Nominal Pluralization and Countability in African Varieties of English

Susanne Mohr

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2021
• Topic: Languages & Linguistics
• eBook ISBN:
  9781000461411
• Subtopic: Linguistics
• Index: Languages & Linguistics

This book is the first comprehensive analysis of nominal plural marking, its morphosyntax and semantics, across different African varieties of English. Mohr explores the rich diversity in the varieties and how different conceptualizations of the number category are realized across different cultures.

The investigation of unstandardized noun plurals in Kenyan, Tanzanian, Ghanaian and Nigerian Englishes is based on a mixed methods design drawing on corpus linguistics, acceptability questionnaires and psycholinguistic experiments. In this vein, the book not only contributes to the description of each of these four varieties, but also sheds light on standardization processes and language change in New Englishes. Importantly, it is a plea for the triangulation of data and mixed methods approaches in World Englishes research, as the combination of these methods grants insight into unforeseen areas of language structures and use.

This volume is a useful reference work for students and researchers in World Englishes, varieties of English and African Studies, as well as those interested in linguistic anthropology.

1 Introduction

DOI: 10.4324/9781003129301-1

Number might appear to be one of the simplest natural categories, as simple as ‘two and two are four’. Yet on closer inspection it presents a great many difficulties, both logical and linguistic.

(Jespersen 1924: 188)

Number, i.e. its (grammatical) marking but also its semantics, is indeed anything but a simple category. It applies to different parts of speech, such as nouns, where it expresses the multiplicity, size or extendedness of a concept (Storch & Dimmendaal 2014), or verbs, where it refers to the plurality of an action and is hence called “pluractionality”. The ways in which to express number in the languages of the world are multifarious (cf. Chapter 3, Section 3.1) and illustrate different conceptualizations of the category across different cultures. The related concept of countability is sometimes included in this conceptualization and can have an impact on number marking. Adding to this variety of marking and conceptualizations, there are also languages in which number is not expressed (Corbett 2000).

Given the diversity of the number category, it is unsurprising that the acquisition of number in a second or foreign language might be difficult. With respect to English, even advanced learners have been shown to struggle with the acquisition of nominal number morphology (McCarthy 2008), possibly due to several irregularities concerning its marking in the language (cf. Chapter 3, Section 3.3). Thus, non-native noun pluralizations are frequently reported for second or foreign language varieties of English in general (e.g. Mesthrie & Bhatt 2008; Kortmann & Lunkenheimer 2013) and for African varieties in particular (e.g. Huber 2012). However, many reports of these pluralizations remain impressionistic: the electronic World Atlas of Varieties of English (henceforth eWAVE) (Kortmann & Lunkenheimer 2013) mentions “native speaker knowledge” as one basis of its frequency categorization of linguistic features. Further, concerning African Englishes, many studies investigate one variety only, such as Mohr (2017) on Tswana English. The present study aims at closing this research gap by investigating the phenomenon empirically in several varieties of English in Africa and thus shedding light on non-native noun pluralizations from a comparative point of view. This analysis includes the frequency of these noun pluralizations (cf. Chapter 4), as well as their acceptance in the respective speech communities (cf. Chapter 5) and finally possible reasons for their formation (cf. Chapter 6). For reasons of data availability (cf. Chapter 4) and feasibility regarding fieldwork (cf. Chapter 5), four varieties from Sub-Saharan Africa were chosen, namely two from East Africa (Tanzanian and Kenyan English) and two from West Africa (Ghanaian and Nigerian English). None from Southern Africa was included, as Huber (2012: 808–810) showed that Eastern and Western African varieties cluster in terms of feature resemblance, while Southern African varieties of English form a separate group. The diversity of different Englishes in South Africa and their extremely complex sociolinguistic situation (Mesthrie 2002) were another reason for their exclusion from this study. It hence seemed advisable to treat them in a separate analysis. However, a comparison of the results obtained here with Southern African, Liberian as well as West African Pidgin Englishes as the other variety clusters identified by Huber (2012), would be an interesting future line of research.

Summarized, the three main research questions of this study are:

1. What types of non-native noun pluralizations can be found in Tanzanian, Kenyan, Ghanaian and Nigerian English (corpus data) and how frequent are these types?
2. What are the respective speakers’ attitudes towards the observed non-native noun pluralizations, i.e. how acceptable do they find them?
3. How are the (most frequently) observed non-native noun pluralizations motivated?

