion and so on. This paper, therefore, sets out to investigate how to enhance the teaching and learning of the Igbo language through Information Communication Technology to enable the language be sustained. The paper identifies some of the tools to be employed in the teaching and learning of the Igbo language. It also addresses some of the problems, which are likely to militate against the teaching and learning of the Igbo language. The work recommends among others; effective documentation, compilation of standard comprehensive Igbo dictionary and government intervention.
Causativity is a universal category in human cognition and its grammar has been widely investigated in many languages. These investigations make cross-linguistic comparisons and seek to understand deeper the centrality of causativity in human cognition. In spite of the great deal of scholarly interest in the grammar of causativity, Anyanwu (2007) is the only major work on causativity in Igbo. Igbo scholars have largely paid a fleeting interest in the phenomenon. Anyanwu’s (2007) approach is to designate formal rules for the derivation of causative structures in the language. This approach detracts from the cognitive perspective, hence, the centrality of causativity in Igbo life and culture. Therefore, this work sets out to describe data that is faithful to the conceptualisation of causativity by the Igbo speaker. The study adopts a descriptive approach where the interaction of the morphology, syntax and semantics of causative constructions express the prominence of this phenomenon in the Igbo speaker’s lexicon and cognition. The data reveals three categories of causative constructions. The first is the lexical causative construction, for example, chi? n?t[? ‘become deaf’, kpo?? u??kwu?? ‘stumble and stagger’ and hu?? e?gbe? ‘frighten a hawk’. These constructions include autonomous linguistic units entrenched in the lexicon and their contextual use must be learned by the speaker. The second category is the morphological causative construction. It involves the suffixation to causative verb roots of evaluative morphemes like –ghe?, ta? and gbo??. It also comprises the verb-verb compounding of -gbu? ‘kill’, to the roots of causative activity verbs. This category is highly productive in the language. The third category which is the analytical causative construction comprises schematic clauses that seem to be standard answers to Wh-questions with the Wh-element o?nye?. This category is the most unproductive in the language. The data in this work compares with data on causativity in other languages and the descriptive methodology facilitates the representation of the Igbo speaker’s conceptualization of causativity and how this phenomenon is central to the cultural and physical realities of Igbo life.
Examining the barriers hindering the effective translation of folktales
The role of translation studies as a discipline in global interaction and mutual co-operation cannot be over emphasized. Translation is vital because it cuts across every facet of human lives. Translation brings home to the people, in the language they understand, the meaning or the content of another language, which is foreign to them. Folktale is rich in cultural values and tradition of a particular group of people. Because of these features of folktale, they make its translation so demanding and challenging. The thrust of this paper is therefore to look at certain factors that could contribute to the difficulties in the translation of folktales. This aim is hoped to be achieved through the translation of selected folktales from The Calabash of Wisdom and other Igbo Stories by R. Egudu and Oka Mgba by J.O. Iroaganachi.
Pronoun is a nominal and a grammatical category named for its function of standing for (pro) the noun. Pronoun in the Igbo language is a close class. Linguists and grammarians have identified several pronouns in the language but none has included ‘s?’ as a pronoun. Based on this premises, therefore, the purpose of this study is to investigate whether the lexical item ‘s?’ is really a pronoun or not. The investigation will be done based on the distribution, grammatical function and the grammatical relation of the lexical item in question. The test for the linguistic item will be by replacement of the claimed lexical element with nouns. The data were gathered through the researcher’s intuitive knowledge of the language. A descriptive method of data analysis was adopted. The study disclosed among other things that; ‘s?’ can function as a pronoun in the Igbo language; that the word ‘s?’ can take only subject position in constructions; and that it can be classified as an impersonal pronoun. The researcher then recommends further investigation into the claim so that the lexeme ‘s?’ can be popularized as an Igbo impersonal pronoun.
