MUTUAL INTELLIGIBILITY BETWEEN UGWULANGWU, OKPOSI AND UBURU

ABSTRACT
This work is a comparative study of Ugwulangwu, Okposi and Uburu spoken in Ohaozara L.G.A in Ebonyi State. The purpose of these research work is to determine the levels of mutually intelligibility between these speech varieties, -in order to evaluate their linguistics status. The motive for the conducting this study is to improve on the linguistics knowledge about Ugwulangwu, Okposi and Uburu to enhance their documentation.
The theoretical framework within which this research work was
conducted. The lexicostatistics was adopted for the statistical handling of available data. The instrument used in data collection was University of Benin 200 wordlist. Three competent speakers of each speech varieties were interviewed for data collection. The researcher was the sole field worker
Data analysis showed that for complete, partial, and non cognates Ugwulangwu, Okposi and Uburu are highly mutually intelligible. For each of the levels of comparisons, percentage scores of complete cognates, for Ugwulangwu /Okposi was 66%, partial 19%, non-cognates 12% and without indigenous equivalents 3%, where the complete cognates were already above 60%. For each percentage scores, for Ugwulangw/Uburu
complete cognates was 85%, partial 6%,non-cognates 6% and without indigenous equivalents 3%.Finally,for Okposi/Uburu complete cognate was 70.5%,partial 16%,non-cognate 10.5% and without indigenous equivalents 3%.These percentile values of Ugwulangwu,Okposi and Uburu shows that they are not one and the same dialect of Igbo language but separate dialects
of Igbo language.
This work would contribute to further research on Ugwulangwu,
Okposi and Uburu varieties. The work would serve as reference point for further linguistics studies on the Igbo languages.it also provide an avenue for the documentation of these varieties of Igbo language.