A SOCIOLINGUISTIC STUDY OF LEXICAL BORROWING IN URHOBO

ABSTRACT

  This research is a sociolinguistic study of lexical borrowing in Urhobo language. It’s major purposes are; to find out the processes of inventing new lexical items through borrowing in Urhobo; to determine the types of borrowing, to find out the reasons for borrowing and the languages from which Urhobo borrow; and to determine the effects of borrowing on Urhobo. The primary source of data for this work will be the participant - observation method while the secondary source shall include text books, online materials and encyclopedias.

During the course of study the researcher found that Urhobo adopt both the importation and adaptation processes of borrowing. And out of the various types of borrowing only two are realizable in Urhobo i.e loan words and loan translation. He also found that Urhobo speakers borrow from languages they are in contact with, they borrow words from these languages in order to identify a   new concept or entity that did not exist at some point, they also borrow word out of ignorance of the actual word for a particular concept or phenomenon in the language, and finally, they borrow word in order to be as brief and as concise as possible and to effectively pass information across. The researcher found that Portuguese, English, Yoruba, Igbo, Hausa and Edo have served as donor languages, with English and Portuguese as the main donors. The effects of borrowing on the language over the years include, language change, elaboration of the lexicon of the language and importation of sounds into the language.