I came to do research on this topic when grading student papers which featured many unstandardized noun plurals and I became increasingly frustrated having to correct their “mistakes”. I tried to dissociate my role as an examiner from my role as a researcher though and started to contemplate the question as to why my students would use these forms. My research focus had for a while been on the (socio)linguistics of languages spoken across the African continent, so I decided to look into this feature in readily available data bases like eWAVE and the World Englishes literature. The lack of a detailed description of the feature (its use, but also its acceptability and motivations for it) in African varieties of English sparked my interest and it felt worthwhile investigating this in detail. As a researcher trained in English and African linguistics, I felt ideally suited to engage with this topic. My firsthand experience with Tanzanian and Kenyan Englishes through friends in both countries also made me believe that it would be easy to conduct this part of the study and collect data there. The data collection in Tanzania turned out to be more difficult than the Ghanaian data collection, mostly due to the large amount of respect, and sometimes even intimidation, I as a White researcher induced in many Tanzanians (see also Chapter 5.1). This, as well as other aspects of my positionality as a researcher, will be taken up throughout this book, especially in the empirical Chapters 4 to 6. In the second part of this introduction, I also comment on my epistemological positionality, in order to make my own assumptions and biases overt to others (cf. also Morrow 2005).

Thus, before delving into the analysis proper, a word on my epistemological (and personal) position is in order. This study is generally informed by the ideology at the heart of World Englishes research, namely the idea of the field as “an anti-establishment, revolutionary philosophy, which opposed […] unrealistically monolithic ideas about English” (Saraceni 2015: 3). Thus, the diversity and heterogeneity of the English language is the norm in our globalized world (cf. also Seargeant 2012) and the issue of pluralization is hence a two- or even threefold focus of this study: on the content level the study focuses on innovative plural forms and on the epistemological level the plural (World) “Englishes” provides the theoretical framework for the study, as does its mixed methods design with respect to methodology. While I do agree with Saraceni (2015) that the endeavor of promoting plurality over singularity with respect to English around the world should not be the only focus of World Englishes research anymore, I still believe that this issue is relevant for research on Englishes in Africa. East African varieties of English such as Tanzanian, Kenyan and Ugandan, for instance, were often treated under one heading “East African English” using the singular “English” (Schmied 2004, 2008a, 2008b) and more recent studies have pointed out the heterogeneity of East African Englishes (e.g. Mohr et al. 2020). Furthermore, there are other, mostly methodological, issues concerning the investigation of World Englishes that this study aims at; they are elaborated on further below.

A brief comment on terminology is also noteworthy. While I decided to include a point of comparison, namely (Standard) British English, for the investigation of noun pluralizations here, this reference point is not intended as and should not be interpreted as a yardstick. Rather, the African non-native environments are considered to be “innovative situations” (Bamgbose 1998: 1), bringing forth innovations as potentially acceptable linguistic variants. This study is hence, in line with the original idea of the field of World Englishes, first and foremost descriptive. Although it is another concern of this study, as mentioned above, to investigate the possible acceptance of innovative usages of noun pluralizations in the respective speech communities, this is not meant to be prescriptive in any way. This part of the investigation is rather supposed to provide insight into the development of the varieties in question, away from British English and possibly towards increasing confidence with respect to new variants in the respective speech communities. Thus, it was decided to choose a terminology that reflects the possibility of the development of new norms, which is crucial in World Englishes research (cf. for example Schneider 2003, 2007). Hence, the pluralizations observed here are labeled “unstandardized plurals”, following Siegel (2006). The choice of unstandardized instead of non-standardized¹ emphasizes the possibility of these forms undergoing the process of standardization and becoming standardized in their respective speech communities at some point in the future. Thus, the dynamic nature of the varieties of English used in the speech communities investigated is emphasized. I believe that, even if seemingly minor, an issue such as terminology supports the idea behind World Englishes, namely promoting varieties of English of the Outer and Expanding Circles in their own right.

While the topic of this study is nominal number marking, its nature, use, attitudes towards it and reasons for innovations in African varieties of English, this investigation is not meant to be and should not be read as yet another analysis of one or several varieties of English, or an examination of one or several morphosyntactic features in them – although the obtained results will certainly contribute to the description of either. Another, and possibly even more important motivation for this study is more far-reaching, namely the possibility of a comprehensive description of a linguistic feature. While it is common to examine a certain linguistic phenomenon from one specific point of view using one particular method, like corpus linguistics, such investigations will always be limited, i.e. shed light on one aspect of a phenomenon, such as frequency in a specific collection of data, only. A more comprehensive description and analysis of a certain linguistic feature is only possible using a variety of methods and triangulating the data thus obtained. This has not been done often enough in World Englishes research, although individual studies have combined corpus and acceptability approaches; for example (e.g. Sand 2011), or are currently developing a framework to combine questionnaire and interview data for attitude research.² The present study is a plea for a similar triangulation of data and mixed methods approaches like these might grant insight into unforeseen areas of language structures and use.

For instance, in the present study the combination of a corpus analysis and acceptability questionnaires did not only suggest conclusions concerning the acceptability of unstandardized plurals in Tanzanian and Ghanaian English, but also with respect to the variety status of both Englishes, as well as language use in the respective speech communities (cf. Chapter 5). While undoubtedly more time-consuming than studies based on one method and kind of data, in light of their additional benefits, mixed methods studies are hence certainly worthwhile.

