From Stigma to Coolness The emergence of Naija (Nigerian ) as a 100 million speaker African language

B. Caron & F. Egbokhare

Breakfast Debate Institut Français du Nigéria 26/09/2017 Google search: « Largest African Languages »

Ranking A Speakers B Speakers C Speakers3 1 Arabic -- English 700 Arabic 100 native + 30 secondary 2 Kiswahili -- Arabic 100 Berber 40 native + 4 secondary 3 Hausa -- Swahili 100 Swahili 5 native + 80 secondary 4 English -- French 90 Hausa 24 native + 15 secondary 5 Amharic -- Hausa 50 Oromo 25 6 French -- Oromo 30 Zulu 9 native + 16 secondary 7 Oromo -- Yoruba 30 Somali 18-21 8 Yoruba -- Igbo 24 Yoruba 19 native + 2 secondary 9 Igbo -- Amharic 18,7 Igbo 18 native + 1 secondary 10 Zulu -- Zulu 10 Amharic 14 native + 3 secondary

A: https://answersafrica.com (Nigerian Enugu-based) B: http://www.africaranking.com (Private: anonymous) C: http://www.focac.org/eng/ (Chinese official website on Africa)

19/11/2014 2 As seen in the previous slide, Nigerian Pidgin is absent from the various lists of the largest African languages. However, it is ubiquitous in .

19/11/2014 3 NIGERIAN PIDGIN ENGLISH (NPE) AN ALL-PERVASIVE PRESENCE

19/11/2014 4 Public sphere:

Radio, TV, video, music, advertising

19/11/2014 5 Advertising

19/11/2014 6 19/11/2014 7 Politics

19/11/2014 8 Song Queen: A Pidgin Opera, (Helen Parker-Jayne Isibor . Opera Photograph: Claire Shovelton)

19/11/2014 9 Private sphere:

Private communication (SMS); social media…. (FB, etc.)

19/11/2014 10 Wedding Announcement

19/11/2014 11 Why is this language generally ignored?

Nigerian Pidgin English suffers from misunderstandings and stereotypes

19/11/2014 12 19/11/2014 13 19/11/2014 14 Why is this wrong?

• NPE is not a ‘simplified’ version of English, spoken by illiterates unable to express themselves in good English • There is no hierarchy between languages, only between the economic and political situations of their speakers • ‘Pidgin’ is a technical term used by linguists to describe certain types of languages

19/11/2014 15 19/11/2014 16 19/11/2014 17 Summary

• are communication languages. A result of simplification and domination of vocabulary • Creoles are the 1st language (mother-tongue) of a community. Are a result of development and complexification.

19/11/2014 18 NPE

• Has creolised in the Delta (2 to 10 million speakers) and in where it a 1st language • But: has since expanded to most of Nigeria where it is learnt as a 2nd language. • Question: Is it de-creolising under the influence of ?

19/11/2014 19 NPE: a multitude of definitions • An expanded pidgin (Mufwene) • A pidgincreole in the process of becoming a vernacular language • A postcreole continuum

• But most of all : a mixed language that is fast expanding (both in geography and function) and rapidly changing

19/11/2014 20 The structure of NPE

• Majority of Nigerian languages are Benue-Congo of Niger Congo. • There is a basic substrate structure and grammatical frame, no matter the original language of contact. • The process of language learning will involve the insertion of lexical frames into the common grammatical frame. • There is a common core of popular vocabulary that defines the NIG-P lexicon.

19/11/2014 21 pɛsın wɛ boro klɔt go pati no dɛ dans tu mɔʧ

19/11/2014 22 Other features • It is a in most of Nigeria • It is the most widely spoken language in Nigeria ( over 100m speakers) • It is the preferred language where mixed audiences are involved • It is thriving in social media much more than other Nigerian languages

All the ‘negative’ elements are the reason for its success • No official status ; no orthography • It has no formal recognition by Government and in language policy • Freedom; expressivity; • A sense of identity.

19/11/2014 23 • It is very popular among students of tertiary institutions • It is no longer restricted to a lower illiterate class • It has creolized in much of the South South Zone of Nigeria (over 10m) where it is gaining ground • It is spreading into domains hitherto reserved for other Nigerian languages • It is used in all spheres except in the classroom and formal business • It is mutually intelligible with Cameroonian and Ghanaian pidgins giving it potentials as a language of regional integration

19/11/2014 24 NIGERIAN PIDGIN: AN IDEOLOGY

19/11/2014 25 • It is no longer stigmatized, it is trending and cool • It is the language of Nigerian pop culture • It represents a culture, a mindset, a Nigerianness. • NPE provides a basis for unity and nationalistic sentiments, cultural and behavioural convergence as well as a philosophical and ideological rallying point. • There is a NPE spirit that defines a Nigerian personality or a personality that Nigerians aspire to as capable of resilience and possessing a “can do” spirit.

