Archive for the ‘AFRICAN ORAL LITERATURE’ Category
NGUGI WA THIONGO,THE GREAT AFRICAN WRITER FROM KENYA,FROM HIS SITE
May 19, 2008
from nguguiwathiongo.com
NGUGI WA THIONGO,THE GREAT AFRICAN WRITER FROM KENYA,FROM HIS WEBSITE
from ngugiwathiongo.com
Ngugi Wa Thiong’o: A Profile of a Literary and Social Activist.
Ngugi wa Thiong’o, currently Distinguished Professor of English and Comparative Literature and Director of the International Center for Writing and Translation at the University of California, Irvine, was born in Kenya, in 1938 into a large peasant family. He was educated at Kamandura, Manguu and Kinyogori primary schools; Alliance High School, all in Kenya; Makerere University College (then a campus of London University), Kampala, Uganda; and the University of Leeds, Britain. He is recipient of seven Honorary Doctorates viz D Litt (Albright); PhD (Roskilde); D Litt (Leeds); D Litt &Ph D (Walter Sisulu University); PhD (Carlstate); D Litt (Dillard) and D Litt (Auckland University). He is also Honorary Member of American Academy of Letters. A many-sided intellectual, he is novelist, essayist, playwright, journalist, editor, academic and social activist.
The Kenya of his birth and youth was a British settler colony (1895-1963). As an adolescent, he lived through the Mau Mau War of Independence (1952-1962), the central historical episode in the making of modern Kenya and a major theme in his early works.
Ngugi burst onto the literary scene in East Africa with the performance of his first major play, The Black Hermit, at the National Theatre in Kampala, Uganda, in 1962, as part of the celebration of Uganda’s Independence. “Ngugi Speaks for the Continent,” headlined The Makererian, the Student newspaper, in a review of the performance by Trevor Whittock, one of the professors. In a highly productive literary period, Ngugi wrote additionally eight short stories, two one act plays, two novels, and a regular column for the Sunday Nation under the title, As I See It. One of the novels, Weep Not Child, was published to critical acclaim in 1964; followed by the second novel, The River Between (1965). His third, A Grain of Wheat (1967), was a turning point in the formal and ideological direction of his works. Multi-narrative lines and multi-viewpoints unfolding at different times and spaces replace the linear temporal unfolding of the plot from a single viewpoint. The collective replaces the individual as the center of history.
In 1967, Ngugi became lecturer in English Literature at the University of Nairobi. He taught there until 1977 while, in-between, also serving as Fellow in Creative writing at Makerere (1969-1970), and as Visiting Associate Professor of English and African Studies at Northwestern University (1970-1971). During his tenure at Nairobi, Ngugi was at the center of the politics of English departments in Africa, championing the change of name from English to simply Literature to reflect world literature with African and third world literatures at the center. He, with Taban Lo Liyong and Awuor Anyumba, authored the polemical declaration, On the Abolition of the English Department, setting in motion a continental and global debate and practices that later became the heart of postcolonial theories. “If there is need for a ’study of the historic continuity of a single culture’, why can’t this be African? Why can’t African literature be at the centre so that we can view other cultures in relationship to it?” they asked. The text is carried in his first volume of literary essays, Homecoming, which appeared in print in 1969. These were to be followed, in later years, by other volumes including Writers in Politics (1981 and 1997); Decolonising the Mind (1986); Moving the Center (1994); and Penpoints Gunpoints and Dreams (1998).
The year 1977 forced dramatic turns in Ngugi’s life and career. His first novel in ten years, Petals of Blood, was published in July of that year. The novel painted a harsh and unsparing picture of life in neo-colonial Kenya. It was received with even more emphatic critical acclaim in Kenya and abroad. The Kenya Weekly Review described as “this bomb shell” and the Sunday Times of London as capturing every form and shape that power can take. The same year Ngugi’s controversial play, Ngaahika Ndeenda (I Will Marry When I Want), written with Ngugi wa Mirii, was performed at Kamirithu Educational and Cultural Center, Limuru, in an open air theatre, with actors from the workers and peasants of the village. Sharply critical of the inequalities and injustices of Kenyan society, publicly identified with unequivocally championing the cause of ordinary Kenyans, and committed to communicating with them in the languages of their daily lives, Ngugi was arrested and imprisoned without charge at Kamiti Maximum Security Prison at the end of the year, December 31, 1977. An account of those experiences is to be found in his memoir, Detained: A Writer’s Prison Diary (1982). It was at Kamiti Maximum Prison that Ngugi made the decision to abandon English as his primary language of creative writing and committed himself to writing in Gikuyu, his mother tongue. In prison, and following that decision, he wrote, on toilet paper, the novel, Caitani Mutharabaini (1981) translated into English as Devil on the Cross, (1982).
After Amnesty International named him a Prisoner of Conscience, an international campaign secured his release a year later, December 1978. However, the Moi Dictatorship barred him from jobs at colleges and university in the country. He resumed his writing and his activities in the theater and in so doing, continued to be an uncomfortable voice for the Moi dictatorship. While Ngugi was in Britain for the launch and promotion of Devil on the Cross, he learned about the Moi regime’s plot to eliminate him on his return, or as coded, give a red carpet welcome on arrival at Jomo Kenyatta Airport. This forced him into exile, first in Britain (1982 –1989), and then the U.S. after (1989-2002), during which time, the Moi dictatorship hounded him trying, unsuccessfully, to get him expelled from London and from other countries he visited. In 1986, at a conference in Harare, an assassination squad outside his hotel in Harare was thwarted by the Zimbwean security. His next Gikuyu novel, Matigari, was published in 1986. Thinking that the novel’s main character was a real living person, Dictator Moi issued an arrest warrant for his arrest but on learning that the character was fictional, he had the novel “arrested;” instead. Undercover police went to all the bookshops in the country and the Publishers warehouse and took the novel away. So, between 1986 and 1996, Matigari could not be sold in Kenyan bookshops. The dictatorship also had all Ngugi’s books removed from all educational institutions.
