A Linguistic Analysis of Metaphors in the Poetry of Niyi Osundare
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A LINGUISTIC ANALYSIS OF METAPHORS IN THE POETRY OF NIYI OSUNDARE BY OLOKO, MUHAMEED JAMIUDEEN B.A. (ED) English (Ilorin), M.A English (Lagos) Matriculation Number: 069013044 A thesis submitted to the School of Postgraduate Studies, University of Lagos, in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the award of the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.) in English. i ii iii iv DEDICATION This work is dedicated to my creator, Allah (SWA), the most beneficent and the most merciful and to my mother, Mrs Fatima Oloko and my late father, Raji Salami Oloko. v ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS The list of my appreciation is so long that abridging it is the best option in this situation where time and space will not permit me to mention all the people whose guidance, support and encouragement spurred me to commence and complete this work. First and foremost, I give all thanks and praise to Allah my creator who sustained me in completing this thesis. I express my deep appreciation to my supervisors, Professor Adeyemi Daramola, my teacher and mentor for almost two decades and Dr Mojisola Shodipe, a humble and dedicated teacher for their painstaking supervision of my research work. I must quickly add that Dr Sola Osoba also played significant supervisory role before his disengagement from the institution. I thank you all for your warm and good-natured disposition. My appreciation also goes to the following members of the Department of English, University of Lagos: Professor Segun Awonusi, my teacher and boss when he was the vice-chancellor, Tai Solarin University of Education, Ijebu-Ode, Dr Augustine Nwagbara and Dr Fola Nurein Alimi for the encouraging support received from them. I also owe a debt of gratitude to Dr Tunde Opeibi for making useful comments and observations on this work. I must also thank members of the Department of English, Tai Solarin University of Education, Ijebu-ode most especially Dr Yomi Okunowo for making useful suggestions at the various stages of this work. I also say a big thank you to Dr Dele Sogbesan, my teacher in the then Ogun State College of Education who assisted in editing the thesis. Professor Alani Seriki, Dean, College of Humanities also deserves to be appreciated for his moral support and encouragement. The support of the University authorities in the course of the programme is also well acknowledged. I also acknowledge the support of Professor Babalola Emmanuel Taiwo, Obafemi Awolowo University ( who was at TASUED briefly on sabbatical leave ), Professor Gabriel Osoba, Lagos State University and Professor Emanuuel Adedayo Adedun, Mountain Top University. My sincere thanks go to my better half, Alhaja Sherifat Oloko for her moral support. Behind every successful man, they say, there is a woman. And to my children, Azeez Oloko (University of Lagos), Azeesat Oloko (Ogun State University), Hafeez Oloko (Federal University of vi Agriculture), Hafsat Oloko and Azif Oloko, I appreciate your sacrifices and understanding during the period of my studentship and the writing of this thesis. An adage in Yoruba says “Ti oba si baase, kini baala fela”, meaning “if there is nobody to prepare a delicious meal, there is nothing for a hungry man to eat”. I therefore extend my appreciation to Professor Niyi Osundare whose volumes of insightful poems constitute the primary sources of data for this study. Besides, he is also a source of inspiration to me since I met him in 2008. I thank him for given me the opportunity to interview him on three different occasions, which is a rare opportunity. At times he called from the United States of America (USA) to ask how far I have gone about my work. Thanks, sir, for your love. Lastly, I commend my humble self for the dogged determination to complete this thesis and the Ph.Dprogramme. At this juncture, Chief Obafemi Awolowo’s wise saying that “it is not how long, but how well” readily comes to mind. I therefore once again appreciate the bountiful mercy of God. Above all, to Him be the glory. vii ABSTRACT Poetic discourse has always been considered an important aspect of discursive practices that presents a scholarly approach to creative uses of language. Poetic discourse is considered to be comprehensively language-dependent; it relies mainly on the rhetorical and pragmatic configuration of linguistic elements for effective communication. In the rhetorical communication of a poet’s message, metaphor is an important device that is deployed deliberately to enhance the persuasive effect of the text by providing striking and vivid images which enhance the communicative meaning of a poetic work. Niyi Osundare is a world- renowned Nigerian poet who has published eighteen books of poetry; multiple