STUDIES IN AFRICAN LANGUAGES AND CULTURES
Datos de la Revista
| Tipo | JOURNAL |
|---|---|
| Editorial | University of Warsaw (PL) |
| ISSN | 2545-2134 / 2657-4187 |
| Scopus | 21101034403 |
| OpenAlex | S4210182121 |
| Sitio web | https://api.elsevier.com/content/serial/title/issn/2545-2134 |
| Total de publicaciones | 61 |
| Periodo de cobertura | 2018 - 2025 |
| País | PL |
| Idioma | EN |
| Acceso | Open Access • OA Diamante |
| Indexación | Indexada en DOAJ • Indexada en Scopus |
| Citada por | 2 |
| Factor de impacto | 0.096 |
| SJR | 0.141 (Q2) |
| SNIP | 0.73 |
| CiteScore | 0.4 |
| Índice h | 1 |
| Participación femenina en la autoría | 23.1% |
History · Literature and Literary Theory · Religious Studies · Linguistics and Language · African cultural and philosophical studies · African history and culture analysis · African history and culture studies · African studies and sociopolitical issues · Colonialism, slavery, and trade · Gender Studies in Language
Vowel and tone processes in Ife (Togo)
This article describes the morphophonological and morphotonological processes that occur when vowels are juxtaposed in Ife, an Ede language closely related to Yoruba that is spoken in Togo and Benin. Its source is an unpublished manuscript based on extensive fieldwork undertaken by the principal author in the 1980s. We have checked the language data in it and expanded, restructured and updated the analysis. The article first investigates the juxt…
Historical consciousness and indigenous rituals: History Education students’ attitude to the Zulu indigenous tradition
This explanatory and qualitative study stems from the expectation that history education students have developed the competency to apply historical consciousness to different concepts, including those that are part of their culture, such as the Zulu indigenous rituals. Historical consciousness is the conceptual framework and postcolonial theory is the theoretical framework for this study. 15 participants were divided into three focus groups for i…
Making African names trendy: Sociolinguistic implications of the ‘englishisation’ of indigenous Igbo names
This study examines an aspect of linguistic globalization known as Englishisation (Kachru 1994; Boussebaa & Brown 2016; Mensah 2021) by adopting the sociolinguistic approach to investigate the creative modifi cations of some Igbo indigenous names with the aim of ascertaining their underpinnings and implications for linguistic and cultural diversity in a globalized world. The findings reveal that in addition to contact and assimilation, the quest …
Ethnopragmatic and sociolinguistic interpretation of death-announcing euphemisms in Ewe
This article explores how the Ewe culture infl uences death-announcing euphemisms and attempts to establish how widely speakers know the contexts of their use. It scrutinises two sets of data: qualitative data analysed using ethnopragmatic lenses to describe the expressions and their typical contexts of use and quantitative data analysed withinthe Variationist Sociolinguistic Approach. The study has found that while some expressions are popular, …
The reciprocal -an in Ndendeule
This article describes the reciprocal -an and its morphosyntactic and semantics in Ndendeule, a Bantu language spoken in southern Tanzania. As in other languages, the reciprocal constructions in Ndendeule express several situations, including prototypical or mutual situations, chain, collective situations, melee, radial, and iterative situations. Most reciprocal constructions involve minimally two participants. Some of the reciprocal situations m…
The development of literacy in indigenous languages in west African francophone countries: Challenges and expectations
The French style of governance during colonisation was “assimilation”. It made French the only medium of instruction and communication in schools, thus annihilating African languages and cultures. Francophone African countries are now struggling to include their indigenous languages into the school curriculum. This article examines the challenges faced by francophone countries like Benin Republic, in their quest to elevate the status of indigenou…
The early Islamic tradition in Ethiopia: Report on the first season of the archaeo-ethnographic research in Negash (Tigray)
In both Islamic and Ethiopian tradition Negash (Tigray, northern Ethiopia) was the destination of a group of followers of the Prophet Muhammad seeking refuge from persecutions ca. 615 CE. They established the first Muslim community in Africa, and the memory of those events is still alive and clear. The article presents the premises and preliminary results of the project aiming to identify any material evidence of the early settlement in Negash as…