In exile, Ngugi worked with the London based Committee for the Release of Political Prisoners in Kenya, (1982-1998), which championed the cause of democratic and human rights in Kenya. In between, he was Visiting Professor at Byreuth University (1984); and Writer in Residence, for the Borough of Islington, London (1985) and took time to study film, at Dramatiska Institute, Stockholm, Sweden. (1986). After 1988, Ngugi became Visiting Professor of English and Comparative Literature at Yale (1989-1992) in between holding The Five Colleges (Amherst, Mount Holyoke, New Hampshire, Smith, East Massachusetts) Visiting Distinguished Professor of English and African Literature (Fall 1991). He then became Professor of Comparative Literature and Performance Studies at New York University (1992 –2002) where he also held the Erich Maria Remarque Professor of languages, from where he moved to his present position at the University of California Irvine. He remained in exile for the duration of the Moi Dictatorship 1982-2002. When he and his wife, Njeeri, returned to Kenya in 2004 after twenty-two years in exile, they were attacked by four hired gunmen and narrowly escaped with their lives.
Ngugi has continued to write prolifically, publishing, in 2006, what some have described as his crowning achievement, Wizard of the Crow, an English translation of the Gikuyu language novel, Murogi wa Kagogo. Ngugi’s books have been translated into more than thirty languages and they continue to be the subject of books, critical monographs, and dissertations.
Paralleling his academic and literary life has been his role in the production of literature, providing, as an editor, a platform for other people’s voices. He has edited the following literary journals: Penpoint (1963-64); Zuka (1965 -1970); Ghala (guest editor for one issue, 1964?); and Mutiiri (1992-).
He has also continued to speak around the world at numerous universities and as a distinguished speaker. These appearances include: the 1984 Robb Lectures at Auckland University in New Zealand; the1996 Clarendon Lectures in English at Oxford University; the 1999 Ashby Lecture at Cambridge; and the 2006 MacMillan Stewart Lectures at Harvard.
He is recipient of many honors including the 2001 Nonino International Prize for Literature and seven honorary doctorates.
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NGUGI WA THIONGO,THE GREAT AFRICAN WRITER FROM KENYA,FROM HIS WEBSITE
from ngugiwathiongo.com
Ngugi Wa Thiong’o: A Profile of a Literary and Social Activist.
Ngugi wa Thiong’o, currently Distinguished Professor of English and Comparative Literature and Director of the International Center for Writing and Translation at the University of California, Irvine, was born in Kenya, in 1938 into a large peasant family. He was educated at Kamandura, Manguu and Kinyogori primary schools; Alliance High School, all in Kenya; Makerere University College (then a campus of London University), Kampala, Uganda; and the University of Leeds, Britain. He is recipient of seven Honorary Doctorates viz D Litt (Albright); PhD (Roskilde); D Litt (Leeds); D Litt &Ph D (Walter Sisulu University); PhD (Carlstate); D Litt (Dillard) and D Litt (Auckland University). He is also Honorary Member of American Academy of Letters. A many-sided intellectual, he is novelist, essayist, playwright, journalist, editor, academic and social activist.
The Kenya of his birth and youth was a British settler colony (1895-1963). As an adolescent, he lived through the Mau Mau War of Independence (1952-1962), the central historical episode in the making of modern Kenya and a major theme in his early works.
Ngugi burst onto the literary scene in East Africa with the performance of his first major play, The Black Hermit, at the National Theatre in Kampala, Uganda, in 1962, as part of the celebration of Uganda’s Independence. “Ngugi Speaks for the Continent,” headlined The Makererian, the Student newspaper, in a review of the performance by Trevor Whittock, one of the professors. In a highly productive literary period, Ngugi wrote additionally eight short stories, two one act plays, two novels, and a regular column for the Sunday Nation under the title, As I See It. One of the novels, Weep Not Child, was published to critical acclaim in 1964; followed by the second novel, The River Between (1965). His third, A Grain of Wheat (1967), was a turning point in the formal and ideological direction of his works. Multi-narrative lines and multi-viewpoints unfolding at different times and spaces replace the linear temporal unfolding of the plot from a single viewpoint. The collective replaces the individual as the center of history.
In 1967, Ngugi became lecturer in English Literature at the University of Nairobi. He taught there until 1977 while, in-between, also serving as Fellow in Creative writing at Makerere (1969-1970), and as Visiting Associate Professor of English and African Studies at Northwestern University (1970-1971). During his tenure at Nairobi, Ngugi was at the center of the politics of English departments in Africa, championing the change of name from English to simply Literature to reflect world literature with African and third world literatures at the center. He, with Taban Lo Liyong and Awuor Anyumba, authored the polemical declaration, On the Abolition of the English Department, setting in motion a continental and global debate and practices that later became the heart of postcolonial theories. “If there is need for a ’study of the historic continuity of a single culture’, why can’t this be African? Why can’t African literature be at the centre so that we can view other cultures in relationship to it?” they asked. The text is carried in his first volume of literary essays, Homecoming, which appeared in print in 1969. These were to be followed, in later years, by other volumes including Writers in Politics (1981 and 1997); Decolonising the Mind (1986); Moving the Center (1994); and Penpoints Gunpoints and Dreams (1998).