Protection and promotion of indigenous Nigerian languages as utility vessels of indigenous knowledge systems (IKS)
The Nigerian speech communities during the pre-colonial era were indigenous language speaking communities before English became the official language of Nigeria. At present, English has not only become the dominant language in the indigenous communities, but also the medium of instruction in schools and media. Parents in most homes, even take pride to bring up their children as monolingual speakers of English which they believe their children will need to function effectively in school and even beyond. Also, with the ever increasing urbanization and the influx of people of diverse social backgrounds into cities where the Nigerian indigenous languages were once only spoken, the common language of interaction within the neighborhood is also shifting to English (Ohiri-Aniche 2008). The implication of this is that while English is gaining more grounds and speakers, indigenous Nigerian languages are being used in fewer domains and by fewer people, especially children (Anyanwu 2015) thus, reducing the number of active population of speakers of the indigenous Nigerian languages due to the lack of a virile and robust intergenerational transfer of the languages. This kind of situation is gradually leading some indigenous Nigerian languages into becoming moribund, endangered or even extinct. The extinction of the languages is also a disappearance of valuable sources of linguistic and historical information, anthropological links for social reconstruction and interpretation and the disappearance of the indigenous knowledge systems. The present paper therefore, adds to several other studies in highlighting the importance of the indigenous Nigerian languages in the preservation of indigenous cultural heritage and cultural diversity. It specifically examines how the Nigerian indigenous languages can be protected and promoted as utility vessels of indigenous knowledge systems. The paper notes that this can be achieved by doing a language survey to find out the sociolinguistic facts about the languages, continuous documentation and description of the languages as well developing tools for working on them. The paper concludes by advocating a status reclassification of the languages, the active use of the languages in all spheres of the speech communities where they are spoken and the creation of indigenous Nigerian language databases suitable for archiving.
Translation as a bridge across languages and cultures
This paper investigates the role of translation in bridging barriers, notably linguistic, cultural, economic, social and diplomatic among nations as well as in globalization. The objective of the paper is to examine some aspects of French and Igbo languages and cultures which translation has made possible. To achieve this, data are collected/drawn from different aspects of the two languages and cultures such as: idioms/proverbs, gastronomy/food, clothing/dressing and social activities. French is one of the Indo-European languages spoken in the metropolitan France and other Francophone countries around the world while Igbo is an African language of the Niger-Congo family spoken in Nigeria by the Igbo-speaking race and it is one of the three major Nigerian languages. The choice of the two languages is to show the translatability of human languages despite their genetic and typological differences. The exercise reveals that the two languages though different in many respects are mutually intelligible through translation as evidenced in our work and some others before it such as the translation of Chinua Achebe’s "Things Fall Apart" (a compendium of Igbo culture) from English to French. The importance of translation in globalization as an agent of human development and a bridge across cultures and languages is made evident in this article through examples drawn from the two languages and cultures.
Copyright (c) 2014 Awka Journal of Linguistics and Languages
A semantic approach to the culinary terms of Jukun and English
This work examines the cooking terms of the Jukun and English languages. Data for the study were obtained through both primary and secondary sources. The result of the analysis of the data indicates that at the surface level, there seems to be differences in the way the two languages perceive, view and use the various cooking terms. This is because some of the terms present in English appear to be absent in the Jukun language. However, there is a unique feature of cooking terms across the two languages because both their semantic and syntactic analyses complement each other. For instance, the terms ‘cook and bake’ are the most general verbs in the field and the freest syntactically because they exhibit an ‘ergative’ feature. Furthermore, in the two languages, the cooking verbs could feature both transitively as well as intransitively. Whenever they appear intransitively, the subject of the construction belongs to the same class of noun phrases as the object of the transitive construction. Based on the above, the study concludes that cooking terms have certain universal applications.
The relevance of ICT in language teaching in Nigeria
All over the world, technology is playing a greater role in teaching/learning. Language teachers in Nigeria need the modern technology for a better method of delivery in order to enhance the process of learning in this new age as ICT puts forward an influential base for efficient education. Therefore, the central theme of this paper is the roles of Information and Communication Technology in language teaching/learning particularly, the English Language. Through a qualitative method of research, this paper examines: the place of language in ICT, the relationship between ICT and language, ICT and teaching, the new technology and language learning, the relevance of ICT in language teaching, the challenges of ICT in language teaching in Nigeria. Also, it forwards that ICT in language teaching represents a complement to present models contributing to an evolution towards the concept of a new culture of learning.