Oral Afrocentric storytelling as mediated enunciation in knowledge space among the Luo people of Kenya
In this article, I reflect on the value of oral Afrocentric storytelling as a mediated method in knowledge space concerning the Luo language. The focus is on some mediation strategies that storytellers use. This was a qualitative study that purposively sampled and interviewed a group of elderly men and women based on their age, experiences in storytelling and leadership roles in the community for the stories used as data. Furthermore, I relied on…
Garden imagery in East African Anglophone literature from the mid-1960s to the present Authors Costanza Mondo
This article examines garden imagery in East African Anglophone literature through contemporary literary sources, and sixties-seventies poetry from two East African literary journals. After exploring East African examples of Foucault’s “oriental garden”, I focus on the colonial English garden in East Africa and its transformation into a coveted status symbol after Independence. Drawing on MacKenzie’s “Empire of Nature” and Quijano’s “coloniality …
Going superstitious and blaming the invisible “other”: A linguistic appraisal of social media posts on “village people”
In this study, we explore how superstitions and blame are weaved in the linguistic constructions and representations of village people, the infamous mystic villains. Using Cultural Discourse Analysis (CuDA), we examine selected social media tweets and posts in which netizens deployed a mix of linguistic humour, traditional African belief system, and quasi-religious sensibilities to project irrational belief in supernatural influences of village p…
Pragmatic strategies in the crime narratives of accused rapists in Agodi Custodial Centre, Ibadan, Oyo State, Nigeria
Existing linguistic studies in Nigeria have focused on investigator’s communicative acts in coercive investigative discourse, with little attention given to non-coercive investigative discourse involving accused rapists (ARs) in correctional centres. This study addresses this gap by analysing the pragmatic strategies ARs employ in crime narratives within Agodi Custodial Centre, Ibadan, Nigeria to offer insights into evidential cues that could imp…
From marginality to expansion: Three polities on the East African central caravan route in the late pre-colonial era
The article concerns the origins and political structures of three polities that emerged during the last decades of the pre-colonial era in the central part of present-day Tanzania. They are usually known under their leaders’ names: Mirambo, Nyungu-ya-Mawe, and Mkwawa. The article pinpoints structural differences between the polities and accounts for them in the light of political anthropology, especially drawing on the concepts of chiefdom and t…
Negative transfer in the L2 acquisition of passive constructions among French learners in Burkina Faso
This study examines the acquisition of French passives by L1 Burkinabè native language learners. It investigates the negative L1 transfer from languages that do not overtly mark passive constructions. The analysis also includes other factors that are strongly associated with successful acquisition of French passives. The results confirm that L1 Burkinabè native language users have difficulty in acquiring L2 French passive constructions. Furthermo…
Ghanaian language as a national language: Perspectives of Ghanaian university students
This article was propelled by some calls for the enactment of a language policy on an indigenous national language for Ghana. It explores the perspectives of Ghanaian university students on the choice of a Ghanaian language as a national one, using descriptive statistics from a questionnaire survey conducted at the Faculty of Social Sciences, KNUST. The analysis of the survey results on key questions on the subject revealed that there is a place …
The character of Chi in Obioma’s An orchestra of minorities in the context of Igbo cosmology
With the growing concern for revisiting the cultural roots in contemporary African literature, this article explores the concept of chi in the Igbo belief system as manifested in literary sources. Specifi c emphasis is put on the Chi character in Chigozie Obioma’s novel An orchestra of minorities. The article focuses on exploring Chi’s role as narrator, guiding spirit, and orator who transcends all spatial-temporal boundaries. Being a representat…
The acquisitive -pata in Swahili