The year 1977 forced dramatic turns in Ngugi’s life and career. His first novel in ten years, Petals of Blood, was published in July of that year. The novel painted a harsh and unsparing picture of life in neo-colonial Kenya. It was received with even more emphatic critical acclaim in Kenya and abroad. The Kenya Weekly Review described as “this bomb shell” and the Sunday Times of London as capturing every form and shape that power can take. The same year Ngugi’s controversial play, Ngaahika Ndeenda (I Will Marry When I Want), written with Ngugi wa Mirii, was performed at Kamirithu Educational and Cultural Center, Limuru, in an open air theatre, with actors from the workers and peasants of the village. Sharply critical of the inequalities and injustices of Kenyan society, publicly identified with unequivocally championing the cause of ordinary Kenyans, and committed to communicating with them in the languages of their daily lives, Ngugi was arrested and imprisoned without charge at Kamiti Maximum Security Prison at the end of the year, December 31, 1977. An account of those experiences is to be found in his memoir, Detained: A Writer’s Prison Diary (1982). It was at Kamiti Maximum Prison that Ngugi made the decision to abandon English as his primary language of creative writing and committed himself to writing in Gikuyu, his mother tongue. In prison, and following that decision, he wrote, on toilet paper, the novel, Caitani Mutharabaini (1981) translated into English as Devil on the Cross, (1982).
After Amnesty International named him a Prisoner of Conscience, an international campaign secured his release a year later, December 1978. However, the Moi Dictatorship barred him from jobs at colleges and university in the country. He resumed his writing and his activities in the theater and in so doing, continued to be an uncomfortable voice for the Moi dictatorship. While Ngugi was in Britain for the launch and promotion of Devil on the Cross, he learned about the Moi regime’s plot to eliminate him on his return, or as coded, give a red carpet welcome on arrival at Jomo Kenyatta Airport. This forced him into exile, first in Britain (1982 –1989), and then the U.S. after (1989-2002), during which time, the Moi dictatorship hounded him trying, unsuccessfully, to get him expelled from London and from other countries he visited. In 1986, at a conference in Harare, an assassination squad outside his hotel in Harare was thwarted by the Zimbwean security. His next Gikuyu novel, Matigari, was published in 1986. Thinking that the novel’s main character was a real living person, Dictator Moi issued an arrest warrant for his arrest but on learning that the character was fictional, he had the novel “arrested;” instead. Undercover police went to all the bookshops in the country and the Publishers warehouse and took the novel away. So, between 1986 and 1996, Matigari could not be sold in Kenyan bookshops. The dictatorship also had all Ngugi’s books removed from all educational institutions.
In exile, Ngugi worked with the London based Committee for the Release of Political Prisoners in Kenya, (1982-1998), which championed the cause of democratic and human rights in Kenya. In between, he was Visiting Professor at Byreuth University (1984); and Writer in Residence, for the Borough of Islington, London (1985) and took time to study film, at Dramatiska Institute, Stockholm, Sweden. (1986). After 1988, Ngugi became Visiting Professor of English and Comparative Literature at Yale (1989-1992) in between holding The Five Colleges (Amherst, Mount Holyoke, New Hampshire, Smith, East Massachusetts) Visiting Distinguished Professor of English and African Literature (Fall 1991). He then became Professor of Comparative Literature and Performance Studies at New York University (1992 –2002) where he also held the Erich Maria Remarque Professor of languages, from where he moved to his present position at the University of California Irvine. He remained in exile for the duration of the Moi Dictatorship 1982-2002. When he and his wife, Njeeri, returned to Kenya in 2004 after twenty-two years in exile, they were attacked by four hired gunmen and narrowly escaped with their lives.
Ngugi has continued to write prolifically, publishing, in 2006, what some have described as his crowning achievement, Wizard of the Crow, an English translation of the Gikuyu language novel, Murogi wa Kagogo. Ngugi’s books have been translated into more than thirty languages and they continue to be the subject of books, critical monographs, and dissertations.
Paralleling his academic and literary life has been his role in the production of literature, providing, as an editor, a platform for other people’s voices. He has edited the following literary journals: Penpoint (1963-64); Zuka (1965 -1970); Ghala (guest editor for one issue, 1964?); and Mutiiri (1992-).
He has also continued to speak around the world at numerous universities and as a distinguished speaker. These appearances include: the 1984 Robb Lectures at Auckland University in New Zealand; the1996 Clarendon Lectures in English at Oxford University; the 1999 Ashby Lecture at Cambridge; and the 2006 MacMillan Stewart Lectures at Harvard.
He is recipient of many honors including the 2001 Nonino International Prize for Literature and seven honorary doctorates.
——————————————————————————–
May 5, 2008
from naijarules.com
1st posted on PAGES
BAYO ADEBOWALE’S GREAT AFRICAN NOVEL “THE VIRGIN” HAS BEEN MADE INTO A FILM (FOR THE SECOND TIME) BY TUNDE KELANI
FROM naijarules.com
Who stole the ‘purity’ of this innocent girl?
——————————————————————————–
By Akeem Lasisi
Published: Friday, 4 Jan 2008
Tunde Kelani’s latest film, The Narrow Path, which he adapted from Bayo Adebowale’s novel, The Virgin, takes Nollywood closer to the ideal. One query that many Nigerian films have not been able to answer borders on how appropriately they have been able to represent or portray the realities of our society. But somehow, Tunde Kelani once again cleverly answers that in The Narrow Path, one of the films that kicked off the 2007 movie season in the country. Only that – well, if observing this matters at all – the 1: 38 minutes movie takes the viewer to some 100 years back in time.
Asedeko (Awero)
The Narrow Path is the story of Awero, a village belle, who, by the virtue of her unadulterated beauty, becomes the toast of several men who want her hand in marriage. At least, three men – hunter Odejinmi, moneybags Lapade and Dauda the sex monger – persistently express their desires accordingly.
Set in Orita Village, where the mud-house home of Awero’s father, Jibosa, (played by a veteran actor, Olu Okekanye) and his wife become a sort of Mecca where men pay homage to secure the heart of their daughter, actions move to Agbede and Aku, which are Odejinmi’s and Lapade’s villages respectively.