Le commentaire compose: Strategie rentable pour l’enseignement des contes nigerians en faculte
Le commentaire composé est l’une des stratégies rentables d’enseigner la littérature non seulement en Facultés de Lettres des universités françaises mais aussi dans les Départements de français des universités nigérianes. Cette méthode d’enseignement permet au professeur de français de varier sa stratégie pédagogique et de stimuler en plus l’attention des étudiants en classe de langue, de même qu’elle permet aux étudiants eux-mêmes de s’enrichir davantage intellectuellement et culturellement. Pourtant, à noter que cette méthode d’analyse littéraire porte le plus souvent, voire exclusivement, sur l’étude du texte de la littérature écrite et conventionnelle mais très rarement ou pas du tout sur la littérature orale. La rentabilité du commentaire composé en classe de langue aussi bien que l’absence quasi-total du choix d’un texte de communication orale sont les raisons pour lesquelles ce travail a été entrepris. Notre étude va démontrer que le commentaire composé peut s’opérer également et même rentablement à travers un conte nigérian aussi bien que dans une classe de langue, stratégie pédagogique qui privilégie la communication entre professeur et étudiant. L’étude va montrer aussi qu’à partir d’un conte d’animaux, d’un conte merveilleux, on peut arriver à retrouver une culture humaine à la fois réelle et moderne.
English language as a solution to issues and challenges of leadership and good governance in Nigeria
Language is the vehicle of social interaction needed by every government for effective and good governance. Unfortunately, Nigeria does not have a well articulated and explicit national language policy that can be found in one document. The official language of governance in Nigeria for now is English. No doubt the problem of poor performance in this is the root of all the difficulties in efficient governance in Nigeria. The state of students' performance in the language has deteriorated to an embarrassing and unacceptable level. If the government cannot communicate its policies and programmes to the least of her citizens, there is bound to be great misinterpretation and misunderstanding between the government and the people which is likely to generate into social unrests. In this paper, the writer asserts that unless the teaching and learning of the English language is given the priority it deserves in Nigeria, issues and challenges of leadership and good governance will remain unattended. The most, and apparently difficult problem of poor performance in the English language and by extension, other subjects especially at the secondary school level is examination malpractice. The phenomenon of examination malpractice has become endemic in the educational system. It is suggested that a serious and better training and re-training of teachers is paramount.
The contexts and functions of Igbo oral poetry
Poetry according to Egudu (1975) is in the first instance literature. Literature consists of a number of major genres and poetry is one of them. According to Finnegan (1977) “…the effect a piece of poetry is likely to have depends not on some permanent characteristics in the text itself, but on the circumstances in which it is delivered, the position of the poet, and perhaps on the native and wishes of the audience”. It is this striking statement of Finnegan above that the researcher tries to identify specific contexts and some notable functions poetry perform in the Igbo literature. Igbo oral poetry plays a lot of roles and is sung in several contexts. By context here, we are talking about situation or occasion in which this particular kind of literature is performed. We have general distinction based on context in various Igbo tradition for instance Ifo or Folktales is an Oral performance distinguished in terms of context as they are told in the might for entertainment. The Igbo Oral Poetry performs specific functions to the audience and the performers alike. These various functions of Oral poetry are distinguished from their context on the basis of what use they are put to as against where they are performed. It is quite difficult for a layman to distinguish between the two as they interwove. The role Igbo oral poetry play in one situation could change in another situation therefore the function Igbo Oral poetry perform is very much related to the context. This work however is limited to the context these poem are sung and some recognizable functions they perform.
