COMPARATIVE STUDY OF ENUANI AND THE NKWERRE DIALECT OF IGBO LANGUAGE
CHAPTER ONE
BACKGROUND TO THE STUDY
1.0 Introduction
This research is a comparative study of Enuani dialect of Igbo and the Igbo language spoken in Imo State by Nkwerre people with the view of capturing the possible similarities and differences found in the sound system of Enuani dialect of Igbo and the Nkwerre dialect of Igbo.
According to Ikekeonwu (1987), there are about 20 Igbo dialects and these dialects include Enuani,
Nkwerre, Ngwa, Orlu, Mbaise and so on. The project work focuses on the phonetics and phonology of the
Enuani and Nkwerre dialects of Igbo. A comparativestudy of this nature sets out to identify similarities or
differences in the sound systems of these dialects with the aim of determining the relationship between them.
1.1 The Igbo Language and People Nkamigbo (2010) claims that the Igbo people occupy what is politically known as the South-Eastern part of Nigeria. The Igbo language is spoken in the core Igbo States – Abia, Anambra, Ebonyi, Enugu, and Imo – as well as some parts of Bayelsa, Delta and Rivers States all in the Southern region of Nigeria. “It is a
recognized language in Equatorial Guinea, Cameroon, United States in the West and West Central Africa.
According to Austin Peter (2008), one thousand languages: living, endangered, and lost page 68; he
said that the Igbo language has about “eighteen to twenty-five million speakers”.
Igbo is a native language of the Igbo people, an ethnic group primarily located in South-eastern Nigeria.
There are about eighteen (18) to twenty-five (25) million speakers or rather approximately 20 million speakers
that are mostly in Nigeria and are primarily of Igbo descent. Igbo is a national language of Nigeria and it is
written in Latin script, which was introduced by British colonialists. There are over twenty (20) Igbo dialects.
There is apparently a degree of dialect levelling occurring.
Before the 16th century, the Igbo had an ideogram form of writing called “Nsibidi ideograms” (“Nsibidi” is an
ancient system of graphic communication indigenous to the “Ejagham people of South-eastern Nigeria and
South-western Cameroon in the Cross River region”).
This form of writing was also used by other neighbouring people like the Ibibios and the Efik. The form of writing
was invented by the Ekoi people for written communication. This form died out most likely due to the
fact that many of its users were members of secret societies such as Ekpe, who then made “Nsibidi” a
secret form of communication and did not want to publicly discuss it.
(“Nsibidi”: National Museum of African Art, Smithsonian Institution and Oraka (1983), the foundations of Igbo
Studies, pp. 17, 13).
The first book to publish Igbo words was Geschichte der Mission der Evangelischen Bruder aufden Carabischen (German: History of the Evangelistic Mission of the Brothers in the Caribbean), published in 1777. Shortly afterwards, in 1789, the interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, a former slave, featuring 79 Igbo words. The narrative also illustrated various aspects of Igbo life in detail, based on Olauah Equiano’s experiences in his hometown in Essaka
(Oraka, 1983:21; Equiano & Olaudah, 1789: 9).