As each of Odejinmi and Lapade push their desires to have Awero, (Sola Asedeko) they clash openly occasionally. The two rivals adopt different approaches to achieve their desires: Odejinmi exercises restraint, preaching love to Awero, while Lapade is eager to flaunt his wealth. Yet, unknown to the two, there is Dauda, the Lagos boy, who is also surreptitiously enticing the lady with ‘city gifts’ such as Saturday Night Powder, Nku Cream and a big mirror. Along the line, Dauda – played by the leader of Crown Troupe of Africa, Dauda Adefila – forces Awero to an unholy and abominable bed where he rapes her and forcefully ‘disflowers’ her. Although he runs back to Lagos immediately afterwards, it is the abominable act that fast-tracks the conflict that pushes Orita and Agbede villages to the very narrow path of war.
The forced exit of Awero’s innocence is the beginning of a suspense and dramatic irony on which the success of the film largely rests. After the Awero family has given Odejinmi a nod, the process leading to the marriage becomes swift. Odejinmi endlessly dreams about the first night – which every villager is also eager to celebrate, as is the custom – when he will go into Awero and turn her into a woman. In the months that precede the traditional wedding, however, misery, depression and nightmares have become the lot of Awero, who cannot imagine the shame that will befall her and her parents when everyone gets to know that she is ‘a broken pot’.
Although The Narrow Path centrally celebrates marital processes in the traditional Yoruba setting, Kelani configures the plot in such a manner that every aspect of it drips with a message. It is a film in which costuming and language tell a story, for instance. Awero and her friends – among whom is Kabirat Kafidipe, popularly called Arapa-re-Gagan, based on the role she played in Kelani’s Saworo Ide – tie only wrappers round their virgin bodies. They don’t wear bras, for example. Yet, the wrappers are tied so tight that the girls feel safe, thus reminding the viewer of the days of guarded innocence.
Kelani further scores a point in his casting. He parades the likes of Okekanye, Seyi Fasuyi, Eniola Olaniyan, Joke Muyiwa, Lere Paimo, Olofa Ina, Mama Rainbow and Ayo Badmus who are able to blend into the rural environment of the film. Where he needs a clownish sanitary inspector, he goes for Papa Ajasco. And where a city girl/education officials required, he goes for Bukky Wright.
It is a good thing that The Narrow Path is subtitled. But there seems to be a puzzle here. The film is rendered in English. Yet, it is sub-titled in English. It is true that Bayo Adebowale’s novel, The Virgin, which is the parent script, is in English. But even if The Narrow Path has to be in the same language, why not subtitle it in Yoruba or French?
Also, in the film, Dauda wears a dreadlock. Some may want to argue that dreadlocks were not a popular sight at the time the story is depicting.
Although The Narrow Path also scores a point in bringing out the versatility of the several ‘Yoruba’ actors and actresses who now act in the ‘English’ movie, an actor such as Badmus fails to totally escapes the cross of mannerism even in his deformed state in the movie. At some points, his gesticulations are too close to what one had seen from him in other films he had acted in.
Beyond such observations, however, The Narrow Path, despite its moderate budget and the simplicity in its setting, fulfils the ambition of any standard film in terms of the significance of its message and entertainment value.
Who stole the purity of this innocent girl?
posted by Uyiuyi, on April l,2008
1st posted on PAGES
BAYO ADEBOWALE’S GREAT AFRICAN NOVEL “THE VIRGIN” HAS BEEN MADE INTO A FILM (FOR THE SECOND TIME) BY TUNDE KELANI
FROM naijarules.com
Who stole the ‘purity’ of this innocent girl?
——————————————————————————–
By Akeem Lasisi
Published: Friday, 4 Jan 2008
Tunde Kelani’s latest film, The Narrow Path, which he adapted from Bayo Adebowale’s novel, The Virgin, takes Nollywood closer to the ideal. One query that many Nigerian films have not been able to answer borders on how appropriately they have been able to represent or portray the realities of our society. But somehow, Tunde Kelani once again cleverly answers that in The Narrow Path, one of the films that kicked off the 2007 movie season in the country. Only that – well, if observing this matters at all – the 1: 38 minutes movie takes the viewer to some 100 years back in time.
Asedeko (Awero)
The Narrow Path is the story of Awero, a village belle, who, by the virtue of her unadulterated beauty, becomes the toast of several men who want her hand in marriage. At least, three men – hunter Odejinmi, moneybags Lapade and Dauda the sex monger – persistently express their desires accordingly.
Set in Orita Village, where the mud-house home of Awero’s father, Jibosa, (played by a veteran actor, Olu Okekanye) and his wife become a sort of Mecca where men pay homage to secure the heart of their daughter, actions move to Agbede and Aku, which are Odejinmi’s and Lapade’s villages respectively.
As each of Odejinmi and Lapade push their desires to have Awero, (Sola Asedeko) they clash openly occasionally. The two rivals adopt different approaches to achieve their desires: Odejinmi exercises restraint, preaching love to Awero, while Lapade is eager to flaunt his wealth. Yet, unknown to the two, there is Dauda, the Lagos boy, who is also surreptitiously enticing the lady with ‘city gifts’ such as Saturday Night Powder, Nku Cream and a big mirror. Along the line, Dauda – played by the leader of Crown Troupe of Africa, Dauda Adefila – forces Awero to an unholy and abominable bed where he rapes her and forcefully ‘disflowers’ her. Although he runs back to Lagos immediately afterwards, it is the abominable act that fast-tracks the conflict that pushes Orita and Agbede villages to the very narrow path of war.
The forced exit of Awero’s innocence is the beginning of a suspense and dramatic irony on which the success of the film largely rests. After the Awero family has given Odejinmi a nod, the process leading to the marriage becomes swift. Odejinmi endlessly dreams about the first night – which every villager is also eager to celebrate, as is the custom – when he will go into Awero and turn her into a woman. In the months that precede the traditional wedding, however, misery, depression and nightmares have become the lot of Awero, who cannot imagine the shame that will befall her and her parents when everyone gets to know that she is ‘a broken pot’.