plays, travelogues, and monographs, as well as numerous scholarly articles and essays. The choice of metaphor in the investigation of Osundare’s creative use of language is motivated by the predominance of this literary device in his poetry. The problem of using a foreign language to express African realities, coupled with the problem of translation, constitutes a serious challenge to African writers. The “language question” has thus been a recurring issue in African literature whereby writers creatively explore the resources of the English language for the adequate expression of African thoughts and ideas. In addressing this problem therefore, this study investigates Osundare’s artistic deployment of a ‘foreign’ language to convey the African indigenous and world view to a global audience while imbuing his poems with a unique bilingual expressiveness and emotive content. The thrust of this study is to undertake a linguistic analysis of metaphors and how they function in communicating meaning for readers’ accessibility. This research also examines the aesthetic significance of Osundare’s poetry in terms of the poet’s skillful manipulation of textual features in the unique structuring of his poetry, and by implication, in structuring the message. The poems which are selected for analysis in this study were chosen for their topicality as well as their political, economic and cultural significance. Furthermore, most of these works are quite definitive of Osundare’s poetic style as they are overwhelmingly relevant in their metaphoric and linguistic import. The analysis of Osundare’s poetry in this study is carefully backgrounded against Halliday’s (2004) theoretical model of grammatical metaphor which explains meaning in terms of the ideational and interpersonal metafunctions of Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL). The findings of this study show that Osundare successfully uses English language to convey his message to the global audience and yet flaour his poems with nativeness and novelty through his bilingual creativity. The study also provides evidence of the emergence of some categories of metaphors that are not commonly discussed in Osundare’s poetry. The study contributes immensely to the understanding of linguistic analysis of Osundare’s poetry. Another significant contribution of this study is that the work linguistically situates Osudare’s use of metaphor in the political, economic, social and cultural life of the Nigerian people. The work also showcases the interface between foreign and indigenous languages thereby ‘‘tackling the language question’’ in African literature. The study thus concludes that for African literature to continue to enjoy large audience which cut across local and international readership, ‘the gradualist’ approach which advocates a de-anglicization and Africanization of the English language should be sustained until the recurring issue of language question is permanently resolved. Keywords: poetry, metaphor, language, linguistics, rhetoric. viii TABLES OF CONTENTS TABLES 1. Summary of Processes in Text 1 108 2. Clausal Analysis of the Processes in Text 1 109 3. Summary of Processes in Text 2 114 4. Clausal Analysis of the Processes in Text 2 115 5. Summary of Processes in Text 3 128 6. Clausal Analysis of the Processes in Text 3 129 7. Summary of Processes in Text 4 141 8. Clausal Analysis of the Processes in Text 4 142 9. Summary of Processes in text 5 154 10. Clausal Analysis of the Processes in Text 5 155 11. Summary of Processes in text 6 166 12. Clausal Analysis of the Processes in Text 6 167 13. Clausal Analysis of Mood Structure in Text 1 182 14. Clausal Analysis of Mood Structure in Text 2 184 15. Clausal Analysis of Mood Structure in Text 3 194 16. Clausal Analysis of Mood Structure in Text 4 202 17. Clausal Analysis of Mood Structure in Text 5 213 18. Clausal Analysis of Mood Structure in Text 6 220 19. Clausal Analysis of Thematic Structure in Text 1 238 20. Clausal Analysis of Thematic Structure in Text 2 239 21. Clausal Analysis of Thematic Structure in Text 3 246 22. Clausal Analysis of Thematic Structure in Text 4 254 23. Clausal Analysis of Thematic Structure in Text 5 265 24. Clausal Analysis of Thematic Structure in Text 6 269 ix CONTENTS Declaration i Certification ii Author’s Statement iii Dedication iv Acknowledgements v Abstract vii Table of Contents viii CHAPTER ONE 1.0 Introduction 1 1.1 Background to the Study 1 1.2 Osundare and his Works 8 1.3 The Significance of Language in Osundare’s Poetry 15 1.4 The Research Problem 19 1.5 Aim and Objectives of the Study 22 1.6 Research Questions 24 1.7 Significance of the study 25 1.8 Scope and Delimitation of the Study 25 1.9 Conceptual Clarifications 26 1.10 Theoretical Framework 28 1.10.0 Systemic Functional Linguistics 28 1.10.1.Grammatical Metaphor 28 1.10.2 Ideational and Interpersonal Metaphors 38