Nativised English in Selected Nigerian Literary Texts

Nativised English in Selected Nigerian Literary Texts

Background to the Study

Language is the main tool for constructing every literary work. The importance of language to human beings cannot be overemphasized. It is an important means of human communication that serves a wide variety of purposes. It is one of the factors that distinguish human beings from animals; the former communicate with language (verbal and non-verbal) and express thoughts, feelings and ideas in it. The primary purpose of language is communication and no human language is inferior to another. The concept of language universal asserts that there are characteristics/properties of language that exist in all languages. Languages co-exist and affect one another to produce sociolinguistic results such as multilingualism, bilingualism, interference, code-switching, codemixing, nativisation/acculturation/domestication, pidginisation and others. Language contact situations lead to most languages getting influenced at one time or another. This results in varying degrees of transfer of features from one language to another. Nigeria is a multilingual nation with about 520 local languages and the English language with some features of the English language rubbing off on the indigenous languages and vice versa. 2 The advent of English and its co-existence with indigenous languages is a case of language contact. Factors like colonialism, religion, education, and commerce can be held accountable for this. The missionaries that came into Nigeria paved a way for colonialism. Nigeria was colonized by the British Empire and English was imposed on Nigeria in the process. The Britons did not think the indigenous languages were worth speaking, so they introduced their own language. According to Foldeh Baldeh, The English language is undoubtedly the most important legacy of the British colonial masters to Nigeria. The adoption of the imperial tongue as a language for wider communication dates back to 1862 when Lagos was formally established as a colony by the British invaders. Its subsequent spread is, therefore, linked closely to British colonial rule and its attendant Christian Evangelical Crusade, with their cultural, political and economic ramifications (1). It is normal for colonizers to impose their language on the colonized. Some will even go as far as forbidding natives to speak their local languages, and this was the case between the Britons and Nigerians at the time. Hence, the English language is a colonial gown

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