Although The Narrow Path centrally celebrates marital processes in the traditional Yoruba setting, Kelani configures the plot in such a manner that every aspect of it drips with a message. It is a film in which costuming and language tell a story, for instance. Awero and her friends – among whom is Kabirat Kafidipe, popularly called Arapa-re-Gagan, based on the role she played in Kelani’s Saworo Ide – tie only wrappers round their virgin bodies. They don’t wear bras, for example. Yet, the wrappers are tied so tight that the girls feel safe, thus reminding the viewer of the days of guarded innocence.
Kelani further scores a point in his casting. He parades the likes of Okekanye, Seyi Fasuyi, Eniola Olaniyan, Joke Muyiwa, Lere Paimo, Olofa Ina, Mama Rainbow and Ayo Badmus who are able to blend into the rural environment of the film. Where he needs a clownish sanitary inspector, he goes for Papa Ajasco. And where a city girl/education officials required, he goes for Bukky Wright.
It is a good thing that The Narrow Path is subtitled. But there seems to be a puzzle here. The film is rendered in English. Yet, it is sub-titled in English. It is true that Bayo Adebowale’s novel, The Virgin, which is the parent script, is in English. But even if The Narrow Path has to be in the same language, why not subtitle it in Yoruba or French?
Also, in the film, Dauda wears a dreadlock. Some may want to argue that dreadlocks were not a popular sight at the time the story is depicting.
Although The Narrow Path also scores a point in bringing out the versatility of the several ‘Yoruba’ actors and actresses who now act in the ‘English’ movie, an actor such as Badmus fails to totally escapes the cross of mannerism even in his deformed state in the movie. At some points, his gesticulations are too close to what one had seen from him in other films he had acted in.
Beyond such observations, however, The Narrow Path, despite its moderate budget and the simplicity in its setting, fulfils the ambition of any standard film in terms of the significance of its message and entertainment value.
Who stole the purity of this innocent girl?
posted by Uyiuyi, on April l,2008
LANGUAGES OF NIGERIA ACCORDING TO WIKIPEDIA.ORG
May 5, 2008
FROM wikipedia.org
Languages of Nigeria
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Linguistic map of Nigeria, Cameroon, and Benin.Nigeria
This article is part of the series:
Culture of Nigeria
Languages
Literature
List of Nigerian writers
List of Nigerian poets
Music of Nigeria
Other countries – Culture Portal
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The number of languages currently estimated and catalogued in Nigeria is 521. This number includes 510 living languages, two second languages without native speakers and 9 extinct languages. In some areas of Nigeria, ethnic groups speak more than one language. The official language of Nigeria, English, the former colonial language, was chosen to facilitate the cultural and linguistic unity of the country. The major languages spoken in Nigeria are Hausa, Igbo, Yoruba, Edo, Efik, Ibibio and Annang language, Adamawa Fulfulde, Idoma, and Central Kanuri. Even though most ethnic groups prefer to communicate in their own languages, English, being the official language, is widely used for education, business transactions and for official purposes. English, however, remains an exclusive preserve of a small minority of the country’s urban elite, and is not spoken in rural areas. With approximately 75% of Nigeria’s populace in the rural areas, the major languages of communication in the country remain tribal languages, with the most widely spoken being Hausa, Igbo and Yoruba. Foreign minorities speak their own languages aside from English and/or major native languages as their second languages.
Nigeria’s linguistic diversity is a microcosm of Africa as a whole, encompassing three major African languages families: the Afro-Asiatic, Nilo-Saharan, and the Niger-Congo A branch of the Niger-Congo family. Nigeria also has one unclassifiable language, Cen Tuum, spoken by a few old people among the Cham in Gombe State. This may represent an intriguing relic of an even greater diversity prior to the spread of the current language families.
Contents [hide]
1 Niger-Congo languages
2 Afro-Asiatic languages
3 See also
4 Wikimedia
5 References
6 External links
[edit] Niger-Congo languages
Niger-Congo predominates in central and southern Nigeria; the main branches represented in Nigeria are Mande, Atlantic, Gur, Kwa, Benue-Congo and Adamawa-Ubangian. Mande is represented by the Busa cluster and Kyenga in the northwest. Fulfulde is the single Atlantic language, of Senegambian origin but now spoken by cattle pastoralists across the Sahel and largely in the North of Nigeria by the Fulani (sometimes Fulbe) diaspora. The Ijoid languages are spoken across the Niger Delta and include Ịjọ (=Ijaw), Kalabari and the intriguing remnant language, Defaka, while the Ibibio language is spoken across the coastal southeastern part of Nigeria and includes Efik, Annnang, oron, Eket, and Ikot Abasi. The single Gur language spoken is Baatọnun, in the Northwest. The Adamawa-Ubangian languages are spoken between central Nigeria and the Central African Republic. Their westernmost representatives in Nigeria are the Tula-Waja languages. The Kwa languages are represented by the Gun group in the extreme southwest, which is affiliated to the Gbe languages in Benin and Togo.
The classification of the remaining languages is controversial; Joseph Greenberg classified those without noun-classes, such as Yoruba, Igbo, and Ibibio, as ‘Eastern Kwa’ and those with classes as ‘Benue-Congo’. This was reversed in an influential 1989 publication and reflected on the 1992 map of languages, where all these were considered Benue-Congo. Recent opinion, however, has been to revert to Greenberg’s distinction. The literature must thus be read with care and due regard for the date. It should be noted that there are several small language groupings in the Niger Confluence area, notably Ukaan, Akpes, Ayere-Ahan and Ọkọ, whose inclusion in these groupings has never been satisfactorily argued.
