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Advances in Social Sciences Research Journal – Vol. 8, No. 7
Publication Date: July 25, 2021
DOI:10.14738/assrj.87.10384. Nnamdi-Eruchalu, G. I. (2021). Anglicization of Written Igbo Personal and Place Names: A Sociolinguistic Study. Advances in Social
Sciences Research Journal, 8(7). 501-515.
Services for Science and Education – United Kingdom
Anglicization of Written Igbo Personal and Place Names: A
Sociolinguistic Study
Geraldine Ifesinachi Nnamdi-Eruchalu
Department of English Language and Literature
Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka, Anambra State, Nigeria
ABSTRACT
The Igbo people are at the verge of losing their language, culture and identity to the
English Language [Azuonye 2002, Asonye 2013, Emeka-Nwobia 2020]. This work
aims at investigating into the Anglicization of written Igbo personal and place
names with a view to highlighting the extent of spellings and pronunciation
inconsistencies, discover what impact it has on the learning and development of the
language, and discover ways the attitude of the people can be changed towards the
language to forestall its death. It argues that the spelling inconsistencies it
introduced to the language is a source of challenge to learners, the majority of
whom already have negative attitude towards the language. Ogbalu [1974],
Oruchalu [1979] and Okodo [2008] made lists of anglicized names with their correct
Igbo spellings, and decried the practice. The data for this research were collected
from personal experiences, class lists, radio and television programmes, the
internet, social and print media, and interviews. It concludes that a change in the
attitude of the people towards their language, culture and identity as well as total
implementation of the Onwu Orthography with regards to the spelling of personal
and place names will complement the efforts being made to sustain the language.
Key words: Anglicization, spelling inconsistencies, identity, Onwu Orthography, names
INTRODUCTION
Igbo people are good at embracing novelties – novelty in dress, customs, language and in short
novelty in everything. In speech they prefer English to the mother tongue and those who have
smarthing (sic) knowledge of Hausa, Yoruba or Efic speak them even in an environment they
are not called for. [Ogbalu, 1974, p. 58]
The graphization of the Igbo Language is usually traced to its contact with the Europeans of the
colonial era and subsequently the writing and compilation of words to produce word lists by
the freed slaves in Freetown, Sierra Leone . However, its development went into limbo between
1929 and 1961 due to the Orthography and Dialect controversies, and reemerged with the
introduction of the (Official) Onwu Orthography in 1961. Also, through the efforts of the Society
for Promotion of Igbo Language and Culture using its standardization Committee, a standard
dialect of the Igbo language was arrived at, [Ogbalu 1974, 1982, Emenanjo 1982, 1985,
Nwachukwu 1983]. Meanwhile, the standardization movement has been blamed for the
marginalization of many Igbo dialects which would have helped to make the language more
viable [Azuonye 2002]. But this argument is beyond the scope of this paper since dialect
influences are not implicated in the Anglicization of Igbo names.
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Since the introduction and acceptance of the Onwu Orthography, it has been adopted in
writings and publications in the language, but one area where spellings have remained as the
colonialists left them or at the discretion of individuals is personal names, and this makes such
names ‘unIgbo’. Names are an embodiment of a people’s culture, worldviews, beliefs and
identity. Names place the thing named in one group rather than another. A name should,
therefore, carry the bearer’s identity, but this is no longer the case in the present-day Igbo
society where many names have been anglicized with little or no signification in the language.
Anglicized names here refer to Igbo names which have been influenced by the English culture
or affected by the English orthography to the extent that they have lost touch with Igbo
language and culture. Consider the following:
Enugu the capital of Enugu state of Nigeria means Énúgwú , which is hill top in Igbo language
due to its topography. Enugu as it is wrongly spelt is meaningless in the Igbo language.
Ísélé Úkwú /ísélé úkwú/, a town in Delta State is wrongly spelt Isele-Uku. Uku is meaningless
in Igbo language, but Ukwu means big/large.