The application of different methods also allows an analysis of linguistic features from a typological (including second language acquisitional, regarding first language [L1] transfer) and sociolinguistic or usage perspective at the same time; an approach that would hardly be possible applying just one method. While the typology of “substrate” languages has been shown to play a role in the formation of varieties of English (cf. for example Szmrecsanyi & Kortmann 2011), usage and pragmatic features have been reported to be powerful predictors of features as well (Kortmann & Schröter 2017). In this vein, the present study aims at considering the African (socio)linguistic background of the varieties under scrutiny for the investigation of innovative pluralizations. Thus, it combines an analysis of the frequency and specific linguistic contexts of unstandardized plurals in the abovementioned four African varieties of English with an investigation into the acceptability of the most prominent forms from the corpus analysis, hence accounting for the fact that although speakers use innovations, they are hardly ever codified and their acceptability is not always granted (Bamgbose 1998: 8). Viewed that a specific type of unstandardized nominal pluralization, namely pluralized mass nouns, is particularly frequent in the results, a third method in the form of quantity judgments is applied in order to determine possible reasons for this heightened frequency. Hence, it sheds light on a possible semantic, i.e. meaning-related and ultimately cognitive, perspective on unstandardized plural nouns. Together, these three methods contribute to the description of pluralizations used by non-native speakers of English in Africa on the one hand, and ultimately to a better understanding of African varieties of English on the other.

Finally, the investigation of unstandardized plurality in African Englishes might contribute to determining the variety type or status of the individual varieties under scrutiny here, i.e. placing them in one of the common models of World Englishes. This includes Kachru’s Three Circles Model (1985), categorizing varieties of English according to type of acquisition (as first, second or foreign language) and use (for international, intranational and everyday communication) but also Schneider’s Dynamic Model (2007) of postcolonial Englishes. Focusing on the evolution of Englishes, it proposes five phases, ranging from first contact between English settlers and the indigenous population with only very limited knowledge of English among the latter to a complete amalgamation of both population groups using an indigenized variety of English with its own norms. The evolutionary phases are differentiated according to four parameters, namely history and politics, identity construction, sociolinguistics and linguistic developments (Schneider 2007). While Schneider (2007) already commented on the placement of Tanzanian, Kenyan, Ghanaian and Nigerian Englishes in his model, the present study provides further linguistic data to be used for a re-evaluation of this placement of varieties with respect to the linguistic feature of pluralization.

This book is structured as follows. Chapter 2 provides an outline of the historical and sociolinguistic background of English in Africa in general, as well as English in East Africa (Section 2.1) and West Africa (Section 2.2) in particular. Similarly, in Chapter 3, number and countability are elaborated on in general (Sections 3.1 and 3.2), and with respect to English (Section 3.3) and African languages (Section 3.4) specifically. Chapters 4 to 6 form the empirical part of the study, providing an analysis of unstandardized plurals in different corpora (Chapter 4), i.e. different components of the International Corpus of English (henceforth ICE) and the Corpus of Global Web-based English (henceforth GloWbE), with the British National Corpus (henceforth BNC) as reference corpus. In Chapter 5 the acceptability of the most frequent unstandardized plurals identified in the corpus analysis is examined for the Tanzanian data (Section 5.1) and the Ghanaian data (Section 5.2). Reasons for the choice of these two varieties as opposed to all four varieties under scrutiny are outlined in detail there. Chapter 6 investigates one type of unstandardized plurals, namely plural mass nouns, in more detail. Thus, the conceptualization of mass and count nouns by Tanzanian and Ghanaian speakers of English³ is examined in quantity judgment tasks (Sections 6.1 and 6.2). Finally, Chapter 7 summarizes the findings obtained in all three empirical chapters (4, 5 and 6), draws possible conclusions and suggests further lines of research.

Notes

1. I am revising my own terminology used in earlier publications (cf. for example Mohr 2016, 2017).
2. Philipp Meer at the University of Münster, for instance, is working on attitudes towards Englishes in Trinidadian schools using both these methods.
3. Again, reasons for the choice of these two target populations are outlined in detail in the chapter itself.

2 English in Africa

DOI: 10.4324/9781003129301-2

The English language was probably first heard in Africa in 1530, when William Hawkins the Elder pass...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half-Title
• Series
• Title
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents
• List of figures
• List of tables
• Acknowledgments
• 1 Introduction
• 2 English in Africa
• 3 Number and related concepts
• 4 Unstandardized plurals in African English corpus data
• 5 Evaluating the acceptability of unstandardized plurals in present-day Tanzanian and Ghanaian Englishes
• 6 The conceptual background of unstandardized plurality in Tanzanian and Ghanaian Englishes: Mass and countability
• Conclusion
• Appendix 1 – Plural frequencies of 20 most frequent ICE-Core nouns
• Appendix 2 – Unstandardized plurals in ICE-EA
• Appendix 3 – Acceptability questionnaires
• Appendix 4 – Quantity judgment task materials
• References
• Index