As used here, lap means ‘the part from waist to knees of a person when they are sitting down’. Thereafter, it ought to read lap.
‘The bomb exploded on Omotoshola’s lap’.
‘I had only fruits for my lunch’.
Fruit
‘He continues to throw his weight around’.
To read:
‘He continues to throw his body around’.
These are things that one learns to incorporate in one’s usage of idioms. With Nigerian speakers of English however, this is not the case. An average educated person while speaking deletes substitutes and sometimes restructures idioms at will, not minding whether or not it conforms to the norm. The following are examples of such Nigerian- English usage of the English idioms:
M.K.O.’s generosity was well known to all and sundries.
‘All and sundry’ means everybody, that is, all types of people. It does not take a plural marker ‘–s.’
If the team wants to qualify they should gather their acts together.
‘Act’, as used in this context should not take is ‘–s’. It is fixed.
The plan was not allowed to see the light of day.
The addition of article the, before day is necessary. The idiom to the native speakers is,
‘...see the light of the day’.
‘The robbers did not know what the day held in stock for them’.
The replacement of ‘store’ with ‘stock is unacceptable. The idiom is ‘hold in store’.
‘Stock’ as used here means the supply of something.
‘Many unscrupulous Nigerians joined the bandwagon of Abacha’s cronies’.
The idioms, as used by the native speakers are to jump/climb/get on the bandwagon. The replacement of ‘jump’ with ‘join’ is totally Nigerian in origin.
‘Your elevation is another feather to your cap’.
‘A feather in one’s cap’ means an honour one has won or something to be proud of. The right arrangement is:
“...another feather in your cap”
‘President Obasanjo has been on the saddle for more than eight years’.
The correct expression is: to be “in the saddle”.
‘By his refusal, he has bitten the finger that fed him’.
“To bite the hand that fed one” is to act badly towards one’s benefactor. It is not substituted with ‘finger’.
‘Those calling for national conference and yet want the government to provide social amenities are only trying to eat their cake and have it’.
This is a re-arrangement of idiom by Nigerians. To educated speakers, whether they are natives or bilinguals, this should be; ‘…have their cake and eat it’
‘There is a rumour making the rounds that the military want to strike again’.
The formal idiom is “to go the rounds”, meaning to be passed from person to person or place-to-place. ‘Making the rounds’ is a typical Nigerian deviation.
‘The Abacha family is not ready to give up their “ill-gotten fortune”.
Standard English knows ‘ill-gotten gains or ‘wealth’.
‘If nothing else, this new exchange rate will satisfy those who have consistently argued that the market-led value of the Naira sets no score by the national currency’.
(Tempo Editorial, 9 Jan., 1997)
“To set or lay store by something” is to value such a thing greatly. It is a formal idiom and it does not allow any restructuring or replacement. The replacement of ‘store’ with
‘score’ is a total deviation.
EXERCISE
From at least ten Nigerian newspapers sort out the grammatical characteristics of Nigerian English citing the pages they are extracted from and give their correct or standard forms.
2.3 CONCLUSION
The characteristics of Nigerian English appear in all the levels of language analysis. The grammatical characteristics of Nigerian English have to do with the deviation from the rules of combining of words into phrases, clauses and sentences. These deviations can be seen in the areas of faulty structuring of words, wrong use of correlative conjunctions, wrong collocation of verbs and phrasal verbs, wrong application of pronouns, plurals and idioms. Though these mark out Nigerian English from that of a native speaker this does not mean that Nigerian English is filled with errors. In every language there is always a standard and non-m standard forms. These have been fully discussed in module 4 units 1 and 2.
2.4 SUMMARY
Drawing a line between the two terms, deviance and deviation, should not pose much problem, given the illustrations so far made. At this point, we must have discovered that the difference between the two is that of conformation to the grammatical norms, and of general acceptability. Both terms mark obvious departure from the conventions of the language. But, while one is taken as being typical, the other is not. As the examples have shown, deviance cuts across levels of usage of the language. That is, it covers
morphemes, syntax, pronunciation and etc. Deviation on the other hand is usually restricted to lexical item and at times too, idiomatic expressions. Finally, it must be said that both are adaptations of English language to a new environment. But far from suggesting any inability for appropriate usage on the part of Nigerian English speakers, the foregoing are only signs of how a healthy language is capable of responding to new social and cultural conditions and it is not enough to say that there is no Nigerian English or what we have is just errors.