COMPARATIVE STUDY OF ENUANI AND THE NKWERRE DIALECT OF IGBO LANGUAGE

COMPARATIVE STUDY OF ENUANI AND THE NKWERRE DIALECT OF IGBO LANGUAGE

Nsibidi ideograms, an old style of pictorial communication exclusive to the “Ejagham people of South-Eastern Nigeria and South-Western Cameroon in the Cross River region,” were used by the Igbo before the 16th century. Other locals like the Ibibios and the Efik adopted this style of writing as well. The Ekoi people developed writing as a means of written communication. This form of communication vanished most likely as a result of the fact that many of its users belonged to secret societies like Ekpe, who turned “Nsibidi” into a private form of communication and did not wish to discuss it in public.

(See “Nsibidi”: Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of African Art and Oraka (1983), The Foundations of Igbo Studies, pp. 17, 13).
Geschichte der Mission der Evangelischen Bruder auf den Carabischen (History of the Evangelistic Mission of the Brothers in the Caribbean), which was published in 1777, was the first book to use Igbo words. Soon later, in 1789, a former slave named Olaudah Equiano published an intriguing autobiography that contained 79 Igbo words. Olauah Equiano’s experiences in his native Essaka served as the basis for the narrative’s detailed illustrations of numerous facets of Igbo life (Oraka, 1983:21; Equiano & Olaudah, 1789: 9).

A “Standard Alphabet” created in 1854 by German philologist Karl Richard Lepsius was intended to be used by all languages in the globe. In order to mandate the instruction of reading and writing only in English, Britain passed an educational ordinance in 1882. After the Igbo culture was destroyed by British imperialism in 1807, following the abolition of slavery, this momentarily hampered the development of Igbo as well as other West African languages. The dialect gaining the most popularity is known as “Central Igbo,” and it is based on the speech of two Igbo from the Ezinihitte tribe who live in the Eastern Nigerian region of Central Owerri Province, between the towns of Owerri and Umuahia.It was first proposed as a literary style in 1939 by Dr. Ida C. Ward, and missionaries, authors, and publishers from all over the area gradually accepted it. A standardization committee was established in 1972 by the Association for Promoting Igbo Language and Culture (SPILC), a nationalist group that considered the development of central Igbo as an imperialist endeavor. With the inclusion of loan words and words from Igbo dialects beyond the “Central” areas, Standard Igbo intends to cross-pollinate central Igbo.It was first proposed as a literary style in 1939 by Dr. Ida C. Ward, and missionaries, authors, and publishers from all over the area gradually accepted it. A standardization committee was established in 1972 by the Association for Promoting Igbo Language and Culture (SPILC), a nationalist group that considered the development of central Igbo as an imperialist endeavor. With the inclusion of loan words and words from Igbo dialects beyond the “Central” areas, Standard Igbo intends to cross-pollinate central Igbo.The new orthography was accepted and implemented by the government, along with Roman Catholic and Methodist missionaries, while other protestant missionaries were against it. In 1962, an agreement was reached on a common orthography, the current Onwu alphabet, which was developed as a compromise between the ancient Lepsius alphabet and a more recent alphabet supported by the International Institute of African Languages and Cultures (IIALC).