Former Eastern Kwa, i.e. West Benue-Congo would then include Yoruboid, i.e. Yoruba, Itsekiri and Igala, Akokoid (eight small languages in Ondo, Edo and Kogi state), Edoid including Edo in Edo State, Igboid, Ibibio, Efik, Annnang, Idomoid (Idoma) and Nupoid (Nupe) and perhaps include the other languages mentioned above. East Benue-Congo includes Kainji, Plateau (46 languages, notably Eggon), Jukunoid, Dakoid and [[Cross River languages|Cross River]. Apart from these, there are numerous Bantoid languages, which are the languages immediately ancestral to Bantu. These include Mambiloid, Ekoid, Bendi, Beboid, Grassfields and Tivoid languages. The geographic distribution of Nigeria’s Niger-Congo languages is not limited to south-central Nigeria, as migration allows their spread to the linguistically Afro-Asiatic northern regions of Nigeria, as well as throughout West Africa and abroad. Yoruba is spoken as a ritual language in cults such as the Santeria in the Caribbean and South-Central America, and the Berbice Dutch language in Surinam is based on an Ijoid language.
Even the above listed linguistic diversity of the Niger-Congo in Nigeria is deceptively limiting, as these languages may further consist of regional dialects that may not be mutually intelligible. As such some languages, particularly those with a large number of speakers, have been standardized and received a romanized orthography. Nearly all languages appear in a Roman script when written, often with modifications allowing for a language’s particularities. The Yoruba and Igbo languages are notable examples of this process; Standard Yoruba came into being due to the work Samuel Crowther, the first African bishop of the Anglican Church and owes most of its lexicon to the dialects spoken in Ọyọ and Ibadan. Since Standard Yoruba’s constitution was determined by a single author rather than by a consensual linguistic policy by all speakers, the Standard has been attacked regarding for failing to include other dialects and spurred debate as to what demarcates “genuine Yoruba”. The more historically recent standardization and romanization of Igbo has provoked even more controversy due to its dialectical diversity, but the Central Igbo dialect has gained the widest acceptace as the standard-bearer; however many such as Chinua Achebe have dismissed standardization as colonial and conservative attempts to simplify a complex mosaic of languages. Such controversies typify inter- and intra-ethnic conflict endemic to post-colonial Nigeria.
Linguistically speaking, all demonstrate the varying phonological features of the Niger-Congo family to which they belong, these include the use of tone, nasality, and particular consonant and vowel systems; more information is available here.
[edit] Afro-Asiatic languages
The Afro-Asiatic languages of Nigeria divide into Chadic, Semitic and Berber. Of these, Chadic languages predominate, with 70+ languages. Semitic is represented by various dialects of Arabic spoken in the Northeast and Berber by the Tuareg-speaking communities in the extreme Northwest.
The Hausa language is the most well-known Chadic language in Nigeria; though there is a paucity of statistics on native speakers in Nigeria, the language is spoken by 24 million people in West Africa and is the second language of 15 million more. Hausa has therefore emerged as lingua franca throughout much of West Africa and the Sahel in particular. The language is spoken primarily amongst Muslims, and the language is often associated with Islamic culture in Nigeria and West Africa on the whole. Hausa is classified as a West Chadic language of the Chadic grouping, a major subfamily of Afro-Asiatic. Culturally, the Hausa people have become closely integrated with the Fulani following the jihadist establishment of the Sokoto Caliphate by the Fulani Uthman dan Fodio in the 19th century. Hausa is the official language of a number states in Northern Nigeria and the most important dialect is generally regarded as that spoken in Kano,an Eastern Hausa dialect, which is the standard variety used for official purposes. Eastern dialects also include some dialects spoken in Zaria, and Bauchi; Western Hausa dialects include Sakkwatanchi spoken in Sokoto, Katsinanchi in Katsina Arewanchi in both Gobir and Adar,Kebbi, and Zamfara. Katsina is transitional between Eastern and Western dialects. Northern Hausa dialects include Arewa and Arawa, while Zaria is a prominent Southern tongue version; Barikanchi is a pidgin formerly used in the military.
Hausa is a highly atypical Chadic language, with a reduced tonal system and a phonology influenced by Arabic. Other well-known Chadic languages include Ngas, Mwaghavul, Bole, Ngizim, Bade and Bacama. In the East of Nigeria and on into Cameroun are the Central Chadic languages, such as Bura, the Higi cluster and Marghi. These are highly diverse and remain very poorly described. Many Chadic languages are severely threatened; recent searches by Bernard Caron for Southern Bauchi languages show that even some of those recorded in the 1970s have disappeared. However, unknown Chadic languages are still being reported, witness the recent description of Dyarim.
Hausa, as well as other Afro-Asiatic languages like Bade (another West Chadic language spoken in Yobe State), have historically been written in a modified Arabic script known as ajami, however, the modern official orthography is now a romanization known as boko first introduced by the British regime in the 1930s.
[edit] See also
List of languages of Nigeria
[edit] Wikimedia
Systematic graphic of the Niger-Congo languages with numbers of speakers
[edit] References
Blench, Roger (2002) Research on Minority Languages in Nigeria in 2001. Ogmios.
Blench, Roger (1998) ‘The Status of the Languages of Central Nigeria’, in Brenzinger, M. (ed.) Endangered languages in Africa. Köln: Köppe Verlag, 187-206. online version
Crozier, David & Blench, Roger (1992) An Index of Nigerian Languages (2nd edition). Dallas: SIL.
[edit] External links
Ethnologue Listing of Nigerian Languages
Blench, Roger (n.d.) Atlas of Nigerian Languages, ed. III (revised and amended edition of Crozier & Blench 1992)
[hide]v • d • eLanguages of Africa
Languages of Nigeria
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Linguistic map of Nigeria, Cameroon, and Benin.Nigeria
This article is part of the series:
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The number of languages currently estimated and catalogued in Nigeria is 521. This number includes 510 living languages, two second languages without native speakers and 9 extinct languages. In some areas of Nigeria, ethnic groups speak more than one language. The official language of Nigeria, English, the former colonial language, was chosen to facilitate the cultural and linguistic unity of the country. The major languages spoken in Nigeria are Hausa, Igbo, Yoruba, Edo, Efik, Ibibio and Annang language, Adamawa Fulfulde, Idoma, and Central Kanuri. Even though most ethnic groups prefer to communicate in their own languages, English, being the official language, is widely used for education, business transactions and for official purposes. English, however, remains an exclusive preserve of a small minority of the country’s urban elite, and is not spoken in rural areas. With approximately 75% of Nigeria’s populace in the rural areas, the major languages of communication in the country remain tribal languages, with the most widely spoken being Hausa, Igbo and Yoruba. Foreign minorities speak their own languages aside from English and/or major native languages as their second languages.
