THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE COALESCENCE AND MULTILINGUALISM IN NIGERIA

Résumé

The language scenario in Nigeria is complex, intricate and dense, leading to an extreme degree of multilingualism due to an array of aboriginal, exogenous and Pidgin languages. Nigeria is one of Africa’s centers for language variety, which has metamorphosed into linguistic diversity. The need to break the language barrier in Nigeria to make for a free flow of mutual intelligible communication led to the introduction of the English language in Nigeria by the colonialists. The aboriginal languages lack the power to unite members of the varied ethnic groups in the country. The English Language in Nigeria has proven to meet the requirements of an official exogenous language to bond the varied ethnic groups in the heterogenous state together for lucid communication, which is fundamental to the economic, social and political unity of the nation. The role of any language in a multi-ethnic community is dependent on certain factors bothering on social relevance. The concept of multilingualism in Nigeria, levels of multilingualism, issues in multilingualism and the unifying role of the English Language in Nigeria, are critically examined in this paper. The paper presents the English language as a linguistic conjoiner in Nigeria and contends that this function is instrumental to the minimized inter-ethnic clashes.