Saudi Journal of Humanities and Social Sciences (SJHSS)
Volume-4 | Issue-04 | 225-228
Review Article
Literature, the Media, and the (Dis) Integration of Languages: The Hausa Language in Focus
Dr. Hamza A. Ainu, Umar Aliyu Bunza, Muhammad Tahir Mallam
Published : April 24, 2019
Abstract
The level of endangerment a language faces is relative to the degree of its resources viz a large and active speaker
population; a thriving literary tradition complemented by a widespread and flourishing readership, and the prestige
accorded the language by its speakers. In this sense, most languages of the world face one or the other forms of
endangerment. This paper however, explores a form of endangerment emanating from within the resources of the
language itself. It observes an ironic even if pathetic situation, where the very resources of a language, particularly its
Media and literary tradition have its thriving practices marked by a propensity for appropriating words from other
language(s) considered more prestigious because of the socio-economic , educational, and political standing it enjoys
globally. This, the paper argues is as threatening to the pristine existence of a language as other forms of endangerment.
Consequently, it suggests borrowing across dialects of the language family than to opt for appropriating words from
other foreign and prestigious languages, particularly for words that exist in the repertoire of either the language or in any
of its dialects, For example, the persistent use of the English derivative ‘chanji’ from the English ‘Change’ where an
equally two-syllable word of the same semantic implication exist in Hausa, ‘Sauyi’.This obnoxious and depreciating
practice largely characterizes the use of the Hausa language in our films, literary texts especially of the popular culture
genre and other popular media. The practice of unnecessarily substituting a linguistic item in a language with an
equivalent from another language is often injurious to the wellbeing of the former as soon its speakers gradually lose the
sense of those substituted linguistic items.