Nigeria’s linguistic diversity is a microcosm of Africa as a whole, encompassing three major African languages families: the Afro-Asiatic, Nilo-Saharan, and the Niger-Congo A branch of the Niger-Congo family. Nigeria also has one unclassifiable language, Cen Tuum, spoken by a few old people among the Cham in Gombe State. This may represent an intriguing relic of an even greater diversity prior to the spread of the current language families.
Contents [hide]
1 Niger-Congo languages
2 Afro-Asiatic languages
3 See also
4 Wikimedia
5 References
6 External links
[edit] Niger-Congo languages
Niger-Congo predominates in central and southern Nigeria; the main branches represented in Nigeria are Mande, Atlantic, Gur, Kwa, Benue-Congo and Adamawa-Ubangian. Mande is represented by the Busa cluster and Kyenga in the northwest. Fulfulde is the single Atlantic language, of Senegambian origin but now spoken by cattle pastoralists across the Sahel and largely in the North of Nigeria by the Fulani (sometimes Fulbe) diaspora. The Ijoid languages are spoken across the Niger Delta and include Ịjọ (=Ijaw), Kalabari and the intriguing remnant language, Defaka, while the Ibibio language is spoken across the coastal southeastern part of Nigeria and includes Efik, Annnang, oron, Eket, and Ikot Abasi. The single Gur language spoken is Baatọnun, in the Northwest. The Adamawa-Ubangian languages are spoken between central Nigeria and the Central African Republic. Their westernmost representatives in Nigeria are the Tula-Waja languages. The Kwa languages are represented by the Gun group in the extreme southwest, which is affiliated to the Gbe languages in Benin and Togo.
The classification of the remaining languages is controversial; Joseph Greenberg classified those without noun-classes, such as Yoruba, Igbo, and Ibibio, as ‘Eastern Kwa’ and those with classes as ‘Benue-Congo’. This was reversed in an influential 1989 publication and reflected on the 1992 map of languages, where all these were considered Benue-Congo. Recent opinion, however, has been to revert to Greenberg’s distinction. The literature must thus be read with care and due regard for the date. It should be noted that there are several small language groupings in the Niger Confluence area, notably Ukaan, Akpes, Ayere-Ahan and Ọkọ, whose inclusion in these groupings has never been satisfactorily argued.
Former Eastern Kwa, i.e. West Benue-Congo would then include Yoruboid, i.e. Yoruba, Itsekiri and Igala, Akokoid (eight small languages in Ondo, Edo and Kogi state), Edoid including Edo in Edo State, Igboid, Ibibio, Efik, Annnang, Idomoid (Idoma) and Nupoid (Nupe) and perhaps include the other languages mentioned above. East Benue-Congo includes Kainji, Plateau (46 languages, notably Eggon), Jukunoid, Dakoid and [[Cross River languages|Cross River]. Apart from these, there are numerous Bantoid languages, which are the languages immediately ancestral to Bantu. These include Mambiloid, Ekoid, Bendi, Beboid, Grassfields and Tivoid languages. The geographic distribution of Nigeria’s Niger-Congo languages is not limited to south-central Nigeria, as migration allows their spread to the linguistically Afro-Asiatic northern regions of Nigeria, as well as throughout West Africa and abroad. Yoruba is spoken as a ritual language in cults such as the Santeria in the Caribbean and South-Central America, and the Berbice Dutch language in Surinam is based on an Ijoid language.
Even the above listed linguistic diversity of the Niger-Congo in Nigeria is deceptively limiting, as these languages may further consist of regional dialects that may not be mutually intelligible. As such some languages, particularly those with a large number of speakers, have been standardized and received a romanized orthography. Nearly all languages appear in a Roman script when written, often with modifications allowing for a language’s particularities. The Yoruba and Igbo languages are notable examples of this process; Standard Yoruba came into being due to the work Samuel Crowther, the first African bishop of the Anglican Church and owes most of its lexicon to the dialects spoken in Ọyọ and Ibadan. Since Standard Yoruba’s constitution was determined by a single author rather than by a consensual linguistic policy by all speakers, the Standard has been attacked regarding for failing to include other dialects and spurred debate as to what demarcates “genuine Yoruba”. The more historically recent standardization and romanization of Igbo has provoked even more controversy due to its dialectical diversity, but the Central Igbo dialect has gained the widest acceptace as the standard-bearer; however many such as Chinua Achebe have dismissed standardization as colonial and conservative attempts to simplify a complex mosaic of languages. Such controversies typify inter- and intra-ethnic conflict endemic to post-colonial Nigeria.
Linguistically speaking, all demonstrate the varying phonological features of the Niger-Congo family to which they belong, these include the use of tone, nasality, and particular consonant and vowel systems; more information is available here.
[edit] Afro-Asiatic languages
The Afro-Asiatic languages of Nigeria divide into Chadic, Semitic and Berber. Of these, Chadic languages predominate, with 70+ languages. Semitic is represented by various dialects of Arabic spoken in the Northeast and Berber by the Tuareg-speaking communities in the extreme Northwest.
