By Farooq A. Kperogi, Ph.D Continued from last week ( read part one here ) 11. “May God punish you!” This maledictory exclamation i...
By Farooq A. Kperogi, Ph.D
Continued from last week (read part one here)
11.
“May God punish you!” This maledictory exclamation in
Nigerian English can take other forms, such as “My God punish you and your
entire family!” “God punish your father and your whole generation!” or simply
“God punish you!” Some Nigerian Christians use “Holy Ghost Fire” in place of “God”
in these curses, which are used in moments of extreme anger.
I have never heard anyone use these expressions in
America in the nearly one decade that I’ve lived here. Professor David Jowitt,
in his widely acclaimed Nigerian English:
An Introduction, also attests that the expression is absent in modern
British English, and suggests that this may indicate that “Nigeria is more religious
than modern Britain.” That is certainly the case.
But America is far from being the post-religious
society that much of Western Europe is. In fact, one might even say America
cherishes outward display of religiosity in almost the same way that Nigerians
do, yet Americans don’t invoke God in maledictory exclamations. “Goddam” or
“Goddamn,” which appears to be equivalent to “God punish you,” is actually now
just an informal expletive to intensify meaning, as in “He is goddamn good at
what he does,” or “He is a goddam hypocrite.”
Modern native English exclamations that have a tinge
of religiosity in them are often irreverent, even blasphemous, and are avoided
in polite company. Expressions such as “Holy Cow!” “Holy shit!” “Jeez!” “Jesus
“f**king Christ!” etc. function primarily to express surprise, and hurt the
sensibilities of many observant Christians.
It’s hard to
tell where the Nigerian “God punish you!” emanated from. There doesn’t seem to
be any record of its use at any point in British English, and it doesn’t strike
me as a direct translation from any major Nigerian language. Even the Hausa “Allah tsine…!” isn’t an exact lexical or
idiomatic equivalent of “May God punish you.”
12.
“Na wa o!” This is certainly a Nigerian Pidgin English
expression, but many Nigerians utter it to express surprise even when they
speak Standard English. The expression isn’t easy to translate into English,
but close approximations would be “Wow! Just wow!!” “That’s terrible!”
“Unbelievable!”
13.
“It’s not easy o!” Despite what its lexical constituents
might suggest, this expression isn’t necessarily a statement on the ease or
difficulty of a task (although it sometimes is). In Nigerian English it can be
used to express the sense that one has resigned oneself to disappointment, or
that something is really surprising, among other idiosyncratic meanings. Yoruba
people have even vernacularized the expression to “ko easy rara.”
14.
“You don’t mean it!” Nigerians use this expression to
express disbelief—in almost the same way that Americans use “get out of here!”
Native English speakers understand “you don’t mean it” literally, that is, that
there is a disjunction between what you’re saying and what you actually mean.
Nigerians, on the other hand, use it figuratively to mean “this is
unbelievable; this beggars belief.”
So, many Nigerians say “you don’t meant it!” to indicate
that they are truly surprised by what they’d just heard. In similar contexts, as
I said earlier, Americans informally say “Get out of here!” They are not, by
any means, commanding you to get lost, although when the context changes, it
can mean that.
Last summer I participated in the training of some
Nigerian high court judges here in Atlanta, and one judge told me he was utterly
flummoxed when an American lady told him to “get out of here!” He was
mystified, he said, because the lady who told him “to get out of here!” didn’t
betray any emotions of anger and was, in fact, interested in hearing more of
what he had to say. I asked him if he’d narrated a hard-to-believe but true
story and he answered in the affirmative. I then explained that “get out of
here!” is an informal expression that Americans sometimes use to express
disbelief—the same way Nigerians say “you don’t mean it!” My explanation saved
his relationship with the American lady.
Another (American) expression used to
express incredulity that non-native speakers may find puzzling is: “get out of
town!”
15.
“What’s there?” This means “it’s no big deal!” or, as
Americans now say informally, “it’s no biggie.” In Nigerian Pidgin English, the
expression is rendered as “wetin dey there?” My guess is that the expression is
a direct translation from the Hausa “me a
ciki?” which literally translates as “what’s inside?” but which actually
means “what’s the big deal in it?” Perhaps other Nigerian languages have
equivalent expressions.
16.
“Wonderful!” Roger Blench, in his draft dictionary
of Nigerian English, writes that “wonderful!” is an exclamation
“used for a surprising event of any type” and add puzzlingly that “on hearing
of the death of a close relative it would be appropriate to say ‘Wonderful!’” He
said this bizarre use of “wonderful!” is derived from the Hausa “mamaki!” which
is used to express incredulity.
I must confess that I am not familiar with that
usage in Nigerian English. In fact, I am dubious of the accuracy of Blench’s
claim that speakers of English in northern Nigeria use “wonderful!” to express
surprise of any kind, including the death of a close relative. I went to
university in Kano for four years, lived in Katsina for a year, worked in
Kaduna for many years, and continue to relate very closely with native Hausa
speakers. Not once have I heard anyone say “wonderful!” upon being told of the
death of a close relative. Maybe I didn’t go to the right places—or don’t
relate with the right people. I’d be delighted if someone can email me to
confirm or disprove this. What I do know for a fact is that “wonderful!” is
used in Nigerian English to express hearty delight.
17.
“Yes now!” or “Yes o!” This expression is used for the intensification
of approval or to indicate the obviousness of an answer.
18.
“You’re highly welcome!” Unlike in Standard English where
“you’re welcome” is the response you give when people say “thank you” to you,
in Nigerian English “you’re (highly) welcome!” is used to signify an
intensified form of “welcome!” As I’ve written in previous articles, this
confuses native speakers a lot.
19.
“Take (your) time o!” This exclamatory expression is used as
a stern, threatening warning, especially during quarrels. It means be warned,
be careful or risk unsavory consequences. No other variety of English in the
world—at least to my knowledge—understands and uses the expression the way
Nigerians do. In Standard English “take your time” simply means don’t be in a
hurry.
20.
“Or whatever you call yourself!” When a Nigerian says
or writes your name and adds “or whatever you call yourself,” you better “take
your time o!” It means he is really upset with you. Any time I write
hard-hitting political commentaries that ruffle big feathers, I get emails from
paid hacks that read something like this: “Farooq, or whatever you call
yourself, you’re a big fool to talk about our president like that! May God
punish you and your entire goro-chewing people for that nonsense article!”
These
expressions crack me up big time every time I read them. There was a time I
laughed so boisterously after reading an even more hilarious version of these
insults directed at me that I literally fell off my chair! I kid you not.
Concluded
Related Articles:
No comments
Share your thoughts and opinions here. I read and appreciate all comments posted here. But I implore you to be respectful and professional. Trolls will be removed and toxic comments will be deleted.