This study examines the usage of the Swahili verb -pata ‘get’ as an auxiliary, shedding light on its multifaceted roles. The examination of its structural variation and functional extensions is based on data from different Swahili varieties. Drawing from a broad and versatile body of previous research on Swahili, this study posits the development of -pata from an erstwhile lexical verb to a light verb used in lexicalized constructions and further…
Variation in Ẹ̀dó personal pronouns: A case of allomorphy
This article re-examines pronouns in Ẹdó, a Niger Congo language indigenous to Nigeria. Previous researches ascribed the large personal pronoun inventory of the language to structural case (Omoregie 1983) and deletion rules (Omoruyi 1986), paying little attention to the internal structure of these words. Thus, this study revisits the issue from the perspective of morphology. Data for the study was obtained from primary and secondary sources. The …
Unmasking racial struggles in postcolonial South Africa in Peter Mtuze’s The Way to Madam
This article aims to unmask racial struggles in postcolonial South Africa relying on Peter Mtuze’s The Way to Madam (2004). To achieve this aim, postcolonial literary theory is applied to the discussions. This article reveals covert dimensions of racial struggles in South Africa that go far beyond the cosmetic level of this short story. Research interest is directed at specific expressions the characters use with references to historical and cont…
The use of Chichewa proverbs as a political campaign tool in Saulos Klaus Chilima’s speeches
This paper examines Saulos Klaus Chilima’s (henceforth referred to as Chilima) use of Chichewa proverbs during the Malawi 2019 presidential election campaign period as a campaign tool. It seeks to highlight how Chilima (re)used Chichewa proverbs to solicit voters for himself and discredit his opponents in the presidential race. The study uses the Conceptual Metaphor Theory, and seeks to identify metaphors generated by the proverbs that Chilima us…
Women in crime: A reader-response analysis of Femi Osofisan’s One upon Four Robbers
This study examines female characters as agents of criminal activities in Femi Osofisan’s Once upon Four Robbers. The study relies on insights from Wolfgang Iser’s Reader- -Response Theory (RRT). Drawing data from twelve purposively selected excerpts from the text, the study argues that Osofisan connects the reader’s knowledge in constructing women as agents of crime. Women’s involvement in crime is constructed through their activities in organis…
The changing linguistic codes in Hausa hip-hop songs
The objective of this article is to examine the use of varying linguistic codes in the lyrics of the Hausa hip-hop songs. It discovers that Hausa hip-hop singers switch languages, drawing inspiration from global hip-hop classics (African-Americans) and Nigerian hip-hop to signal socio-cultural awareness and the complex weave of contemporary hip-hop music culture. It also reveals that the singers construct their lyrics by combining Hausa and Engli…
Culture and author’s personality in the literary text: A rereading of Abubakar Imam’s Magana jari ce
The article is an attempt to look at the literary text as a manifestation of the author’s personality and cultural background. The analysis concerns the book Magana jari ce ‘Wisdom is an asset’, containing stories from the native Hausa tradition and foreign motifs, adapted by the author, Abubakar Imam, for the Hausa text. The analysis is to demonstrate links between author’s personality and cultural background in creative adaptation of the storie…
Ethnic diversity and its impact on group identification in Darfur
This study addresses historical and cultural problems of man’s identity and ethnic origin in the Darfur region, famous for its cultural role throughout history. This subject deserves particular academic attention in order to understand the structure and identity of the Darfurian cultural features, their dimensions and characteristics viewed from different perspectives. The article explores the rich and complex centuries-old history of the Darfur …
Sentential and proverbial morphological structures of Christian theonyms in Bemba
Drawing on Bemba, a Bantu language primarily spoken in northern Zambia, we interrogate the Christian theonyms to account for their complex morphological structures, while highlighting the wealth of information on the Bemba society and their sociocultural environment. For data, semi-structured interviews, focus group discussions, and document analysis were employed. Thus, the article highlights two morphological structures, one being a sentential …
Numeral systems of Fula and Wolof: A comparison of morphosyntactic characteristics
