Farooq A. Kperogi, Ph.D. This week’s Q and A is based on questions and comments I received from a Kenyan and two Nigerian readers of t...
Farooq
A. Kperogi, Ph.D.
This week’s Q and A is based on
questions and comments I received from a Kenyan and two Nigerian readers of
this column. I will publish the rest in the coming weeks. Keep sending your
questions.
Question:
Many of the examples you give
English usage errors are also found in other African countries. One common
English expression in Kenya that always drives me crazy is: "he resulted
to" instead of "he resorted to." What do you think of the
expression "he painted him to a corner?" This expression drives me
crazy, too. It is quite common in Kenyan English.
Answer:
I have been thinking of doing an
exploratory comparative analysis of “African Englishes.” But the thought of the
sheer labyrinthine complexity such an undertaking would entail
frightens me into impotence. You are now giving me the inspiration to summon the
pluck to do it.
But these are my preliminary
thoughts on your comments: It seems to me that we can isolate and map African
Englishes and show their similarities, differences, and continuities. The
varieties of English spoken in Kenya, Uganda, and Tanzania seem to share enough
similarities to warrant being grouped as "East African English." The
English spoken in Nigeria, Ghana, Sierra Leone, and the Gambia has
traditionally been labeled "West African English" in the scholarly
literature.
For historical reasons,
Nigerian English and Ghanaian English are particularly sufficiently proximate
in lexis and structure to deserve being called close linguistic cousins. Many,
perhaps most, of Ghana's high school English teachers in the 1960s were
Nigerians, and most of Nigeria's high school English teachers in the 1970s and
the 1980s were Ghanaians. (For instance, most of my English teachers in the
first two years of my high school education in Nigeria were Ghanaians). So it's
easy to see why the varieties of English spoken in the two countries are
robustly similar. Liberian English, because of its American heritage, is a West
African outlier, although it has had a lot of Nigerian influence lately.
Now Nigerian home movies appear to
be spreading Nigerian English across West Africa, perhaps across all of
Anglophone Africa.
I know very little about Southern
African English, i.e., the English spoken in South Africa, Zimbabwe, Zambia,
Malawi, Namibia, etc. But I expect them to share many similarities.
I find your examples of Kenyan
English usage interesting. Some of my British grammarian friends tell me that
the "result to/resort to" error is also present in British English. I
have also encountered it a number of times in Nigerian newspapers. So it's not
uniquely Kenyan. But it is completely absent in American English, as far as I
know, because Americans roll their r's [“resort” is pronounced “resoRt”] and so
don't have a reason to confuse "resort" with "result."
To "paint oneself or somebody
into a corner," that is, to put oneself or somebody in a difficult
situation, is a time-honored American English idiom. So the expression "he
painted him into a corner" is legitimate. Kenyan English only missed the
preposition "in" in their version of the idiom.
Question/Comment:
There
are many annoying, obviously grammatically wrong expressions that Nigerians
keep repeating. A good example is the phrase “media practitioners.” For
goodness sake, how can one practice media?
Answer
"Media practitioner" is a perfectly legitimate and correct expression. The phrase is also widely used in British and American English. I am aware, of course, that some language columnists in Nigerian newspapers say it’s wrong. But they are mistaken. They are guilty of the grammatical offense of “hypercorrection,” that is, a grammatical mistake caused by a false analogy. As I am writing this, there is a book on my shelf titled Applied Mass Communication Theory: A Guide for Media Practitioners. It is written by two respected American professors of journalism and mass communication by the names of Jack Rosenberry and Lauren Vicker and it was published in 2008 by Allyn & Bacon, a well-regarded American publishing company. So, yes, one can practice media.
Question:
Please Dr., I’ve these problems that
keep recurring in my everyday written and spoken English and I don’t know how
to overcome them. The problems are when and how to use “has,” “have,” and “had.”
The second is the difference between “been” and “being.” To be honest, I tried
the best I could but to no avail.