The capital of Anambra state is wrongly spelt Awka instead of Ọka.
A more disturbing situation is where place names with the same pronunciations are spelt
differently across different Igbo towns. Examples:
Onícha in Anambra State is spelt Onitsha, while the one in the Igbo speaking area of Delta State
is spelt ‘Onicha’.
Ọba /ọba/ in Idemili North LGA in Anambra State is spelt Ọba, while the one in Nsukka, Enugu
State is spelt Ọrba.
The word Anambra is an aberration in Igbo spelling because of the presence of the consonant
cluster <br> which is not acceptable in Igbo phonotactics. The correct spelling is Anambara in
line with the ‘Ọmambala River’ from where her name was derived. The /m/ is a syllabic nasal
and as such treated as a vowel.
The danger in this practice is that the meanings of Igbo words are being lost, and people who
are not familiar with the correct pronunciation of such wrongly pronounced names pronounce
them wrongly.
Personal names are not left out of this trend. People who answer Okafo, meaning a male child
born on Afor market day, for instance, have spelt their name as Okafo, Okafor, Okarfor, Okaphor
respectively, while those who answer Uzoka have spelt it as Uzoka, Uzorka, Uzohka, Uzokar.
Uzokah. These inconsistencies are misleading to learners of Igbo, and create confusion for users
of the language as to which of the spellings to select when faced with a situation to address an
Okafo or an Uzoka, for instance, in writing. It was this observation that drew my interest to this
research.
Okodo [2008], Oruchalu [1979], Ogbalu [1974], compiled anglicized Igbo names to illustrate
their forms, and condemned the practice. Obitube and Okeke [2019] studied the sociolinguistic
and pedagogical implications of Anglicization on Igbo place names using questionnaires and
observation as instruments for data collection. This paper, in addition to compiling an extensive
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Nnamdi-Eruchalu, G. I. (2021). Anglicization of Written Igbo Personal and Place Names: A Sociolinguistic Study. Advances in Social Sciences Research
Journal, 8(7). 501-515.
URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.14738/assrj.87.10384
list of Anglicized Igbo names and describing the patterns of the Anglicization is a clarion call to
standardize the spellings of personal names to make the language simpler for learners now that
UNESCO has listed it as an endangered language. It advocates ways the people can change
their attitude towards their language so as to sustain their culture and identity. To this end, the
researcher sets out to document and carry out an in-depth analysis of Igbo place and personal
names in the face of Anglicization with a view to finding out its implication for Igbo language
development and learning. To achieve these set objectives, the research is guided by the
following research questions.
i. In what ways have Igbo personal and place names been Anglicized?
ii. What implication has the Anglicization of Igbo personal and place names on the
language and the learners?
iii. How can the the Anglicization of Igbo names be checked?
The answers to these questions will provide the information needed to understand the major
concerns of this paper.
LITERATURE REVIEW
The Igbo and their Attitude towards their Language
Igbo is a major Nigerian language spoken as a first language in the South Eastern states of Abia,
Anambra, Ebonyi, Enugu, and Imo, and parts of the South Southern states of Akwa-Ibom, Rivers,
Delta, and Cross Rivers. However, due to the gregarious, industrious, and innovative lifestyle of
the Igbo, it is spoken all over Nigeria and in the diaspora where the speakers live [Buah 1973,
Asonye 2013]. Ribadu [2017] observes that it is common joke that whichever village you go in
Nigeria and you don’t see an Igbo man, you should take to your heels. Though taken simply as
a joke, this speaks to the industrious and adventurous nature of a typical Igbo persona and
illustrates how rooted the Igbo are in this country [p..9].
