Nigerian English

Abstract

The present form of the English language in Nigeria is the outcome of its contact with the indigenous languages of the region: a confirmation of the truism that languages in contact influence each other. When English was initially introduced through trade, then entrenched through colonialism, it was ‘derobed’ of its British flavour. Paradoxically, such a state of affairs brings to mind a statement by Enoch Powell, a professor of Classics and former Conservative member of the British Parliament, who noted, rather eccentrically: ‘Others may speak and read English – more or less – but it is our language, not theirs. It was made in England by the English and it remains our distinctive property, however widely it is learnt or used’ (as quoted in Kujore 1995:367).