THE MORPHOLOGICAL INFLUENCE OF ENGLISH ON IGBO NOUNS


THE MORPHOLOGICAL INFLUENCE OF ENGLISH ON IGBO NOUNS  

ABSTRACT

Nominalization is a process of creating ‘nouns’ from other words. This study examines the morphological influences of English on Igbo nouns in code-mixed and switched utterances of Igbo-English bilinguals. There is overwhelming evidence that English and Igbo languages influence or interfere with each other in informal conversations of Igbo-English bilinguals. This calls for a research to ascertain the degree of dominance of English language on Igbo language.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Title page i

Certification ii

Dedication iii

Acknowledgement iv

Table of contents v

List of figures ix

List of tables x

List of abbreviations xi

Abstract xii

CHAPTER ONE

 INTRODUCTION

1.0   Background to the Study………………………………………………………1

1.1   Statement of the Problem………………………………………………….......2

1.2   Scope of Study…….……………………………………………………………2

1.3   Purpose of Study……………………………………………………………….3

1.4   Methodology…………………………………………………………………...3

1.5   Limitation of Study…...…………………………………………………………4

1.6   Significance of Study..…………………………………………………………...4

1.7 A Linguistic Sketch of the Igbo Grammar………………………………………..5

CHAPTER TWO

LITERATURE REVIEW

2.0      Introduction………………………………………………………………....7

2.1     The Advent of English Language in Nigeria……….……………………….7

2.2 Functions of English Language in Nigeria….…………..…………………….9

2.3 Language Contact……………………….…………..………………………12

2.3.1    Effects of Language Contact………………………………………………..13

2.3.1.1Bilingualism…………………………………………….….………………..13

2.3.1.2 Multilingualism…………………………………………….….…………….15

2.3.1.3 Code-switching…………………………………………….……………….17

2.3.1.4 Code-mixing……………………………………………….……………......19

CHAPTER THREE:

 DATA ANALYSIS

3.0 Preamble………………………………………………………………………...22

3.1.1 Nominalization: An Overview………………………………………….……22

3.1.2 Inflection………………………………………………………………….….23

3.1.3 Derivational…………………………………………………………………...24

3.1.4 Composition (Compounding)..……………………………………….………25

3.2 Nominalization in Igbo Grammar……………………………………………...26

CHAPTER FOUR 

SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION

4.1 Summary of Work……………………………………………………………..36

4.2 Conclusion…………………………………………………………………….38

Works Cited………………………………………………………………………39

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

1.0 Background to the study

The accession of English language in Nigeria can be traced back to 1553, when Britons visited the coastal areas of Nigeria for slave trade; the means of communication between the Nigerian traders at the time was ‘pidgin English’. With the abolition of slave trade, British explorers started moving beyond the coastal areas, penetrating deep into Nigeria to promote legitimate trade.

However, the arrival and existence of English language in Nigeria, which was also factored by the European colonization of Africa, had a huge influence on Nigerians and their indigenous languages. The Britons imposed ‘English’ on a largely fragmented linguistic group that is known today as ‘Nigeria’. The importance of English thus became overemphasized (even up till now) to the detriment of our indigenous languages. In the case of English in Igboland, the ability to speak and write English was so much valued that a competent user of English was accorded so much respect and recognition among his people. The Igbo people, known for their astuteness, dynamism and receptivity were so fascinated by this foreign tongue that everybody strove to learn it or strongly admired those who were able to speak what they referred to as “Asusu ndi ocha”. Loosely translated, it means ‘Whiteman’s tongue’.

Writing on languages in contact, Comrie (2009) asserts that while much change takes place in a given language without outside interference, many changes can result from contact with other languages. When two or morelanguages come in contact, some socio-linguistic phenomena take place, among which are bilingualism, multilingualism, code-switching, code-mixing, calquing, borrowing, language interference and,perhaps, creolisation and pidginisation (Olaoye, 2007).

Some Nigerian languages alsohad contact withArabic and French. English, as Nigeria’s Lingua Franca, is a British colonial legacy which eventually became a major player in Nigerian education, politics, administration, economy and legislation. English today can be regarded as the lamp with which the Nigerian youth travels through the education tunnel. It is now being referred to as one of the major Nigerian languages (Ogundare, 2004). It is a compromise language of communication in Nigeria’s multi-lingual and multi-cultural setting. 

The reason being that the orchestrated political resistance to the choice of an indigenous language

,as a national official language (NOL),has foreclosed choosing any of the three major Nigerianlanguages (Hausa, Igbo and Yoruba)as a Lingua Franca. English is thus seen as the socio-linguistic and symbolic embodiment of political power and authority (Adekunle, 1974).

English is a vehicle of globalization through which came information and communication technology (ICT), which has a pervasive influence on education delivery. Through English, western democracy has become a popular and regular news menu on the nation’s political agenda. Through ICT many exoglossic languages have had close contact with some Nigerian languages. The influence of these foreign languages has been overwhelming, contributing to the growth and development of the Nigerian ethnolects. Through language borrowing, vocabulary expansion is made possiblebylexical modernization. Yoruba language in particular has become superbly enriched. This enrichment takes place in almost all aspectsof Yoruba language.

