The Phenomenon of linguistic borrowing in English and Nupe languages: implications for Nupe learners of English

Abstract

Borrowing is a linguistic phenomenon through which languages adopt forms and structures from other languages to facilite verbal communication. It arises due to situations such as cultural contact and the need to name scientific and technological inventions which occur in some languages, among others. This paper shows that linguistic borrowing may involve not only lexical but phonological rules, grammatical morphemes, syntactic patterns, semantic associations and discourse strategies. The phenomenon of borrowing in Nupe and English languages is asymmetric as more words are borrowed from English with nothing from the other side. Any English word borrowed by Nupe speaker undergoes morphological and phonological changes. The paper establishes that borrowing is not a case of linguistic laziness, but a universal phenomenon and may facilitate the learning of English language on one hand or result in language extinction on the other. It is therefore recommended that English language teachers, text book writers, and curriculum planers should be coscious of this phenomenon so as to ensure that learners have access to pure and correct forms of the words we use and the language we speak at all times.