LINGUISTIC CREATIVITY: THE STUDY OF THE INNOVATIVE LINGUISTICS AND TEXTUAL STRATEGIES IN THE NIGERIA ACADEMIC DISCOURSE.

Abstract

In any geographical contact zone, where the diverse languages and cultures intersect, there would inevitably be linguistic and cultural integration and assimilation. This is the situation with the English expressions in Nigeria where important social-cultural habits and traits are expressed in a foreign Language. Based exclusively on the data collected from ‘Purple Hibiscus’ by Chimamanda  Ngozi  Adichie and ‘The secret lives of Baba Seyi’s wives’ by Lola Soneyin, this study therefore is an attempt to examine how the authors appropriated and reconstituted the English Language to embody the energies of their respective cultural sensibilities. Secondly, the study equally tries to examine those innovative linguistic and textual strategies used by these writers to bear the burden of their cultural experiences or to convey in a language that is not their own the spirit that is their own. The theoretical frameworks that piloted this study are the Giles and Coupland's "Language Accommodation Theory” and John Grumpez’s ‘Theory of Speech community’. These theories presented a systematic framework for the categorization of the mutual influence and mixing that takes place when different languages and cultures come in contact. This study is an explanatory research design. This method of analysis involved studying the literary texts, examining the use of the nativized variety of English in them, extracting excerpts from the literary texts and describing/analysing them. The nativized variety was extracted and analysed to establish if they have aesthetic values they add to these literary texts in terms of the functions of language. The study finds out that the English language was indigenized by creative writers to perform culture specific functions. The study equally observed that the creative writers use of English is no doubt seen as an acceptable departure from the rules in diction or from what is generally regarded as the standard but nonetheless, it possesses mutual intelligibility and acceptability even at international level. The discourse is concluded from the perspective of the local languages, for not only has English influenced the languages with which it has come into contact around the world with, but English itself has been and continues to be influenced by other languages and this influence is responsible for the new forms of English mushrooming all over the globe. The study recommends that this variety be developed,  standardized and identified as Nigerian because it has been used by some writers to win international awards.