Terrible State Of The English Language In Nigeria

Theif of hearts, you have not once heard me say, we should speak the English language incorrectly. I simply have a different view. I mentioned the English, because sometimes as Nigerians we point out our misgivings in such a way that we lose sight of the balanced view. The balanced view IMO is that we are not the only people who have English as their official language who fail to use it correctly. Neither do I feel that pidgin English is the reason, the English don't speak it, but many can't speak their language.

To say that I asserted somehow, that it should be an excuse for not speaking or writing English propery is incorrect.

Someone who speaks pidgin speaks pidgin and if that same person is taught standard English, both in written and spoken form, he/she will have no problem with the latter.


Someone who writes "thot" or "taught"  instead of thought, is not doing so because of pidgin IMO because those words do not form part of pudgen English as far as I am aware.

Now if someone says "una" instead of "you" or "chop" instead of "eat" in an exam or at an interview, then we can blame pidgin.

ghettochyk you completely miss the point

no one is castigating an illiterate farmer or market woman for poor English, they have not been given the opportunity to study and thus you cannot expect that much from them. The section of the population we are talking about involves people who have supposedly been going to school for 10-15 years, being taught all subjects (except for some languages) in English, and at the end of it all cannot express themselves properly in English without making egregious mistakes in spoken or written situations. that is the terrible state we are talking about - the poor SSCE performances, the horrible English that some people speak when they go for interviews, the appalling misuse of words like taught/thought, leave/live, and other basic, I repeat basic mistakes one would not expect from a good Primary 6 student.

It may not be compulsory to speak good English, but after studying the lingo for so long, is it too much to ask that a person with a university degree or even  SSCE should be able to speak intelligible English with minimal mistakes? 

i live in the UK, but majority of the welsh people in cardiff can't speak and write good english. they can't speak welsh either. 

it is good for us to be able to speak good english. but if someone can't speak well we should not "criminalise" the person. we may want to encourage the person to speak well. after all 2 years in the UK majority of them can't even pronounce my name well, and yet we nigerians are made to understand and pronounce names like montgomery, eissenhower etc

abeg leave us joo let them come and speak efik or try to pronounce igbinovbaro

abeg which kind international position person fit find for nairaland wey una no go allow man pikin fire him pidgin de go. nairaland wey seun don ban all the dudes wey get intellectual contribution leaving only kids who love to quarrel when they are not discussing sex and boyfriends, na here person go find international position?

abegi

omoge, wetindey now? is that also considered as terrible English?


?

true talk

the admin might have been threaten by too many intellects, so the guy dey build hin own chaotic Nigeria online, if he can't be president in real life, he might as well be president virtually. na hin own, baba obj (virtually) carry go.

FYI: i can't fit call u yar' adua, u never reach that level yet

abeg me i no go sukulu o,so make una leave oyinbo matter,abi na english i go chop,abeg leave english give me dollars or pounds.

how about these:
still yet (used in one sentence!)
severally
Travvic (instead of traffic)
Christover (instead of Christopher)
Sliver board (instead of Silver bird)
We abuse english too much. is it a function of how much u spent in learning the thing!!!!!

una don start again abi? wetin dey wrong for inside pidgin. my first language na YORUBA, 2nd na Nigeria PIDGIN, 3rd na ENGLISH. abeg speak ur "correct" english when in ur boardroom meeting, but outside, PIDGIN 4 LIFE.

them dey go school for Naija?  Yes oh!  "How's tins"-----------

Lol when they are busy wearing fake gucci and versace at Nigerian events they don't remember lame speeches about "losing culture and colonized mentality"

Wasnt a thread made a few months back about how Yardua should be wearing suit and tie at international functions, what happened to the "colonial mind" crap then? Not sure who you guys are fooling, sure as hell isnt me.

fufu king, thanks for pointing out that last bit. i've seen even the most educated people use those words incorrectly - there's a huge difference between "lose" and "loose". it drives me crazy when i see it being misused over and over again. this one has nothing to do with spelling mistakes, some just don't know the difference!

Amazing small timers,you've got a long way to go before you realize what's important,unfortunately,you may never do in your life time,what a pity.

maybe it needs to used in a sentence for people to actually grasp the difference between "lose" and "loose".

keep spewing rubbish there while living in ENGLAND

lol soul_patrol, please give these delusional people examples of sentences that show the differences.