Language and Cultural Identity: The Izonization of English in Gabriel Okara’s The Voice

Language is an integral part of culture. It expresses a cultural reality and speakers identify themselves and others through their use of language which is the index or symbol of their social or cultural identity. Human language grows, changes in form and function and even dies off. It is not monolithic but heterogeneous and varies according to regions, contexts and users. No human language is fixed uniform. Every language is a continuum of languages – dialects and idiolects marking the identity of its speakers. Language is a species specific to man and it is socially or culturally transmitted. English is an intranational and international language and used almost in all countries and continents of the world. It is a global language which has spread from the British Isles to other regions and has produced different varieties. English has been domesticated or acculturated to reflect the totality of the cultures, mores, philosophies, customs and experiences of its new speakers, bringing about “New Englishes”. L2 users of English have given it some local colour and local identity, forcing it to play unaccustomed roles. Language users bring to any verbal encounter blue prints for action that have developed through their socialization or acculturation in a given society. The structure of the language one habitually uses influences the manner in which one thinks and behaves. There is an arbitrary link between a linguistic structure and a given cultural world-wide. Language is a mirror of the mind and it affects the thought process of its users, making them to think and speak differently as their language offers them different ways of expressing the world around them. Gabriel Okara, has translated or “Ijawized” the English syntax in The Voice to reflect his “Ijawness”. It is an interference-induced language variety which this paper is set to analyse stylistically.