The paper presents an overview of Fula and Wolof numeral systems. Fula is represented by six major lects, for which cardinal, ordinal, distributive, fraction, and human forms of numerals are analyzed. Wolof is the closest relative of Fula, and for this language cardinal and ordinal numeral systems are also analyzed. Apart from the numerals themselves, the syntax of the noun phrase which contains a numeral is analyzed for each language. The langua…
Kinship metaphors in Swahili language and culture
Swahili kinship terms are highly polysemous and occur in many figurative meanings out of which some are fully conventionalized in language usage. The article focuses on a specific case of such extensions which metaphorically frames an unrelated person as one’s kin. The usage patterns of this “fictive” kinship will be analyzed in various pragmatic contexts demonstrating their illocutionary and perlocutionary effects. In addition, it will be shown …
Christianity and the formation of the ideology of power in Soyo in the 17th century
The aim of the article is to present the role of the Christian elements in the formation of the ideology of power in Soyo in the mid of the 17th century. Thanks to its location, the province of Soyo played an important role in Kongo’s relations with Europe. Its location also meant that European influences in this province were stronger than in the rest of the Kingdom of Kongo. A permanent mission of the Capuchin order in Soyo was established as e…
The numeral system(s) in Western Serengeti: Formal, functional, and historical inferences
In this study we offer a detailed synchronic and diachronic account of the hitherto un(der) documented numeral systems of the four closely related (Eastern) Bantu language varieties: Ikoma, Nata, Ishenyi, and Ngoreme – together forming the Western Serengeti subgroup. We describe the essentially identical formation and organization of numerals in these language varieties while also noting the morphosyntactic behaviour of numeral expressions and th…
Transitive L-verbs (grade 2) and transitive H-verbs (grades 1, 4, 5, and 6) in Hausa verbal compounds
This paper examines Hausa verbal compounds in terms of the division of regular verbs (verbs in the “grade system”) into verbs which have a High or Low tone first syllable. The focus of the paper is the surprisingly small number of transitive L-verbs (verbs beginning with a Low tone – “grade 2”) and their limited use of compound markers which contrasts strongly with the frequency of transitive H-verbs (verbs beginning with a with High tone) and th…
Images of Amhara women in oral poetry
The objective of this article is to describe the thematic images of Amhara women in oral poetry. The study is based on field research conducted in rural areas of Western Gojjam and Awi Zone. The data was collected by observation, interview, and focus group discussion. For documentary evidence, twelve informants were selected with the use of a purposive sampling technique. The research method employed was ethnographic qualitative description. The …
Reflections on a community-based approach to writing grammars of endangered African languages
Increasingly, there have been proposals for grammar writers to take into account the realities and needs of the community in order to produce grammars that can serve the interests of the native speakers (e.g. Kadanya 2006, Rehg 2014). Obviously, a grammar of an endangered language should, among other things, lead to the maintenance and/or revitalization of the language. However, grammars that are comprehensive and clear (Noonan 2007, Payne 2014, …
Islamic martyrdom in northern Nigeria
The paper discusses some elements of the tradition of martyrdom among Muslims in northern Nigeria. It describes the basic frameworks of the concept of martyrdom in Islam with special reference to its contemporary usage. Then it discusses the shape of the idea of martyrdom during the times of Usman ɗan Fodio’s jihad. It further examines the concept of martyrdom as presented in the speeches of Muhammad Yusuf, the ideologue of the Boko Haram organis…
Nominal suffixes as markers of information structure in Basketo
This paper deals with the information function of two nominal suffixes, -i appearing in all nouns, and -n- in first- and second-person pronouns in Basketo, a North Omotic language predominantly spoken in the Basketo Special Woreda in Ethiopia. The suffix -i is often described as nominative. However, object nouns without definite marker can be marked by -i, and as a result -i can appear in both subject and object in the same sentence. We analyze m…
