That the Igbo language, as exuberant a cultural repository as any in the world, is in decline is a fact of the present; that it is driven into the near-danger zone of possible extinction is a fact that is as yet not pronounced.
By Chimezie Chika
In 1933, Pita Nwana (Pita is the Igbo enunciation of the English name, “Peter”), a retired, well-travelled carpenter who had worked for British missionaries in the capacity of labourer and interpreter, finished a novel in Igbo language. Omenuko, the novel he wrote, was the first of its kind in Igbo language.
It tells the biographical story of Omenuko, its hero, from birth to death. The historical setting of the book (from the mid-1800s) puts it on a pedestal as also being the first historical novel in the language.
Published in 1935, after the novel had won a competition by the International African Institute, it made Pita Nwana a household name in Igboland. Its readers were moved not only by its fictional story of a slave trader but also by the very skill with which the story was told.
Having become the quintessential literary classic of the Igbo language, Omenuko (it has since been translated a number times into English, most notably by the African literature scholar, Ernest Emenyonu) paved the way for the emergence of a period of boom for Igbo literature, spearheaded by the likes of E.N. Achara, F. C. Ogbalu, Tony Ubesie, and Chinedum Ofomata.
Okpa Akụ Eri Eri (1981), Uche Odilora’s beloved classic, tells the story of its satirically named protagonist, Akubuzo, a miserly teacher who lost his great fortune through his extreme stinginess. The name “Akubuzo” has become synonymous with “miser” in colloquial Igbo language usage. It is not too difficult to discover why these novels became popular when they did.
The most logical evidence was the forthrightness with which the different regions of Nigeria pursued orthographical literacy in indigenous languages in the twentieth century.
The turn of the 20th century, up to the 1970s and 1980s, was an intense period of concentrated literary production in indigenous African languages. It began with the publication of South African Thomas Mafolo’s Moeti oa Bochabela (1907) and Chaka (1925), his classic historical novel about the great Zulu king. (Mafolo, who wrote primarily in Sesotho, has been identified as the first novelist in an African language.)
By the 1930s when Nwana and D.O Fagunwa, who wrote what is now regarded as the first Yoruba language novel, Ògbójú Ọdẹ nínú Igbó Irúnmọlẹ̀ (1938), African language novels began to penetrate the cultural environment of a period in Africa when independence agitations and racial consciousness defined the African identity.
Notwithstanding this, the majority of the continent’s literary business were freighted in English rather than indigenous languages. In the late 1970s and 1980s, this became a hotly contested issue among African novelists and critics.
The Language Debate
In a 1974 scholarly essay titled, “The African Novel in the 1970s: Basic Identity and Categorisation”, critic Ihechukwu Madubuike argued that African writers cannot claim to be writing African literature if they are writing in a non-African language. “The language in which African literature is written is definitely important,” he wrote, “and much has been written and said about the subject… The problem, as I see it, does not lie with the fact that African writers express themselves in non-African languages. The crucial problem is that they do not express themselves in their mother tongue!”.
Madubuike’s concerns were not new. Earlier in the previous decade, during the Conference of African Writers of English Expression held in Kampala, Uganda in June 1962, the first ever such pan-African gathering of writers on the continent, the topic was debated for the first time. The writers were naturally divided into two camps along the lines of whether or no African writers should use English.
Writers like Ngugi wa Thiong’o (then known as James Ngugi), Obi Wali, Pio Zirimu, and others, argued that anything not written in African languages is not African literature. The other camp led by Wole Soyinka and Chinua Achebe fiercely defended their right to write in English.
Achebe would later crystalise his thoughts on this in “Colonialist Criticism”, an essay that appeared as part of his essay collection, Hopes and Impediments (1974). It is in that essay that he made his now oft-referenced statement: “Let no one be fooled by the fact that we may write in English, for we intend to do unheard of things with it.”
In 1963, the very next year following the conference, Obi Wali published his controversial essay, “The Dead End of African Literature”, in which he criticised the Kampala conference as a mere meet and greet where nothing of significance regarding the definition of African literature was achieved.
He argued that the definition of African literature, as iterated in Kampala, is a dead end. Wali, however, might have been too consumed by his umbrage to notice a movement of decolonisation that began with a class of writers that attended the conference.
Ngugi wa Thiong’o led the way by changing his name to a Kikuyu one. In subsequent essays, he would carefully outlay his position on the question of African literature and language.
In his polemic, Decolonising the Mind: The Politics of Language in African Literature (1986), Ngugi argues that language is the biggest tool for the decolonisation of the colonial mindset of the African, that the African cannot think and progress if he maintains his cultural and national identity in the hegemonic language of the colonial powers.
Following the publication of Decolonising, Ngugi began to write in his native Kikuyu. His first novel after his rejection of English was Matigari Ma Njiruungi (1986). He has since written more books in Kikuyu, including the Wizard of the Crow, arguably the biggest novel written in an African language at over 700 pages.
The most cited work published on the language issue in African literature is Chinweizu, Ihechukwu Madubuike and Onwechekwa Jemie’s seminal attack on the use of colonial languages, Towards the Decolonisation of African Literature (1983). Many of Ngugi’s sentiments were echoed here with great tenchancy. Unfortunately, they have not considered the role of a working government in the preservation of a language.