The Hausa language is the most well-known Chadic language in Nigeria; though there is a paucity of statistics on native speakers in Nigeria, the language is spoken by 24 million people in West Africa and is the second language of 15 million more. Hausa has therefore emerged as lingua franca throughout much of West Africa and the Sahel in particular. The language is spoken primarily amongst Muslims, and the language is often associated with Islamic culture in Nigeria and West Africa on the whole. Hausa is classified as a West Chadic language of the Chadic grouping, a major subfamily of Afro-Asiatic. Culturally, the Hausa people have become closely integrated with the Fulani following the jihadist establishment of the Sokoto Caliphate by the Fulani Uthman dan Fodio in the 19th century. Hausa is the official language of a number states in Northern Nigeria and the most important dialect is generally regarded as that spoken in Kano,an Eastern Hausa dialect, which is the standard variety used for official purposes. Eastern dialects also include some dialects spoken in Zaria, and Bauchi; Western Hausa dialects include Sakkwatanchi spoken in Sokoto, Katsinanchi in Katsina Arewanchi in both Gobir and Adar,Kebbi, and Zamfara. Katsina is transitional between Eastern and Western dialects. Northern Hausa dialects include Arewa and Arawa, while Zaria is a prominent Southern tongue version; Barikanchi is a pidgin formerly used in the military.
Hausa is a highly atypical Chadic language, with a reduced tonal system and a phonology influenced by Arabic. Other well-known Chadic languages include Ngas, Mwaghavul, Bole, Ngizim, Bade and Bacama. In the East of Nigeria and on into Cameroun are the Central Chadic languages, such as Bura, the Higi cluster and Marghi. These are highly diverse and remain very poorly described. Many Chadic languages are severely threatened; recent searches by Bernard Caron for Southern Bauchi languages show that even some of those recorded in the 1970s have disappeared. However, unknown Chadic languages are still being reported, witness the recent description of Dyarim.
Hausa, as well as other Afro-Asiatic languages like Bade (another West Chadic language spoken in Yobe State), have historically been written in a modified Arabic script known as ajami, however, the modern official orthography is now a romanization known as boko first introduced by the British regime in the 1930s.
[edit] See also
List of languages of Nigeria
[edit] Wikimedia
Systematic graphic of the Niger-Congo languages with numbers of speakers
[edit] References
Blench, Roger (2002) Research on Minority Languages in Nigeria in 2001. Ogmios.
Blench, Roger (1998) ‘The Status of the Languages of Central Nigeria’, in Brenzinger, M. (ed.) Endangered languages in Africa. Köln: Köppe Verlag, 187-206. online version
Crozier, David & Blench, Roger (1992) An Index of Nigerian Languages (2nd edition). Dallas: SIL.
[edit] External links
Ethnologue Listing of Nigerian Languages
Blench, Roger (n.d.) Atlas of Nigerian Languages, ed. III (revised and amended edition of Crozier & Blench 1992)
[hide]v • d • eLanguages of Africa
LIST OF NIGERIAN POETS ACCORDING TO WIKIPEDIA.ORG
May 5, 2008
from wikipedia.org
List of Nigerian poets
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Nigeria
Poets from Nigeria include: BAYO ADEBOWALE (1944-)
Toyin Adewale-Gabriel
Gbola Adiamoh
Dr. Jerry Agada
Richard Ugbede Ali
Chidi Amaechi
Ngozi Obasi Awa
Ibukun Babarinde
Tubal Rabbi Cain
John Pepper Clark
Etebom Ekpo
Tade Ipadeola
Okinba Launko Aka Femi Osofisan
Ahmed Maiwada
Ayodele Morocco-Clarke
Uche Nduka
Austyn Njoku
Onyeka Nwelue
Kenneth Nwobosi
Emeka Chike Nwogu
Maik Nwosu
Enenche F. Ogiri
Seni Ogunkola
Tolu Ogunlesi
Chris Ogunlowo
Obododimma Oha
Ezenwa Ohaeto
Francis Ohanyido
Paula Iriowen Ohanyido
Dr. Tanure Ojaide
Gabriel Okara
Promise Okekwe
Diego Odoh Okenyodo
Niran Okewole
Christopher Okigbo
Ike Okonta
Olatubosun Oladapo
Prince Joshua Olawuyi
Emmanuel Onwi
Chidi Anthony Opara
Dennis Osadebay
Dare Oshinuga
Sola Osofisan
Niyi Osundare
Naan Pocen
Remi Raji
Ken Saro-Wiwa
Wole Soyinka
Mazui Tonganawa
Chime Hilary Uchenna
Ugonna Wachuku
List of Nigerian poets
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Nigeria
Poets from Nigeria include: BAYO ADEBOWALE (1944-)
Toyin Adewale-Gabriel
Gbola Adiamoh
Dr. Jerry Agada
Richard Ugbede Ali
Chidi Amaechi
Ngozi Obasi Awa
Ibukun Babarinde
Tubal Rabbi Cain
John Pepper Clark
Etebom Ekpo
Tade Ipadeola
Okinba Launko Aka Femi Osofisan
Ahmed Maiwada
Ayodele Morocco-Clarke
Uche Nduka
Austyn Njoku
Onyeka Nwelue
Kenneth Nwobosi
Emeka Chike Nwogu
Maik Nwosu
Enenche F. Ogiri
Seni Ogunkola
Tolu Ogunlesi
Chris Ogunlowo
Obododimma Oha
Ezenwa Ohaeto
Francis Ohanyido
Paula Iriowen Ohanyido
Dr. Tanure Ojaide
Gabriel Okara
Promise Okekwe
Diego Odoh Okenyodo
Niran Okewole
Christopher Okigbo
Ike Okonta
Olatubosun Oladapo
Prince Joshua Olawuyi
Emmanuel Onwi
Chidi Anthony Opara
Dennis Osadebay
Dare Oshinuga
Sola Osofisan
Niyi Osundare
Naan Pocen
Remi Raji
Ken Saro-Wiwa
Wole Soyinka
Mazui Tonganawa
Chime Hilary Uchenna
Ugonna Wachuku
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