Greenberg 1963 classified Igbo among the kwa sub group of the Niger-Congo languages family
[Niger-Congo Languages, n.p., Asonye 2003]. It is a tonal as well as multidialectal language, with
its dialects different mainly in their phonological and lexical components, at times to a point of
being mutually unintelligible. The preliterate Igbo were farmers, hunters, fishermen, traders,
and craftsmen and women with specialized knowledge of pottery, carving, black smiting,
weaving, and many others, and were thus comfortable with their subsistent economy In fact,
the Igbo were living an organized lifestyle in their ‘self-sufficient society’ before they were
invaded by the Europeans [Isichei, 1973, p. 50].
The Europeans did not penetrate the Igbo interior early, but when they did, they established
trading relationships with the people, as well as their religion, and government. With a colonial
government in place, schools, churches, courts, and administrative offices, prisons, and others
were opened, and provided various opportunities to the people. Thus a foreign culture, foreign
religion, and foreign language were imposed on them. By their very adaptive, dynamic,
individualistic, and adventurous nature, they embraced them wholesomely.. Consequently, the
lifestyle of the Igbo was disrupted. Achebe captures it vividly in this excerpt:
But he says that our customs are bad; and our own brothers who have taken up his religion also
say that our customs are bad. How do you think we can fight when our own brothers have
turned against us? The white man is very clever. He came quietly and peaceably with his
religion. We were amused at his foolishness and allowed him to stay. Now he has won our
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brothers, and our clan can no longer act like one. He has put a knife on the things that held us
together and we have fallen apart. [2008, p. 141].
The people placed everything English above their own local values. Many educated Igbo parents
have forbidden addressing their children in the Igbo language, or even speak it at home
[Azuonye 2002]. Such parents boldly announce that their children neither speak nor
understand the language. The uneducated, some of whom cannot utter a single grammatical
sentence in the English language or pronounce the words correctly cannot miss any
opportunity to brandish English even when such a display is uncalled for. They also make it a
point of duty to make English the language of the home, thereby introducing their children to
bad English and no Igbo. The implication is that many Igbo children living right in the heart of
Igbo land among Igbo parents cannot speak the Igbo language well [Ani 2012, Emeka-Nwobia
2020]. It is already established that many Igbo today lace their Igbo with English words in their
day to day use of language because they are losing grip of their language [Asonye 2013, Okoye
and Onwuegbuchunam 2011]. I have not forgotten that I heard the word ‘enemy’ as a child from
my late paternal grandmother who never went to school for one day and who was never
exposed formally or informally to the English language. At first I thought it was an Igbo word
until I came across it in the course of my primary education. Yet, she used it and other English
expressions in her everyday conversations. That is the extent English has permeated the Igbo
rural areas. Ogbalu in Afigbo affirm that:
The people’s flair for things foreign, their dislike for their own things, tradition and mode of
living have constituted the main obstacle to Igbo language development.... Even persons who
had not been to school and could not make any single correct English sentence now find it
difficult to speak Igbo without punctuating it with English utterances suitable or unsuitable
[1995, p. 257]
Also worrisome is that many Igbo have gone to the extent of blotting out everything Igbo in
their names by Europeanizing both their given names and surnames, thereby making it
impossible for them to be traced to their root [Nnamdi-Eruchalu, 2017]. Originally, through
Igbo names you could point to the part of Igboland where someone comes from, but this is
becoming increasingly impossible with such names as Bianca Paul, Goodness Loveday, John
Israel, Salome Sunday, Sunday Moses, Felix Abraham, Nikky Michael which many Igbo answer
officially as their name. This trend if not urgently tackled by launching well-crafted campaigns
targeted at discouraging it, or documenting Igbo names answered in different parts of Igboland,
with their meanings, will lead to the loss of many Igbo personal names (of which some of them
are already extinct) by 2050. In many of the instances I inquired into such change of name was
done by the family, while the original Igbo name is left to die.