Chaque langue repose sur un système linguistique qui en gouverne tous ses aspects. Elle fonctionne selon des règles qui déterminent la prononciation, la formation de nouveaux mots, la formation des phrases et le sens en général. Le but de cet article est de faire une analyse de pronoms personnels Gworog et de démontrer comment la langue construit et rendre explicite l’usage des pronoms personnels. Nos recherches nous révèlent que les pronoms personnels Gworog sont en deux formes pour chaque personne représentée dans la liste de pronoms personnels. Ces deux formes révélées, peuvent avoir plusieurs fonctions : sujet, objet, possessive, renforcées et emphatiques. De plus, la langue Gworog ne faire pas de distinction entre les formes masculine et féminin de la troisième personne singulière ou plurielle. On a découvert que la langue utilise les affixes à la forme possessive et la formé renforcée tandis que la forme neutre utilise les articles définis Gworog, pour décrire les noms déjà indiqué pendant le discours. Nous précisons cependant que nous mettons en relief des particularités des pronoms personnels de la langue Gworog, en nous servant du côté français qui nous permis de tenter une étude pareille. Notre intention ici, n’est pas de réaliser une étude contrastive ou comparative de la Gworog et le français : mais c’est une étude purement descriptive.
Copyright (c) 2013 Awka Journal of Linguistics and Languages
Promoting the use of the Igbo language among the Igbo people in Nigeria and in the diaspora
Nobody promotes what he does not possess or what he knows little about. Promoting a product implies that the product is in the custody of its promoter or that details of the product are well-known to its promoter. The Igbo language however is alien to the majority of Igbo youths especially the urban dwellers who form part of the highly placed civil servants and who may be privileged to interact with members of the international community. The objective of this paper therefore is to investigate ways of redirecting the negative attitude of the Igbo people towards their language in order to be well equipped to promote it among themselves and the international community. Discussions and awareness campaigns were carried out at different levels with different classes of Igbo people (youths as well as the elderly), in order to find out the reasons for this aversion to their language. It was observed that their attitudes are embedded in some socio-political and economic factors. The paper therefore highlights these factors and then suggests ways of boosting the Igbo language among the Igbo at home and in the diaspora.
An account of the syntax of Igbo reconciliation verbs
This paper sets out to examine the syntax of Igbo reconciliation verbs, their morphological structures and how they manifest in the syntactic structures of the language. The data for this work were obtained through oral interviews and also through recording of natural speech of the Igbo native speakers. The paper adopts a descriptive method in the analysis of the data. The findings show that Igbo reconciliation verbs are overtly morphologically marked in the syntactic structures of the language. It is observed that not all the verbs are used in making reconciliation between human beings. The verbs involve two or more participant NPs. The verbs are: [+ human] and [+ concrete noun]. The verbs can be employed to express reflexive and reciprocality notions in the language. They can also be used to express imperative in Igbo.
The morpho-syntactic coding of motion events in Igbo?
The phenomenon of motion events is universal in human cognition and language. These events are coded in the verbal structure of human language. This work builds on the past study of Igbo motion verbs and seeks to investigate the interaction between morphology, syntax and semantics in the description of Igbo motion events. Igbo verbal morphosyntax codes four categories of motion events. The first category, which includes verbs like ba?a? ‘enter’ and la?a? ‘go home/go to destination’, code the FIGURE, PATH and GROUND in the motion event. The second category includes verbs like zo?? ‘transplant’ and kwa? ‘push’ which code FIGURE and GROUND in the motion event. The third classification contains verbs like fe? e?fe? ‘flying’ and gbe? i?gbe? ‘crawling’ which code FIGURE and MANNER in the event. The last category consists of verbs like n?a? a?n?a? ‘wobble’ and so?? go??no?? go??no?? ‘stagger’ which code FIGURE, MANNER AND CAUSE. The study concludes that motion events in Igbo are coded morphologically. This conclusion is foundational to the further investigation of the core components of motion events in Igbo that is, PATH and MANNER. In other words, it is the groundwork of the contribution of Igbo to the study of the cross-linguistic phenomenon of motion events.
