Phonological Variation in English Sound System and Morphological Problems of Ibibio Speakers of English Language in Secondary Schools
CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
1.1 Background to the Study
Language is structured. It is a system of signs and symbols which communicate information or messages, ideas and emotions among humans. It is made up of levels which can be analyzed scientifically. The basic levels of linguistic analysis are phonetics and phonology, morphology, syntax and semantics.
Sapir (2011) views language as a purely human and non-instinctive method of communicating ideas, emotions and desires by a means of voluntarily produced symbols. The word to be noted here is ‘system’. This portends that language is made up of units or forms in a manner comparative to the human circulatory system, which comprises the heart, blood vessels, arteries, veins and capillaries and so on.
A closer look reveals that at each level of linguistic description, the linguist is likely to encounter a further existence of structures. These structures do not exist in a haphazard manner. Bas(2010) asserts that whether spoken or written, language is not a hotchpotch of randomly distributed elements. Rather, its linguistic ingredients are arranged in accordance with a set of rules. Therefore, at the phonological, morphological, syntactic and semantic levels of language, one can describe what constitutes the structures of sound combination, word formation, word combination and larger syntactic chunks, lexical and sentence meaning.
Sommerstein (2007) defines phonology as a branch of Linguistics which is concerned with how sounds and prosodic features operate in natural languages. In his discussion of the aims and principles of phonology, the author is of the opinion that phonology is a means for reducing the literally infinite variety of human articulation to what is, for each language, a relatively small number of essential distinctions, and more as a code whereby the grammatical structures known as sentences are given audible form (Somerstein, 1977).
The author has pointed out the distinction between phonology and phonetics. According to him, the phonology of a language is the sound system of that language. Unlike phonetics, which is concerned with the study of speech sounds in general, phonology is concerned primarily with the sound patterns of individual languages (Essien, 1990 p.3). In his treatment of the phonology of Ibibio language, the author has provided some parameters with which the phonology of a language can be examined.
Universally, human beings employ certain speech sounds in their different languages. These speech sounds: consonants and vowels differ from language to language. Generally, users of English in a second language situation such as Nigeria exhibit variations from the norm which may be phonological, syntactic or lexicosemantic. English is used in Nigeria as the language of education, commerce, among others and it is necessary for the Ibibio speakers of English to speak a variety that is both nationally and internationally intelligible.
International and national intelligibility may be said to be most threatened in Ibibio English. At the level of phonology, Ibibio lacks certain English sounds and this poses problems in the pronunciation of many English words. Also, phonological variation and morphological problems may result in semantic problems which may hinder effective communication in English.
Phonological Variation in English Sound System and Morphological Problems of Ibibio Speakers of English Language in Secondary Schools
The variation of segments has a significant impact on the Ibibio-English bilinguals who, owing to the less number of consonant and vowel sounds of his L1, may tend to perform poorly in the combination and articulation of English sounds. Eka, (1996), observes that the situation results in impossible combinations. Just to restate the problem, the Ibibio learners and users of English tend to articulate the words from the point of view of the existing letters of the Ibibio alphabet
A phonetic study also provides information on how the sounds of a language are made as well as their physical properties. Not every speech sound that can be produced occurs in every language. This means that the inventory of English sounds for example, will show that the sound [ʧ] occurs but the sound [kp] does not occur in English.
There are three main branches in the field of phonetics namely, auditory, articulatory and acoustic phonetics. Auditory phonetics is the study of how listeners perceive sounds; articulator phonetics focuses on how speech sounds are articulated or produced while acoustic phonetics is the study of the physical properties of the sounds that are produced. Our focus in this unit however, will be on articulatory phonetics.
Phonology is a study of human speech sound in a particular language from the point of view of their function in the language pattern. A phonological study describes the behaviour of the speech sounds of a particular language in all the linguistic and para linguistic environments earlier discussed under phonetics. For instance, the contrastive and contextual patterns of speech sounds in a particular language are accounted for by a phonological study Effiong and Eka (2010).
Morphology, according to the Effiong and Eka (2010), is the study of the structure of words, that is, the study of the rules governing the formation of words in a language. For Ogbuehi (2001) morphology is concerned with the formation of words from the morpheme which is the smallest meaningful unit. This procedure, according to the writer, helps in the understanding of words and their functions in a linguistic system.
The sound system of English is primarily made up of phonemes. A phoneme is a significant or distinctive sound unit in the phonological system of a language. Phonemes constitute the segments in which any language is composed of. These segments fall into two major groupings; vowels and consonants. The vowels and consonants are generally referred to as the segmental. They are so called because they are formed in segments. Every natural language is unique in its system.
English sounds, for instance, differ from other sound systems in terms of the quality of sound, number of sounds, the type of sounds and the place and manner of realization of the sounds. In dealing with the segmental features of English, focus is on the grouping, the description and the distribution of the basic sounds of English. It is against this background that the study sought to find out the phonological variations in English sound system and morphological problems of Ibibio speakers of English Language
1.2 Statement of the Problem
The Ibibio language, as spoken at present, has certain identifiable characteristic that distinguishes it from other languages that are genetically distinct. The problem with an Ibibio speaker of English is that he tends to apply the rules of Ibibio language in his use of English particularly at the early stages of his attempt to learn English. This problem features in many areas of sound production. For example, the English consonants / y/ and / i/, / sg/ and / k/pose a problem to some Ibibio Speakers.
These sounds are often reduced to /y/ and /j/ respectively because of their absence in Ibibio. Some Ibibio speakers hardly distinguish between /ℓ/ and /r/ hence ‘grass’ /grQs/ sometimes becomes ‘klass’ [klas] and vice versa. There are also problems relating to the production of vowel sounds. Some sounds of Ibibio are basically different from those of English.
Some Ibibio speakers hardly distinguish between long and short sounds. In many instances, long sounds are considerably reduced in length. Ibibio speakers also have problems relating to the non-segmental features of English. The problem of intonation is very pronounced among Ibibio speakers of English.
The problem of this study is that students of English in school perform incorrectly when speaking or writing English in classroom environment; in other words, they encounter phonological and morphological difficulties when using English in classroom environment. For instance, the wrong phonological performance is made due to change of features of segments in articulation and in other phonological processes, namely, deletion and insertion.
However, the morphological misuse of morphemes is made due to omission, addition and malformation. The study therefore sought to find out the phonological variations in English sound system and morphological problems of Ibibio speakers of English Language
1.3 Purpose of the Study
The main purpose of this study is to investigate the influence of phonological variations in English sound system and morphological problems of Ibibio speakers of English language in secondary schools in Etinan Local government Area. Specifically, the study sought to
- Determine the influence of phonological variations in English language in secondary schools in Etinan local government area
- Determine the influence of morphological problems of Ibibio speakers of English
- Examine the influence of interference in English phonological variations and morphological problems of Ibibio speakers of English Language
1.4 Research Questions
The following research questions guided the study;
- To what extent does phonological variation in English sound system and morphological problems influence Ibibio speakers of English language in secondary schools in Etinan local government area?
- What are the morphological problems in English sound system that influences Ibibio speakers of English language in secondary schools in Etinan local government area?
- To what extent does interference in phonology variations in English sound system and morphological problems influence Ibibio speakers of English language in secondary schools in Etinan local government area?