The three major Nigerian languages, Hausa, Igbo and Yoruba borrowed from English. Someof the characteristics of those borrowed words arethat they are integrated into the borrowing Nigerian languages, and that consonant clusters in these words are broken with epentheticvowels.This is an incidence of linguistic symbiosis.According to Brann (2008) the inroadsoexoglossic languages havebrought a shift from monolingualism to multilingualism, and has thus created a class of polyglots in urban cities from the monoglots of the rural areas.

It is pertinent to note that English language is a ‘migrant language’. A language that migrates from its ancestral home and becomes established as a second language in a heterogeneous, multilingual society as English language left England for Nigeria will unavoidably impact on its new environment in several ways (Ekundayo 14). First, the imported language (i.e. second language) interacts with the users’ first language (L1) and/or mother tongue (MT). Such an interaction often leads to language transfer habits. Second, the imported language then assumes some of the features of the second language users after interacting with the new environment. Third, even features of the second language in the mind of the learner(s) interact and influence one another independently. Consequently, the psycho-sociolinguistic interaction of the languages in contact leads to the transfer of syntactic, pragmatic, morphological and semantic developments of both languages. Albeit, this research work takes a look at the morphological influences of English language on Igbo language. 

1.1 Statement of the problem

The contact and influence of English language on Nigerian indigenous languages is not without controversies or problems. Many Nigerian linguistic communities feared that the reception of English language will lead to the extinction of their culture and even their language. This was the reason for the resistance of English language in the early Nigeria by many language groups. Nwala (1985) describes the Igboman’s receptivity to change in the following words: “it…was paradoxical that the group that most resisted the Whiteman’s rule and the Whiteman’s way of life, eventually turned around to be the most anglicised and the most Europeanized among Nigerians”.Other people have rather criticized the Igbo peoples’ desire for foreign things. Afigbo(1979) describes the Igbo people as those “who more than most other  Nigerian people have tend rather recklessly to abandon their indigenous culture for the European culture”. This research does not aim at projecting the contact between English language and Nigerian languages as a weakness or a curse; rather, it will focus on the morphological influences and contributions of English to Igbo nouns.

1.2 Scope of study

The peculiar grammatical or linguistic influence that the English language had on Igbo spans through phonetics, phonetics, lexico-semantics, pragmatics, morphology, etc. this research will concern itself with the ‘morphological influence of the English language on Igbo, using some utterances of Igbo-English bilinguals.

1.3 Purpose of study

The major purpose of this research is to examine the influence of English on Igbo nouns morphologically in code-mixed and code-switched utterances. In the process of creating some Igbo nouns, verbs play important roles (even though they belong to a different word class). Igbo verbs accept different types of affixation (prefix, interfix, and suffix) which enables them to move from one word class to another, especially to nominal. This research therefore projects the verb as a beast of burden, because of its role in nominalization

1.4 Methodology

This research will base its analysis on ‘morphology’, which is the science of the shape of words. The data for this research work was gathered through simple unstructured selection of lexical items in the language (Igbo).

1.5 Limitations

The study of Igbo nouns can never be exhausted. There are different ways of analysing them like; phonological, semantically, pragmatic, and stylistic ways of analysing them, but research will concern itself with the morphological analysis of Igbo nouns.

1.6 Significance of study

Code-switching and mixing are known to be a universal phenomenon among bilinguals. Not until recently, code-switching and mixing was seen as an evidence of “internal-mental confusion, the inability to separate two languages sufficiently to warrant the description of true bilingualism (Lipski 1982). This study shows that code-switching/mixing is not a manifestation of mental confusion, but a rule governed behaviour among bilinguals which is motivated by various socio-psychological as well as linguistic factors.

1.7 A linguistic sketch of the Igbo language

The Igbo language is a ‘Kwa language’ of the Benue-Congo subfamily of the Volta-Congo and Atlantic-Congo branches of the Niger-Congo language family. It is one of the four largest languages in West Africa. Within Nigeria, Igbo is spoken in the following southern delta region: Abia, Anambara, Ebonyi, Enugu and Imo. It is also spoken in the Northeast of Delta state and Southeast of Rivers state, but it is rarely spoken outside Nigeria. Igbo speakers are typically bilinguals, speaking as well.

The phoneme inventory consists of eight vowels, thirty consonants and two tones, depending on the analysis. The double articulation in the consonant system, in particular the (implosive) labiovelars (e.g. [kp], [gb]) is a defining feature of the Igbo sound system. Likewise, aspiration and nasalization are also phonemic (contrastive) in the language.

The tone system of Igbo consists of two primary tones (high and low). When these tones are combined, in a variety of ways, various complex derived tone changes and tonal melodies occur. As in many West African languages, tone is both lexically contrastive and grammatical. In fact, the grammatical relations are expressed via tone than by word order or morphology.