English phonological errors by Kimakunduchi speaking EFL learners in Zanzibar
The aim of the present study was to find the phonological errors on segmental level involving selected consonant sounds which are produced by Kimakunduchi speaking English as Foreign Language (EFL) learners in Zanzibar. Specifically, the study sought to provide the evidence of cross-linguistic influence involving phonological transfer on segmental level. The study employed two sampling techniques: stratified and random sampling. The data for this…
The role of lethuelas/sangomas in Lesotho. “Traditional” beliefs, spiritual professions and Christianity among the Basotho
This article investigates the place of lehuelas/sangomas in Basotho society, their vocation, work and relationship with Christian churches. Lethuelas, also called sangomas or shamans, are healers, diviners and/or mediums. Thanks to the country’s mountainous isolation, their vocation and work can be observed in its most primal and unspoilt version, passed down for generations without much influence of outside shamanic traditions or New Age forms o…
Discourse strategies of handling denials in police – suspect interaction in Ibadan, Nigeria
Studies on police interrogation have examined interrogating police officers’ (IPOs’) deployment of power abuse in gleaning confessional statements from suspects. However, studies on how IPOs handle denials during interrogation has not been given adequate attention. Therefore, this study investigates discourse strategies of handling denials in police-suspect interaction in Ibadan, Southwest Nigeria. Spencer-Oatey’s rapport management theory served…
Contextualizing Universal Theory of Acronym Formation in Kiswahili acronyms
In controlling and managing knowledge there is need of a tool that ensures such management. Theories, principles and rules are the right tools for knowledge management (cf. Mkude 2008: 158). There has been so far only one theory known to the present researcher, which is UTAF (Zahariev 2004). This study evaluates the applicability of Universal Theory of Acronym Formation (UTAF) to Bantu languages drawing data from Kiswahili since the UTAF was deve…
African elements (Africanisms) in modern American English
The article deals with the influence of words of African origin on the formation of American English [AE] word stock. It provides new interpretation of Africanisms and shows the significance of this part of vocabulary in determining the characteristics of the American culture. The investigation is based on the existing sources (mainly lexicographic works) and is aimed at their new structural and functional analysis. As a result of the research, i…
Greeting and saying farewell in two Bantu languages: Swahili and Zulu
The article discusses greetings and farewells of a typical conversation in two Bantu languages: Swahili and Zulu. The conversation usually comprises the greeting followed by the enquiry about each other’s well-being, the actual conversation, and then the parting farewell. The article outlines the importance of nonverbal, sociolinguistic, and situational factors of the salutation. The objectives of the paper are to explore the feasibility of consi…
Laughter interjections in Xhosa
The present paper analyzes the system of laughter-based interjections (L-INTJs) in Xhosa. By drawing on corpus and fieldwork evidence, the author concludes the following: the systems of L-INTJs consists of five types of constructions built around the segments ha, he, ho, hi, and yha, the satellites te and ti, as well as a number of replicative templates. The pattern hVhVhV with a short vowel is the most productive. Other replicative patterns, pat…
A critical analysis of "Baubawan Burmi, kassasaɓarmu ce kan zaɓar jagora" by Aminu Ladan Abubakar (ALA)
This paper explores understanding of literature as a medium through which poets address issues in order to reach their audience with a message of service to the community or the society more broadly. Poets engage the society through their literary composition by using the language that pleases and, through entertainment, they try to put across ideas of bringing a change. The analysis focuses on 21st century Hausa poetry of Aminu Ladan Abubakar (A…
Conceptualizations of Head in Dholuo
The role of the body in human perception of the surroundings has been continually investigated in the recent past. It has been influenced by the embodiment hypothesis which holds that the human body provides the very first experience that humans have about their environments. This article brings evidence from Dholuo that the head is conceptualized in various ways like metonymic head for hair, head for person, head for character traits, unit of me…