This study investigates the tones of I?ka?ra?m, a dialect of the Akpes language, spoken in A?ko?ko? North West Local Government Area of Ondo State, Nigeria. Specific areas of the I?ka?ra?m tonology are investigated with a view to establishing the I?ka?ra?m tone system. These areas include, I?ka?ra?m tones, functions of tones and tonological processes which I?ka?ra?m tones undergo, among others. The study reveals that I?ka?ra?m has three basic tones High (H), Low (L) and Mid (M). Contour tones, high-falling and low-rising, are also phonetically realized in I?ka?ra?m. Tone is a distinctive feature of I?ka?ra?m phonology and I?ka?ra?m tones perform both lexical and grammatical functions. These tones are used to distinguish meanings of segmentally identical words. They perform grammatical functions like assimilation in noun phrases, in possessive constructions, as negation markers, as relative clause construction markers, as subject-verb agreement construction markers, as tense markers, as imperative markers and as associative markers.
Wavelength and fundamental frequency as determinants of type of intonation
In this study, attempts have been made to use wavelength and fundamental frequency as cues to the determination of type of intonation. Twenty five pairs of utterances were produced by native speakers of English and Ika Igbo. These were produced with various tunes and their wavelengths and fundamental frequencies were calculated using the praat software. Though generally, the High Rise intonation showed a consistent relationship between the wavelengths and the Fos, there were much inconsistencies in the other intonation types – Low Rise, Rise Fall and Fall Rise. Hence using Fo and wavelength relationship in determining type of intonation may not be reliable.
PRAGMA-STYLISTIC ANALYSIS OF MAJOR GENERAL J. T. AGUIYI IRONSI’S MAIDEN SPEECH
This paper specifically reviews the language of major General Aguiyi Ironsi’s maiden speech from the perspective of speech Acts theory as formulated by John Austin in 1962 and developed by Searle 1999. However, it is brought to the open in his research how the language of the speech under review in relation to its context of use,influences to a large degree the interpretation generated from the speech. It also explores how the language of the speech has been pragmatically organised and planned towards luring and mobilising people to accept the government in power. Towards this end, the speech is framed in such a way that it caters for all shades of opinions, interests groups and thoughts. This then informs the use of various kinds of illocutionary tactics employed in the speech, which are meant to cajole and elicit the support of the citizens for the new government.
Copyright (c) 2005 Awka Journal of Languages and Linguistics
The central concern of this paper is to describe the rules underlying plural formation in koring. The number distinction is essentially between singular and plural. Three levels of plurization are identiofied:word, phrasal and sential. Our analysis demonstrates that there are several rules involved in plurization in koring
IGBO FEMALE IN IGBO LITERARY TEXTS AND IGBO FEMALE LITERARY WRITERS
While the presence of men made itself concretely felt in Igbo language as far back as 1933. Igbo women would not publish a literary work until after four decades. This paper will trace the history of Igbo female writers and throw light on the sources of hindrances that Igbo female literary writers encounter. It will also examine the focus of Igbo female literary artists and determine whether they have used their works to project the interest of the Igbo female or not. The problems that the Igbo female writers encounter will also be considered. Finally, suggestions on how they can improve their lot towards a better achievement for the Igbo female image and interest, and for a better democratic experience and greater developmental achievement in Igbo society and Nigeria, as a whole will be discussed.
GRAPHO-SYNTACTIC ANALYSIS OF SELECTED POLITICAL SPEECHES OF SOME NIGERIAN MILITARY HEADS OF STATE
This study investigates how the non-professional politicians; - the military, when they become head of states use, the linguistic resources and devices of Grapho-syntax to convey their political ideas and thoughts. It is therefore, a part of the objectives of this study, to find out which of the components of linguistics resources; Grapho-syntactic features are mostly prominent in the speeches. It is also meant to unravel the thematic roles played by these prominent features in the realisation of the political intentions of the speakers. The data used for the work is based on some selected political speeches of the military heads of state that ruled the country from 1966 to 1983. The data or speeches were analysed from the perspectives of the linguistic stylistic approach and linguistic model of Systemic Functional Grammer of Berry (1975). It is discovered from the analysis that the language of the military political rulers is permeated with sparsely use of punctuation marks (open use of punctuation marks) and this is claimed to be in tune with swift and quick manner with which they carry out their administrative duties. Besides, their language in political addresses is mainly of simple declarative sentences. This style too, is in concomitance with their simple and unbureaucratic way of governing.