19/11/2014 26 NIGERIAN PIDGIN ENGLISH OR NAIJA?

19/11/2014 27 • Nigerian Pidgin English is – Not a Pidgin (its functions go beyond those of a pidgin); – not a creole either (2nd language), – not a variety of English (Deuber: code switching). • NAIJA (also written 9ja) from the root word Niger in the word Nigeria. • Used mainly in popular culture and youth parlance to refer to Nigerian people. • Naija may also be seen as a statement by the youths, a popular movement

19/11/2014 28 19/11/2014 29 Music Website: 9JA Breed

19/11/2014 30 The conditions for the emergence of Naija

19/11/2014 31 Collapse of traditional social structures

• Urban segregation, citizenship challenges (indigene vs settlers) and bifurcation of economy into formal and informal • Minority agitations and civil war leading to creation of new political structures; • Labour and class mobility • Conclusion: A discredited diversity has created the need for a lingua franca

19/11/2014 32 Why has English not filled the gap?

• Collapse of public Education • Ideological tensions: Negritude, Negation and Adaptation • Lagbaja and Fela’s Vernacular underlie the ideology of resistance

19/11/2014 33 Why hasn’t any Nigerian Language been able to fill the gap? • Political power/relevance can only be negotiated through ethnic membership • Hardening of ethnic boundaries • Nigerians (individually and as a whole) cannot identify to one of the 500 or so languages spoken in the country

19/11/2014 34 The role of Globalisation & ICTs

19/11/2014 35 Wavering boundaries of loyalties and identity New patterns of social connections • Globalization and ICTs are creating new mentalities, philosophies of identities and images of self. • Convergence, Adaptation, Syncretism, Hybridization (reflected in code switching/language mixing) • New definitions of community, changing expressions of fraternity and loyalty. • Old orders on which social fabrics and identities are built are crumbling due to the blurring of private and public space • Merging of formal and informal spaces

19/11/2014 36 • The tools of production are democratised: people can make content freely unhindered, unconstrained. • Democratization of distribution: the dissemination of linguistic innovations is now cheaper. • Individuals have greater control of their linguistic choices as opposed to formal prescription. • Supply and demand are connected through search engines, blogs, recommendations lists, etc. • Governments and organized regulatory environments no longer have monopolies of standards and channels of language flow: formal recognition of language and power of regulatory control are wilting in the new digital environment.

19/11/2014 37 Conclusion • Diversity has created the need for a lingua franca, • The pop star, Fela Kuti destigmatized and transformed pidgin into a “cool” language. • ICTs, Mobile Phone, Radio and social media provide new patterns of social connections. • It was the association of NIG-P with popular culture, comedy, music, Nollywood and through these the linkage with mainstream youth movements of protest, later hip hop, and rap that tipped Pidgin. • Driven by the ideology of syncretism, hybridization, adaptation and convergence and a need for a national identity, Pidgin became a natural candidate in a market of multitudes. • A norm is emerging through concensus and not by presciption: NAIJA

19/11/2014 38 Phases of the development of NAIJA

19/11/2014 39 INDIGENIZATION PHASE

Indigenisation Phase

• Origin and Consolidation in the Delta: 15th- 18th century (300 years) • Seeding in Lagos by recaptives and renewal in the Delta by missionaries, national seeding by labour mobility to commercial and administrative centres, military barracks: 18th century to 1960s (about 100 years)

19/11/2014 40 INDIGENIZATION PHASE

Lingua Franca Phase

• Spread to hinterland in the Delta areas and adjoining territories following the creation of the Midwestern Region from Western Region in 1963 and the Civil War between 1967-70 and subsequent creation of 12 states in 1968 including 2 from the Eastern Region.

19/11/2014 41 INDIGENIZATION PHASE

Ideology Phase

• De-stigmatization and adoption as a language of youth movements, protest, youth solidarity, popular culture, especially by Fela Kuti. Gained popularity in the schools: mid 1970s- 90s

19/11/2014 42 INDIGENIZATION PHASE

Identity and Globalization Phase

• Digital Era. Aligning with social media, explosion in electronic media, hip hop and rap, advertising, political campaigns: 2000 to date

19/11/2014 43 INDIGENIZATION PHASE

Wazobia FM: an All-Naija radio station • Lagos 95.1 FM: started operations in November 2007 • 94.1 FM: started operations in November 2008 • Abuja 99.5 FM: started operations in January 2011 • Kano 95.1 FM: started operations in Janujary 2011

19/11/2014 44 19/11/2014 45 Literature in Naija • Ken Saro Wiwa’s High Life (short story, 1969); Die-A-Tribe (id., 1989); Dis Nigeria sef (1985) • M.J. Vatsa Tori for Geti Bow Leg (poetry, 1985) • E. Oribhabor, Abuja na Kpangba an Oda Puem-dem (2011) • Tunde Fatunde’s plays: No food for Country (1985), Oga na Tief Man, (1986)

