Languages ​​of Nigeria

Linguistic Map of Nigeria 1979

Linguistic Map of Nigeria Today

Distribution of languages ​​in the region: The language and national borders do not match

The Nigerian languages include over 500 native languages ​​as well as the official language English .

Official language policy

Of the approximately 500 individual languages, in addition to the official language, which has been English since colonial times, the languages Edo , Efik , Adamaua-Fulfulde , Hausa , Idoma , Igbo , Central Kanuri and Yoruba are considered national or official languages . French was declared the official language by the National Language Policy in 1998, but this declaration has hardly been put into practice.

Hausa, Igbo and Yoruba are understood by more people than English in rural Nigeria . It is official policy to increase the importance of these three local lingua franca, e. B. by translating Nigeria's constitution, which was previously only available in English, into these languages.

The languages ​​with over 10 million speakers ( decamillionaire languages ) - Hausa, Igbo and Yoruba (often referred to as the three main languages ​​of Nigeria) - which are essentially multimillion -speaker languages , function as the local lingua franca ( Lingua franca) as well as regional or national languages ​​in areas where they are spoken as mother tongue. It is estimated that over 70 percent of Nigerians can speak these languages.

Estimation of speaker numbers

The lack of an unambiguous number for the languages ​​of Nigeria is primarily due to the lack of a generally accepted definition of language as distinct from dialect , and secondly to constantly changing linguistic classifications. The 3rd edition of the Atlas of Nigerian Languages lists 30 more languages than the 1st edition.

Estimates of speaker numbers in Nigeria are also made difficult by the lack of reliable census data. The figures given in sociolinguistic studies, for example, often contradict official figures. Often they are based on the numbers of older censuses in which, after ethnic asked affiliation and this was equated with number of speakers. However, the spoken language and ethnic group are not always the same. Languages ​​also have different statuses, which can induce people to pretend to be speakers of a certain language in surveys or to actually use a language in everyday life that is not the language of their own ethnic group. Since administrative boundaries and thus the distribution of state funds are often made dependent on language distribution, incorrect information is tempting for regional administrations. A study of the Nigerian Middle Belt languages ​​therefore reports that for 27 languages ​​in the area examined, it is impossible for the authors to make any assumptions about the actual number of speakers - except for the indication that the number of speakers is probably small .

National languages ​​in education

During the colonial era, both the Protectorate of Northern Nigeria and the Protectorate of Southern Nigeria focused on learning the languages ​​of the colonizers. Since the country gained independence, however, there has been discussion about strengthening regional, indigenous languages. In recent years there has been an actual change in national educational policy regarding languages ​​in curriculum development and implementation.

The language curriculum currently in use takes into account four groups of languages: the official English language, other foreign languages ​​and Nigerian languages ​​as a mother tongue, and Nigerian languages ​​as a second language. Curricula and teaching materials have been developed for each of these groups. The national language policy in Nigeria determines:

1. The use of Nigerian languages ​​in formal and non-formal education;
2. The study and application of the developed Nigerian languages ​​as co-official languages ​​with English;
3. The study of all Nigerian languages ​​as subjects and as media of instruction at certain levels of formal education;
4. The study of Classical Arabic and French as electives at all levels of formal education;

A major constraint is the insufficient number of teachers to teach the four groups of languages. Even where teachers are available, the teaching methods of the issued language curricula rely heavily on a traditional grammar approach. There is also a shortage of language teaching materials. These problems have resulted in poor performance results and very low levels of communication skills.

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1. ↑ ethnologue
2. ↑ ^{a b} Segun Awonusi: Linguistic hegemony and the plight of minority languages in Nigeria. (PDF (90.8 kB)) (No longer available online.) Reseau-amerique-latine.fr, archived from the original on September 3, 2014 ; accessed on December 13, 2014 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  
3. ↑ Nigeria upgrades main local languages. afrol.com, April 13, 2010, accessed December 13, 2014 . 
4. ↑ Atlas of Nigerian Languages ( Memento of the original from March 26, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. 
5. ↑ Table 3 and Figure 2 show the numbers and percentages assigned to each size class; Figure 2. Size classes of the Nigerian Middle Belt languages: PDF Language Death ( Memento of the original from March 26, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. 
6. ↑ Research Journal of International Studies - Issue 8 (November 2008) 55
7. ↑ Emenanjo, EN 1992. Languages ​​and the national policy on education: implications and prospect. In: Ipaye, B., ed. Education in Nigeria: past, present and future: essays in honor of Professor AB Fafunwa, Vol. 1. Publ. Macmillan, Lagos. quoted from eurojournals ( Memento of the original from February 27, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (PDF file; 99 kB) 
8. ↑ eurojournals ( Memento of the original from February 27, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (PDF file; 99 kB)