Igbo is an isolating language with relatively little morphology. That is to say, grammatically, on discrete root morphemes as opposed to word-internally via a series of affixes. As is typical of Kwa languages, the majority of Igbo words are morphologically simple, showing little to no morphological structure. Igbo verbs, however, do bear a modest amount of morphological structure. Verbs inflect for tense (past, present, future) and aspect (progressive, perfective, durative, inchoative), via both prefixation and suffixation. In addition, verbs bear additional morphology depending on the sentence-type. For example, verbs in imperative sentences bear special suffixes, and in negative sentences they take certain prefixes. Reduplication is a productive derivational morphological process in the language (e.g. it is the primary means by which verbs are nominalized). Syntactically, verbs are among the most complex category of expressions in the language. 

.

THE MORPHOLOGICAL INFLUENCE OF ENGLISH ON IGBO NOUNS



TYPE IN YOUR TOPIC AND CLICK SEARCH.






RESEARCHWAP.NET
Researchwap.net is an online repository for free project topics and research materials, articles and custom writing of research works. We’re an online resource centre that provides a vast database for students to access numerous research project topics and materials. Researchwap.net guides and assist Postgraduate, Undergraduate and Final Year Students with well researched and quality project topics, topic ideas, research guides and project materials. We’re reliable and trustworthy, and we really understand what is called “time factor”, that is why we’ve simplified the process so that students can get their research projects ready on time. Our platform provides more educational services, such as hiring a writer, research analysis, and software for computer science research and we also seriously adhere to a timely delivery.

TESTIMONIES FROM OUR CLIENTS


Please feel free to carefully review some written and captured responses from our satisfied clients.

  • "Exceptionally outstanding. Highly recommend for all who wish to have effective and excellent project defence. Easily Accessable, Affordable, Effective and effective."

    Debby Henry George, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Cambridge, USA.
  • "I saw this website on facebook page and I did not even bother since I was in a hurry to complete my project. But I am totally amazed that when I visited the website and saw the topic I was looking for and I decided to give a try and now I have received it within an hour after ordering the material. Am grateful guys!"

    Hilary Yusuf, United States International University Africa, Nairobi, Kenya.
  • "Researchwap.net is a website I recommend to all student and researchers within and outside the country. The web owners are doing great job and I appreciate them for that. Once again, thank you very much "researchwap.net" and God bless you and your business! ."

    Debby Henry George, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Cambridge, USA.
  • "Great User Experience, Nice flows and Superb functionalities.The app is indeed a great tech innovation for greasing the wheels of final year, research and other pedagogical related project works. A trial would definitely convince you."

    Lamilare Valentine, Kwame Nkrumah University, Kumasi, Ghana.
  • "I love what you guys are doing, your material guided me well through my research. Thank you for helping me achieve academic success."

    Sampson, University of Nigeria, Nsukka.
  • "researchwap.com is God-sent! I got good grades in my seminar and project with the help of your service, thank you soooooo much."

    Cynthia, Akwa Ibom State University .
  • "Sorry, it was in my spam folder all along, I should have looked it up properly first. Please keep up the good work, your team is quite commited. Am grateful...I will certainly refer my friends too."

    Elizabeth, Obafemi Awolowo University
  • "Am happy the defense went well, thanks to your articles. I may not be able to express how grateful I am for all your assistance, but on my honour, I owe you guys a good number of referrals. Thank you once again."

    Ali Olanrewaju, Lagos State University.
  • "My Dear Researchwap, initially I never believed one can actually do honest business transactions with Nigerians online until i stumbled into your website. You have broken a new legacy of record as far as am concerned. Keep up the good work!"

    Willie Ekereobong, University of Port Harcourt.
  • "WOW, SO IT'S TRUE??!! I can't believe I got this quality work for just 3k...I thought it was scam ooo. I wouldn't mind if it goes for over 5k, its worth it. Thank you!"

    Theressa, Igbinedion University.
  • "I did not see my project topic on your website so I decided to call your customer care number, the attention I got was epic! I got help from the beginning to the end of my project in just 3 days, they even taught me how to defend my project and I got a 'B' at the end. Thank you so much researchwap.com, infact, I owe my graduating well today to you guys...."

    Joseph, Abia state Polytechnic.
  • "My friend told me about ResearchWap website, I doubted her until I saw her receive her full project in less than 15 miniutes, I tried mine too and got it same, right now, am telling everyone in my school about researchwap.com, no one has to suffer any more writing their project. Thank you for making life easy for me and my fellow students... Keep up the good work"

    Christiana, Landmark University .
  • "I wish I knew you guys when I wrote my first degree project, it took so much time and effort then. Now, with just a click of a button, I got my complete project in less than 15 minutes. You guys are too amazing!."

    Musa, Federal University of Technology Minna
  • "I was scared at first when I saw your website but I decided to risk my last 3k and surprisingly I got my complete project in my email box instantly. This is so nice!!!."

    Ali Obafemi, Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida University, Niger State.
  • To contribute to our success story, send us a feedback or please kindly call 2348037664978.
    Then your comment and contact will be published here also with your consent.

    Thank you for choosing researchwap.com.