A Comparative Study on the Aesthetics of Language and Structure in T.S. Eliot and Mahmoud Darwish’s Poetry (Published)
This paper explores the insights and inspirations Mahmoud Darwish has received from other poets. The thematic and structural analysis the study conducts on T. S. Eliot’s “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” and Mahmoud Darwish’s “A Truce with the Mongols in the Forest of Oak” indicates that the two poems are narrated using a fragmented, ironic and symbolic language. Likewise, both purposefully repeat lexical items and syntactic structures, and abound with imageries and figures of speech.
Keywords: Eloit, Forest of Oak, Language, Mahmoud, Poem, Poetry, Speech
The Impact of the National Policy on Education (NPE) On Multilingual Proficiency in Nigeria (Published)
About 450 languages are spoken in Nigeria with Hausa, Igbo and Yoruba as the major languages. In order to assign functional roles to the multiplicity of languages, the Federal Government promulgated the National Policy on Education (henceforth NPE) in 1977 stipulated that every Nigerian child must be proficient in his mother tongue and in a major Nigerian language. At the secondary level, it is expected that every child should be bilingual in two Nigerian languages. Thirty six years later, the impact of the policy on the language education of Nigerian pupils was assessed. Data were collected using questionnaire and interview methods. Findings revealed that the primary aim of the NPE has not been achieved. Based on the findings, the recommendation made include the organization of intensive workshop sessions for language teachers to expose them to the modern techniques for attaining bilingualism through effective training.
Keywords: Education, Language, National Policy, Nigeria
Language Use in Arrow of God: A Socio-Linguistic Dimension (Published)
This paper examines the lexis structure and other linguistic features that coalesce to convey the intended message in Achebe’s Arrow of God. It highlights Achebe’s adaptive use of the English language to capture peculiar cultural ideals in the Igbo traditional society. The study analyses the corpus of the novel. Arrow of God and portrays the vocabulary, syntax and expressions that depict the socio-cultural Igbo norms and setting. The analysis explores how Achebe employs lexical and syntactic formations to realize the central message of conflict in Arrow of God. Linguistics styles such as proverbs, transliteration, focalization, lexical borrowings, sentential code-mixing, imageries are discovered. It is these unique that make the novel a master piece in the Nigeria context.
Keywords: Achebe, Arrow of God, Language, Socio-Linguistic, Vocabulary
Deviant Collocation As A Writing Technique In African Literature: A Stylistic Study of Helon Habila’s Measuring Time. (Published)
This paper appraises the use of deviant collocations in Habila’s Measuring Time. Ordinarily, collocations are words or expressions that naturally co-occur. But some literary artists have as a matter of fact made some incongruous blending for stylistic stand point and to unravel the ills in their environments. This inquiry adopts the systemic functional Grammar because it highlights the functions of language, the descriptive methods of data analysis, the primary and secondary data collection methods. It was discovered that language use depicts the afflictions of the people like the twins La Mamo and Mamo in the novel. Thus, elements of language as used in the Measuring Time stand for Habila’s ideological orientation. He therefore, uses deviant collocations such as personification, paradox, oxymoron, grotesque scheme, hybridity and so on to unearth the sense of fragmentation, despair and perplexity, which define his fictional Keti community, which is a paradigm for Nigeria and indeed Africa.
Keywords: African literature, Deviation and Collocation, Language, Style
Language Use in Arrow of God: A Socio-Linguistic Dimension (Published)
This paper examines the lexis structure and other linguistic features that coalesce to convey the intended message in Achebe’s Arrow of God. It highlights Achebe’s adaptive use of the English language to capture peculiar cultural ideals in the Igbo traditional society. The study analyses the corpus of the novel. Arrow of God and portrays the vocabulary, syntax and expressions that depict the socio-cultural Igbo norms and setting. The analysis explores how Achebe employs lexical and syntactic formations to realize the central message of conflict in Arrow of God. Linguistics styles such as proverbs, transliteration, focalization, lexical borrowings, sentential code-mixing, imageries are discovered. It is these unique that make the novel a master piece in the Nigeria context.
Keywords: Arrow of God, Code-Mixing, English, Language, Socio Linguistics