Today is another sweet day, with a gloomy bright daylight that makes this morning be.
Today I'll like to talk to us about Africa, so sit back, relax and learn....
Africa is a big place.....a very large continent.
Nigeria is one of the countries in West Africa.
Nigeria is the most populous black nation in the world.
Nigerians alone, speak over two hundred and fifty languages.....
I mean languages not dialects...
For example 'Yoruba' my language, is one of the three major languages, English is the Lingua Franca, or the official language spoken.
Some few months ago, a non Nigerian asked me about Swahili when I travelled to the states to go visit my uncle.
"You're from Africa right, How about the Swahili?"
It sounded ridiculous to me, didn't know what to say at first, but I can't just keep mute, being a writer and a speaker, I just had to say something.
"Many people think Swahili is 'the African language'.
There's nothing like an African language or the African language.
There are over one thousand languages spoken in Africa, but Swahili is the most widely spoken, especially in the east part of Africa and central Africa.
Although I'm from Nigeria, west Africa, and I confess that I don't know a word in Swahili".
There was a project by Pan-African movements to have a common African language made up of phrases and words from various African tribal or ethnic languages, but the project didn't work out.
Even in Nigeria, there was an attempt by some nationalist groups to have a common Nigerian language, just to be able to break the hold of imperialism and stop educating our children in a foreign language, but it also didn't work out.
And I am so glad it didn't work, because, like it or not, English is the language in which the world trades and communicates.
English has become the international language, it has become almost a universal second language in nation's where it is not the first.
Why?
English is adaptable to any culture.
There is great latitude within the accepted standard English language.
There's
- American English
- British English
- Caribbean English
- Indian English
- Jamaican English
- Nigerian English etc.
Even within a country, for instance; Let's take a look at the United States.
There are variations in meaning and usage from region to region, and different accents too, such as;
- Texan accent
- Brooklyn accent
- Manhattan accent etc.
So when I speak the best way I understand, especially in other countries outside Nigeria and some people tells me I don't speak the correct English, I only smile and say in me that their utterance actually shows their ignorance and how parochial they are.
What they may say is that I don't speak their type of English, but that does not mean my type of English is substandard or inferior.
The English I speak and write falls within accepted standard English and follows the rules of grammar and pronunciation.
All speakers of the English language worldwide speak English with their own accents and nuances. I've been in places where, after I spoke few sentences, someone quickly recognized the accent and asked if I was Nigerian. With pride I always reply that I am.
Some immigrants, especially children readily adopt a new accent when they relocate, but adult immigrants rarely lose their original accent.
And that's all right.
If sometimes you have to exercise a lot of patience and struggle to understand other people's accents, so be it. You'll travel round the world you'll meet new people, go to places, places with diversity and plurality, you just have to adapt and get the conversation going, even if you're having tough time understanding people, you have to communicate with people and it has to be done by you.
Nobody will help you with that, it's just you and your nose.
HOME OF STEEMIANS
Thanks for stopping by.
