CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

Background of the Study

English language came to play an important role in Nigeria in the nineteenth century.  “It is the period the white men began to come into the country in steadily increasing numbers as missionaries and traders and, in the latter part of the century, as soldiers and Government Officials” (Jowitt, 1991:15).

Jowitt continues to say that:

The majority of white people who have resided in Nigeria for many length of time over the past century and a half have been of British origin, and a large proportion of those who occupied government posts during the colonial era came from the upper and middle strata of British Society.  Their Presence helped to ensure that Standard British English (SBE1)1 combined with Received Pronunciation (RP)2 had the same predominance and prestige in Nigeria as in Britain.  This was the model held up in schools and in the civil service for Nigerian learners to emulate….

SBE1. – Is the form of English, Spellingand Pronunciation etc that most people in Britain use, and that is not limited to one area or group of people (which is generally accepted by all that use English).

RP2– Is the general accepted way of pronunciation.

English has occupied a dominant position in Nigeria as a medium of communication and an official language.  It is a very important language in many parts of the world.  The fact is shown as English is spoken by more than a quarter of a billion people and is becoming increasingly popular as a second language for non-English Speaking people.Burns (1971) is of the opinion that Nigerians should learn it and learn it properly.According to Azikiwe (1998:1), they should learn it well so that they will be able to:

• Communicate with non-native speakers of English;
• Learn and understand the culture of the owners of the language;
• Be able to politically fit into the wide comity of nations; and
• Impart or acquire a particular knowledge or skill for future life i.e. Education of the individual.

Ubahakwe (1974) says that English is the language for specialized education, language for the elitist and lastly, language for assimilation.  He further states that those who cannot speak or understand English have less opportunity to participate in the social activities of the society.  Also, Ndahi (1977) postulates that:

The ability to speak intelligible and write Standard English is thus seen as the yardstick of educational standards.  Ability and competence in the medium of instruction affects the quality of performance in other subjects.  Since many of our pupils leave the secondary school without being able to construct simple sentences in English, and since English is used as the medium of instruction, the place of grammar in the teaching of English deserves special attention.  Effective handling of the conventional syntactic structures of the language is pre-requisite to effective communication. (p. 18)

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