Continuing Problems or Cultural Decline?
Would a language like Igbo have fared better if the Kampala conference had adopted the use of African languages to write the literature of the continent? There is no doubt that it would, but such a singular resolution would also create its own problems.
I have had time to think about the language question in African literature since my university days, and if I claim at this time that I have formed a definite opinion on how best it can be tackled, then I would be simply blundering.
No topic in African literature has been as difficult or contentious, without offering any clear solutions. And the lack of panacea is not for lack of critical thought or rigorous reasoning.
Take Ngugi’s volte-face on the English language. What did it change? His decision has not created a sweeping linguistic movement in which the majority of African literature is written in African languages. If what we have presently is anything to go by, then literature in indigenous African languages is declining fast.
Ngugi himself is, to some extent, symptomatic of the major problem of literature in African language—its inability to reach a wide audience outside the linguistic confines of the writing language—a big problem for Africa, where writers do not have institutional support for their writing.
When Ngugi turned to writing in Kikuyu, he tried to solve this problem by translating himself. A recourse to such tedious routines to prove a language point only helps to support the adoption of a more universal language, as Achebe and Soyinka have tactfully argued.
It could be argued of course that there are writers around the world who write in a small language but are known and read worldwide, having had their work translated into many languages. The problem with this is that African languages are faced with different systemic problems in poor educational policies and cultural preservation drives.
For instance, the French, the English and the Germans have cultural organisations that promote their languages around the world such as Alliance Francais, British Council, and Goethe Institute. But where are the equivalent institutions supporting and promoting African languages?
That the Igbo language, as exuberant a cultural repository as any in the world, is in decline is a fact of the present; that it is driven into the near-danger zone of possible extinction is a fact that is as yet not pronounced.
Nothing of importance has happened linguistically to the language since the 1980s (The one exception is the novelist, Chinedum Ọfọmata); its decline has been helped by a misguided consciousness among the poor and middle classes that English is synonymous with elitism—an idea that is evidently colonial.
I have continued to enjoy reading Igbo language novels into adulthood because I grew up in an era and in a family that prioritized Igbó language. What is obtainable now is the opposite.
Social media and tech tools created by conscious individuals have not stemmed this problem. The crucial question from which meaningful solutions can emerge is if the problem is a new one or one that epitomises a gradual cultural decline. From most of the evidence, it appears to be a bit of both.
The language problem emerged with colonisation, when the British created a geographical map and imposed a language on the people resident within its confines. But at the same time, governments in a place like Southeastern Nigeria have neglected the educational sector, especially in terms of supporting Igbo language pedagogy.
Igbo language teachers are few and students interested in the language have reduced. There are still schools in Igboland who still enforce the infamous “vernacular” policy—a strict practice which encourages students to speak English while anyone who speaks Igbo is severely punished—which is one of the surest recipes for destroying a language.
One problem which many commentators have ignored is the rise of Pentecostalism in Igbo land. Pentecostal Christianity pursues and preaches a kind of religious hegemony that demonises any form of Igbo cultural consciousness. And because language is sustained by culture, a decline of culture also translates to a decline of language. Where a culture is experiencing abandonment, it is hard to argue its biggest vehicle, language, will not be abandoned as well.
It is a similar problem in publishing and the Igbo literary scene (and a scene built around Igbo language literature does not exist). A lot has already been written (not least by me) about Nigeria’s poor publishing infrastructure, even with Nigerian literature written in English. The situation is far worse in Igbo literature.
The poor quality of what little is being published these days is linked to the poor language skills of the writers and their use of pamphlet printers. In Universities in Southeastern Nigeria, publishing is only done to prop the curricular.
The university presses are nothing more than photocopy centers, not publishers. And these depressing lists of problems are part of a larger problem of corruption and economic decline in Nigeria, and their subsequent effect on the purchasing power of readers. As a good economy supports literacy, so does literature sustain culture and language.
Literature cannot happen in such hostile conditions as is found presently in Southeastern Nigeria. The production of quality Igbo language novels in the 20th century happened because the independence government and the people consciously sought to promote cultural identity through the proactive promotion of proficiency in the indigenous mother tongue.
The 21st century consciousness, buoyed by a contemporaneous digital frenzy for trends across a wide spectrum, promotes globalization and multicultural consciousness. The atrophy of Igbo language novels is partly a ripple effect of this and partly the result of an absent language policy—debated as it has been for decades.
And thus the promise of the past boon in Igbo literature, the great works that have enhanced the cultural standing of the language, is being lost in the drab philistine pursuits of the present age.
Chimezie Chika’s short stories and essays have appeared in or forthcoming from, amongst other places, The Weganda Review, The Republic, Terrain.org, Isele Magazine, Lolwe, Fahmidan Journal, Efiko Magazine, Dappled Things, Channel Magazine and Afrocritik. He is the fiction editor of Ngiga Review. His interests range from culture, history, to art, literature, and the environment. You can find him on Twitter @chimeziechika1.
Cover photo credit: Language Afrik