Nominal Phrase Structure in Ikyaushi (M.402)
This is my presentation for the Southern African Linguistics and Applied Linguistics Society. Please accept my apologies for the shorter length; OSF would not allow me to upload the full twenty minutes, so I had to make substantial "cuts" for the email to be accepted
Convergence of form and content between indigenous and Christian songs and beliefs of the Yoruba in south-western Nigeria
Beginning and the development of Yoruba written poetry was believed to be influenced by the Christian songs and hymns. However, this study demonstrates the impact of Yoruba traditional poetry and beliefs in the development of local Christian religion and beliefs in the present time. Relevant data on both Christian and indigenous Yoruba beliefs were sampled through observation as well as extracted from written texts such as songs, hymns and poems …
Stefan Strelcyn and his archival recordings of oral tradition of Ethiopia made in 1957/58 (including four Amharic love songs)
Stefan Strelcyn – a Polish scholar whose achievements were acknowledged by the Emperor Haile Selassie I in 1967 with a Haile Selassie Award for Ethiopian Studies – initiated African studies at the University of Warsaw. His main field of scholarly activity covered cataloguing manuscripts in various European library collections as well as studying traditional Ethiopian medicine and medicinal plants. However, during his field trip to Ethiopia in 195…
A systemized explanation for vowel phoneme change in the inadmissible phonological structure /VV/ in Zulu
This article offers a systematic and comprehensive account of vowel changes that take place in the inadmissible phonological sequence /VV/ within a word in Zulu. Instead of discussing vowel changes in terms of vowel coalescence, vowel elision and glide insertion (as is conventionally done) this approach discusses the vowel changes with regard to the position of the two juxtaposed vowel phonemes on the vowel chart. The resultant form is predictabl…
Metaphorical euphemisms in death-discourse among the Nzema
This article seeks to deepen our understanding of the cognitive processes in death euphemisms in Nzema, a Kwa language of Ghana. The article highlights the metaphorical “mappings” across conceptual domains, where the concept of death (target domain) is well understood in terms of more physical events such as journey, departure, return, invitation, continuous sleep, lose a fight, etc. (source domain). It is demonstrated that the Nzema conceptualis…
Forms and functions of “impossibility” expressions in Yoruba informal interactions
This study investigates the forms and pragmatic functions of “impossibility” slangy expressions in Yoruba informal interactions, within the framework of Mey’s pragmatic acts (2001). Data comprised ten informal interactions randomly sampled from thirty interactions observed among the Yoruba in different contexts. Findings revealed “impossibility” slangy expressions in Yoruba trifurcate into function‐oriented, structure‐function‐oriented, and dange…
Construction Morphology in Yoruba names: Schemas and processes
This article is an attempt to explore how the framework of construction morphology may apply to the analysis of Yoruba names. Following this approach, we show that each Yoruba name is a unique construction involving semantic, syntactic and phonological properties. Hence, this discussion highlights that names constitute a form-meaning pair. Yoruba names may be grouped into categories as distinct constructions with unique SEM, SYN and PHON properti…
Yorùbá in South-West Nigerian primary schools in the context of the national policy on education
Studies on primary schools and language policy implementation showed that only a few schools in Nigeria adhered to the stipulated language policy. Therefore, the study examines the extent to which Yorùbá (the mother tongue) vis-a-vis English and Pidgin was used as a medium of instruction at lower primary schools, and, also, the extent to which Yorùbá vis-a-vis foreign languages (Arabic, English, and French) was taught as a subject at upper primar…
Phonological adaptation of Arabic names in Atebubu (Bono Region, Ghana)
This paper discusses the phonological processes embedded in some nativised Arabic personal names in Atebubu, in the Bono East Region of Ghana. The study shows that the main phonological processes entrenched in the nativisation process include segment deletion, vowel insertion, prothesis, substitution, consonant deletion, hypocorism, and free variation. These phonological processes are employed as a mitigation strategy to conform to the phonotacti…