19/11/2014 46 Literature with Naija passages

• J. Cary’s Mr Johnson (novel, 1939) • W. Soyinka’s The Interpreters (novel, 1965) • C. Achebe’s A man of the People (novel, 1966) • F.-A. Imoukhuede’s, Pidgin Stew and Sufferhead (poetry, 1982)

19/11/2014 47 NaijaSynCor A corpus-based macro-syntactic study of Naija (Nigerian Pidgin) • Partners : ANR-Llacan-Modyco • Beginning: Feb 1st 2017 • Duration: 54 months

19/11/2014 48 Nature and functions of Naija (Nigerian Pidgin) in Nigeria today • Sociolinguistic and geographical study of variation according to formal/informal uses, gender and education of speakers. • Link between change in structure and change in language use and function. • Using NLP tools for corpus study • Evaluate the distance between Naija and Nigerian English through the study of intonation, information structure, morphology, micro- and macro-syntax.

19/11/2014 49 A 500,000 words oral corpus

19/11/2014 50 Using and developing new NLP tools

• Elan (morphosyntactic annotation) • Automatic Tagger & Parser (Deep learning) • SPPAS (Phonetisation and alignment) • Analor & PENTA (Intonation) • Arborator (Universal Dependencies Grammar) • Trameur (Queries and Statistics on annotated corpora)

19/11/2014 51 Elan: Morphosyntax (C. Chanard)

19/11/2014 52 Analor: Prosodic Analysis (Avanzi, Lacheret, Victorri)

19/11/2014 53 Syntax: Arborator (UD) (Kahane, Gerdes)

19/11/2014 54 Sociolinguistic Analysis: Trameur (Fleury)

19/11/2014 55 Conclusion

Through the creation of a deeply annotated corpus, the NaijaSynCor project documents the emergence of Naija as a language at the national level, challenging existing theories of the development of creoles and languages in contact.

19/11/2014 56 This innovative approach to the dynamics of contact and change in the areas of human behaviour and sociology of language will powerfully impact the methodology and technology of research on emerging languages. It is ground-breaking as, for the first time, it will use new NLP tools that integrate syntax, intonation and information structure on a large deeply annotated corpus to build a gold- standard bench-marking database.

19/11/2014 57 Last but not least, it is hoped that it will provide the annotated data and the NLP tools necessary to produce linguistic tools (orthography guide, dictionary, grammar) for an evaluation of Naija to be done on tangible elements, rather than personal beliefs and intuitions. The assessment of the language can then lead to its development and help systematically channel the opportunities it offers in the areas of education, culture and mobilization.

19/11/2014 58 We tank una

contacts: Bernard CARON [email protected] Sylvain KAHANE [email protected] Francis EGBOKHARE [email protected]

19/11/2014 59 References • Bigi, Brigitte & Daniel Hirst. 2012. SPeech Phonetization Alignment and Syllabification (SPPAS): a tool for the automatic analysis of speech prosody. Speech Prosody, 19–22. Shanghai (China): Tongji University Press. • Caron, Bernard. 2017-21. NaijaSynCor : A CORPUS-BASED MACRO-SYNTACTIC STUDY OF NAIJA (NIGERIAN PIDGIN). http://naijasyncor.huma-num.fr/ (11 September, 2017). • Chanard, Christian. 2014. ELAN-CorpA-V4.7.3. http://llacan.vjf.cnrs.fr/res_ELAN-CorpA.php. • Davies, Mitchell. Pidgins and Creoles. http://slideplayer.com/slide/10888787/ (11 September, 2017). • Egbokhare, Francis. 2016. The accidental lingua franca. The paradox of the pidginization of the Nigerian linguistic space. Keynote address. Paper presented at the International conference on urbanization, youth languages and technological innovations in Africa, Yale University. • Fleury, Serge & Maria Zimina. 2014. Trameur: A Framework for Annotated Text Corpora Exploration. Proceedings of COLING 2014, the 25th International Conference on Computational Linguistics: System Demonstrations. August 2014, Dublin, Ireland, 57–61. • Gerdes, Kim. 2013. Collaborative Dependency Annotation. Proceedings of the Second International Conference on Dependency Linguistics (DepLing 2013), 88–97. Prague: Matfyzpress. • Kahane, Sylvain. 1997. Bubble trees and syntactic representations, in Becker & Krieger (eds), Proc. 5th Meeting of the Mathematics of Language (MOL5), : , 70-76. In T. Becker & H.U. Krieger (eds.), Proceedings of the 5th Meeting of the Mathematics of Language (MOL5), 70–76. Saarbrücken: Deutsches Forschungszentrum für Künstliche Intelligenz. • Lacheret, Anne, Paola Pietrandrea & Atanas Tchobanov. 2014. Rhapsodie: a Prosodic-Syntactic Treebank for Spoken French. http://hal.upmc.fr/hal-00968959/document (23 March, 2016).

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