Nevertheless, the English language is a force to reckon with. It is spoken in the UK, United States
of America, Canada, New Zealand, Australia, and South Africa as a first language [Veghese
1989]. In Nigeria, India, Ghana, Sierra Leone, and almost all the countries colonized by Britain,
English is used as a second language. In many other countries of the world it is an official
language. Hornby [2015, R 91] enthuses that “one in five of the world population speaks English
with some degrees of competence”. It is the language of international diplomacy, world trade
and commerce, and international sports. The wealth of knowledge in modern scientific and
technological discoveries can only be adequately accessed through the medium of the English
language. It is one of the major languages used in the deliberations of the United Nations, and
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Nnamdi-Eruchalu, G. I. (2021). Anglicization of Written Igbo Personal and Place Names: A Sociolinguistic Study. Advances in Social Sciences Research
Journal, 8(7). 501-515.
URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.14738/assrj.87.10384
its organs, EU, AU, and many other international bodies as well as world communication. It is
also the language of command of NATO. In Nigeria, it is the linguistic bridge that links her
multiple small nations merged as one for colonial convenience. In fact, Nigeria exits because
English oils her existence. Though a second language in the country, its functional load is almost
as enormous as that of a first language [Onuigbo and Eyisi, 2009 ].
The Writing System
Writing is one of the “three basic modes of linguistic communication” [Finnegan 2012: 17].
Others are speech and signing. It is the use of graphic inscriptions to represent the words of a
language. Writing is system of representing the words of a language visually, and is different
from paintings, carvings, and so on which do not represent the word of a language [McGregor
2009]. Writing is said to have been invented thrice at three different regions of the world: the
Near East, China and Mesoamerica, the earliest of them being the Mesopotamian Cunieform
developed by the Sumerians of the present-day Iraq in the 3rd Millennium [Schmandt- Besserat,
2014 ]. Writing derives from speech which is primary to it, and represents it in some ways in
all true writing systems [McGregor 2009]. The writing system of a language defines the
linguistic unit that is represented by the graphemes of a language [Miller 2019. p. 1].
The world has evolved three main writing systems: the syllabary where a syllable corresponds
to a grapheme, morphographic where a word corresponds to a grapheme, and alphabetic where
a letter corresponds to a grapheme [Coulmas 2003, Schmandt- Besseret 2014]. The extent of
the consistency or accuracy between the sounds and graphemes of a language vary across
languages with Spanish, Igbo, for example, showing consistency, and English being highly
consistent, mainly due to the foreign status many of her word stock. Learning to read in a
language, therefore, involves discovering the linear correspondences between the sounds of
the spoken language and the graphemes. For instance, to be able to read the Igbo word ‘ụlọ’, the
reader would need to be able to realize that the sound /ụ/ is realized as the grapheme ụ, the
sound /l/ is realized as the grapheme l, and the sound /ọ/ is realized as the grapheme ọ. This
pattern of correspondence between the written and phonological forms is called the
orthography of the language.
The Igbo Orthography
The English language was already in use in this part of the world before the colonial rule. The
Education Ordinance of 1882 provided grants-in- aid for the teaching of reading and writing in
English, thereby sealing the fate of the fate of the Igbo language [Oraka, 1983, p. 2]. Meanwhile,
Igbo slaves continued to speak a dialect of Igbo called the Isuama Igbo. The German Missionary,
G. C. A. Oldendorp, came in contact with them in the West Indies, and had some Igbo words in
the book he published in 1777 [Oraka, 1983, p. 21]. Those were the first known written Igbo
words. About a decade later, tens of Igbo words were found in Oluida Equiano’s autobiography
published in London in 1789. The Abolition of slave trade, and subsequent settlement of ex- slaves in Freetown, Sierra Leone led to the compilation of Igbo word lists by ex-slaves.
Missionaries like Morrick (a missionary in Fernando Po), John Clark, S.W. Koelle also published
their Igbo wors lists. (Pritchett, n.p). Discussed below is a brief history of orthography of the
Igbo language:
The Lepsius Orthography: Lepsius, a German philologist produced the International Standard
Alphabets for all languages of the world in 1854 [Oraka, 1983, p. 25]. Thirty-four of them,
comprising twenty-six consonants and six vowels were adopted for the Igbo language. Among