Answer:
Here is a quick, easily digestible
answer to your questions. "Have" is a verb that always goes with
plural nouns. Examples: “People HAVE been here," "Ten people HAVE
asked me the same question," "Many things HAVE happened today,"
etc. But there are exceptions: "Have" also goes with "You"
and "I" even if "you" is used in a singular sense.
Examples: "I HAVE a nice car," "You HAVE been nice to me,"
etc.
"Have" is also the only
acceptable form to use after auxiliary verbs like "shall/should,"
"can/could," "will/would" even when the subject of a
sentence is singular. Examples: "It should HAVE been here by now," He
could HAVE gone there," "She would HAVE to come here," etc.
"Has," on the other hand,
is always used with singular nouns. It is the opposite, or more correctly the
singular form, of "have." Examples: "He HAS been here,"
"one person HAS asked me the same question," "one thing HAS
happened today," etc.
"Had" is the past tense of
both “has" and "have."
The best way to know the difference
between "been" and "being" is to remember that "been"
ONLY appears where the verbs "have," "has," "had,"
and “having” are in a sentence. If none of these words is in a sentence, use
only "being." Examples: "He has been nice to me." Compare
to: "He is being nice to me."
Related Articles:
1. A Comparison of Nigerian, American and British English
2. Why is "Sentiment" Such a Bad Word in Nigeria?
3. Ambassador Aminchi's Impossible Grammatical Logic
4. 10 Most Annoying Nigerian Media English Expressions
5. Sambawa and "Peasant Attitude to Governance"
6. Adverbial and Adjectival Abuse in Nigerian English
7. In Defense of "Flashing" and Other Nigerianisms
8. Weird Words We're Wedded to in Nigerian English
9. American English or British English?
10. Hypercorrection in Nigerian English
11. Nigerianisms, Americanisms, Briticisms and Communication Breakdown
12. Top 10 Irritating Errors in American English
13. Nigerian Editors Killing Macebuh Twice with Bad Grammar
14. On "Metaphors" and "Puns" in Nigerian English
15. Common Errors of Pluralization in Nigerian English
16. Q & A About Common Grammatical Problems
17. Semantic Change and the Politics of English Pronunciation
2. Why is "Sentiment" Such a Bad Word in Nigeria?
3. Ambassador Aminchi's Impossible Grammatical Logic
4. 10 Most Annoying Nigerian Media English Expressions
5. Sambawa and "Peasant Attitude to Governance"
6. Adverbial and Adjectival Abuse in Nigerian English
7. In Defense of "Flashing" and Other Nigerianisms
8. Weird Words We're Wedded to in Nigerian English
9. American English or British English?
10. Hypercorrection in Nigerian English
11. Nigerianisms, Americanisms, Briticisms and Communication Breakdown
12. Top 10 Irritating Errors in American English
13. Nigerian Editors Killing Macebuh Twice with Bad Grammar
14. On "Metaphors" and "Puns" in Nigerian English
15. Common Errors of Pluralization in Nigerian English
16. Q & A About Common Grammatical Problems
17. Semantic Change and the Politics of English Pronunciation
I dont see why wrong usage of english should go as far as annoying people.Agreed,it might be a little irritating,but as they say its no 'biggie'!If the message is understood,then khalaas!!!
ReplyDeleteClearly I am late to commenting on this post as it was posted years ago. While I appreciate the historical lesson on the differences in African Engishes and even the examples, I have to say it drives me absolutely insane is when someone speaks out of their area of expertise and gives definitive and incorrect answers. I respect your Phd in Communications, however you have misused linguistic terms and misrepresented a sound (another area of Linguistics).
ReplyDeleteEnglish speaking Americans do NOT roll their Rs. We pronounce them. Rolling an r is not a natural sound for the English language. An example of a rolled r can been evidenced in the Spanish language as in the word Perro.
Also Nigerian English and Ghanaian English are not linguistic cousins. They are dialects of the same language. An example of a linguistic cousin would be Spanish and Portuguese. these are two completely different languages that share the same roots.
hi
ReplyDelete