Federal University of Technology Yola - the citadel of higher learning

INAUGURAL LECTURE DELIVERED BY ABEL GBENGA FAKUADE
B.ED English (Ibadan) MA English Stylistics (Ibadan), Ph. D. Linguistics (lIorin) MRSA, MLAN, MNESA.

Prof. A.G. Fakuade, B.ED English (Ibadan) MA English Stylistics (Ibadan), Ph. D. Linguistics (lIorin) MRSA, MLAN, MNESA., Deputy Vice Chancellor (Academic) FUTY

INTRODUCTION

The Chairman, Prof. Abdullahi Y. Ribadu, Vice Chancellor FUT Vola.
The Registrar
The University Librarian & Chairman, Lectures & Award of Prize Committee
Deans and Directors
Distinguished Professors
Heads of Departments
Members of FUTY Community
Members of the Press
Great FUTY Students
Invited Guests
Ladies and Gentlemen

A few years ago, linguists raced to the Turkish farm village of Haci Osman to record Tefvik Esenc, a frail farmer believed to be the last known speaker of the Ubyk language once spoken in the northwestern Caucasus. At that time only four or five elder tribesmen remembered some phrases of the language, but only Esenc knew it fluently. Even his own three sons were unable to converse with their father in his native language because they became Turkish Speakers. In 1984 Esenc had already written the inscription he wanted on his grave stone. This is the grave of Tefvik Esenc. He was the last person able to speak the language they called Ubykh.

Four years later (Nettle & Romaine 2000) in South Carolina a native American named Red Thundercloud died, the last voice of a dying tongue. No longer able to converse in his native language with the remaining members of his community, he took the language of his tribe to the grave with him. Roscinda Nolasquez of Pala, California, the last speaker of Cupeno died in 1987 at the age of 94 and Laural Somersal, one of the last speakers of Wappo, died in 1990.

Tefvik Esenc, Red Thundercloud, Roscinda, Nolasquez and Laura Somersal, lived and died thousands of miles apart in radically different cultural and economic circumstances. Although the precise factors that destroyed their communities and left them as the last representatives of dying languages were quite different, their stories are remarkably similar in other ways. Unfortunately, their fates reveal a common pattern, which is but the tip of the iceberg: the world's languages are dying at an alarming rate.

A brief look around the world today reveals that the trickle of extinctions of the last few centuries is now turning into a flood. My opening examples indicate that language extinction is not an isolated phenomenon confined to ancient empires and remote backwardness. It is going on before our very eyes in all parts of the world, and Nigeria is no exception. In fact, this lecture tells the story of how and why languages are disappearing in Nigeria. It also shows how the various factors responsible in the past for language extinction pose an even greater threat to many languages today in Nigeria. The lecture concludes with some strategies that will help combat this linguistic phenomenon.

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CONCLUSION

Mr. Vice Chancellor, I must move towards concluding this inaugural lecture.

I have spent most of this lecture examining how the Nigeria’s biolinguistic diversity has come to the brink of a new extinction crises because I believe that only a better understanding of these processes will allow us to change them. I equally think there are many reasons why all of us - not just linguists, or those whose languages are under threat - should be alarmed at what is happening and try to do something to stop it.

As a uniquely human invention, language is what has made everything possible for us as a species: our cultures, our technology, our art, music and much more. In our languages lies a rich source of the accumulated wisdom of all humans. While one technology may be substituted for another, this is not true of languages. Each language has its own window on the world. Every language is a living museum, a monument to every culture it has been vehicle to. It is a loss to every one of us if a fraction of that diversity disappears when there is something that can have been done to prevent it. Moreover, every people has a right to their own language, to preserve it as a cultural resource and to transmit it to their children.

Most of us take the diversity found in the Nigeria=s languages for granted, just as the cow takes her tail for granted in this Jamaican Proverb: "the cow didn't know what use her tail was until the butcher cut it off".

Mr. Vice Chancellor, the preservation of local ecosystems is, in turn, critical for the preservation of the global ecosystem, which is the intersection of all local ecosystems. Because it is in local ecosystems that the game of life is played out, it is these individual habits all around the world which need support. As the environmental slogan tells us: "think globally, act locally".

We must apply an ecological bottom-up approach to language maintenance as well. Action needs to begin at the most local level in two senses. First, most of the work will have to be done primarily by small groups themselves rather than by any of the government agencies and networks that exist today (though their support also has a role to play). Second, it is necessary to concentrate on the home front (Le intergenerational transmission) before resources are expended at higher levels (school, work, government, and so, on). Without transmission, there can be no long-term maintenance.

The point being made here is that language maintenance must first begin in the community itself through voluntary efforts and be financed from the bottom-up through community resources in the early stages.

The home is a safer space whose boundaries the majority can more easily control when a more powerful group dominates the public spheres. Securing the home front does not rely on the majority's cooperation, nor does it involve major costs. A good example of language maintenance at local level has been demonstrated by Ghotuo speakers in Owan-west Local Government Area of Edo State. The Ghotuo speakers insisted that their children must be taught in Ghutou, not in Edo, at least, in early primary education (Cf. Elugbe 1991, Awobuiuyi, 1991, Fakuade 2001).

This is not to absolve the state of responsibility, but financial aid comes at a price. Dependence on state resources undermines the minority's responsibility and right to control its own affairs. In so far as a minority language represents an alternative point of view and lifestyle that is potentially in conflict with the dominant culture, requests for finance for local language development may represent a threat to the powers that be.

In addition to bottom-up strategies for preserving language and diversity, there are also some useful top-down strategies I will like to suggest.

The first one is to make the preservation of languages part of general activism on behalf of the environment. Arguments in favour of supporting linguistic diversity are the same as those used by scientists in favour of protecting biodiversity. This means that linguists and others will have to become activists and convince other international groups such as Cultural Survival, Green Peace, Amnesty International, the Sierra Club and various local civic groups that language preservation is an important task falling within their remit (Kangas 2000).

The second strategy is to establish language policies on a local, regional and national level as part of overall political planning and resource management. Nigeria should have language policy that embodies the principle of linguistic human rights. Establishing an institution for Nigerian languages is not enough. Nigeria should set up agencies for language maintenance and development. At the moment more is being said about the plight of bush burning, tree felling, tree planting than about the disappearance of human language diversity.

Some still regard the concept of language rights as, regressive because they are seen as encouraging the persistence of ethnic differences leading to antagonism. Some even see it as a curse. But we should not forget that there is another face to the Old Testament story of the Tower of Babel, where multilingualism is a debilitating punishment visited upon humanity for its presumption. The New Testament, by contrast presents linguistic diversity as a divine boon bestowed upon the apostles who are empowered by this miraculous gift of tongues. Every ethnolinguistic group should strive therefore to see that their language is not murdered.
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