₦airaland Forum

farem:
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You ask a good question. BUT your question is not different from a son who querries why his mother always claims her (mother's) husband has bought a new car. That child fights back;mummy, why are you saying the person who bought the car is your husband? No, he is my daddy!
Somebody should remind the child that the "husband" and the "daddy" IS the same person!

Read it from the fountain of life below:

King James Version: John Chapter 1

1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
2 The same was in the beginning with God.
3 All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made.
4 In him was life; and the life was the light of men....
14 And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth.

sonOfLucifer:
Jesuse contributed nothing of worth to medical science. Burn that Bible amd pick up a good book to read.

Elslim:
what works for Mr A must not necessarily work for mr B

Fourwinds:
may be. It will attract more men to her or probably she want to hook someone down to marry her

Lemon12:
wicked

How can they pay for crime their late father committed?

Juliano47:
...wicked geh.

majekdom2:
and then many will call that stammering fluency when it is known she does not stammer normally.

shedraq1:
It has become extremely difficult to identify a Nigerian from his or her accent these days. We are now sounding more American and British than the Americans and Britons themselves. When you listen to radio and voice in some TV commercials and radio jingles these days, you hardly hear the ‘Nigerian accent’ we grew up to know, and I begin to ask how we got here. Is this western influence? Did over half of our population suddenly travel abroad overnight to acquire an accent?

As I begin to ask questions, let me take a look at the people closest to me. Two of my uncles studied in the United States. Not just first degree but master’s degree as well. One of them even had a Ph.D and lived there for over 20 years before returning to Nigeria; none of them has an American accent. One of my maternal uncles and another aunt have been living in the UK ever since I can remember. When they came visiting some years back, none of them had a British accent. And so does my uncle that has lived in Australia for about 20 years.

My wife schooled in the UK for her master’s degree and does not have an atom of British accent when she speaks. Her elder sister schooled for 2 years in the United States and doesn’t have an American accent either. My wife’s half brother and sister are half-caste because their mum is a white English woman. They schooled in the UK to master’s degree level and lived there for a while as well and they don’t have a British accent (though a few words can’t escape her). I can go on and on about so many others. So it beats me hollow when a Nigerian travels to the United States for two months and returns with an American accent or when a Nigerian goes for her master’s degree in the UK and starts talking through her nose when she returns. It’s even so bad now, that some people accompany someone who is travelling overseas to the international airport and comes back home with an accent!

I can understand that some people were born and raised there and it has become part of their system and way of life. But one thing I have discovered is that those that travelled there don’t lose their Nigerian tongue completely. When I was in New York, I stayed in Manhattan with my cousin who had been living in the United States since he was 8 years old. He is about 30 now. He has a flat mate that is also a Nigerian who went there to school and has been living there.

I observed that they had this strong black American accent when they speak on the phone or have a conversation with their American friends, but whenever we were having a chat in the house, they always returned to their Nigerian accent. Even when he visits Nigeria, He speaks in his Nigerian accent even though he can speak like an American very well and not those fake and undone accents I get to hear on radio. I have observed closely those ‘returnees’ that have lost their Nigerian accent really haven’t. Once in a while, when you have a conversation with them, it slips out in some words or sentences and they return to their other accent. But will you blame them? Speaking in an American or British accent is now a status symbol. We admire and respect anything that has a resemblance to America or England. We see them as superior and since as they enjoy that position they would want to remain there.

I have worked in the entertainment and media industry for over 10 years and trust me, I have seen a lot. Most of our on-air personalities now have a foreign accent. There was even a radio station in Lagos that wouldn’t even want to hire you if you had a Nigerian accent. Our voice over artists who grew up in Ibadan can’t even pronounce “Adeola Odeku Street’ anymore the way we will know that it’s a street on Victoria Island and not Los Angeles. Some of them cannot even pronounce their own name very well. This is sad. I grew up listening to Tokunbo Ajayi, Cyril Stober and Ruth Benemesia Opia deliver news casting in a way that made you admire them for their professionalism. All that is gone. A young girl once worked as a newscaster in a TV station in Lagos and I heard that because she had a foreign accent, she got lots of privileges and I know this for a fact because it’s my industry and I have friends in every media house. She got holidays oversees and other perks that others who had been working there could not dream of.

Of course she left after a while and we hardly see her anymore but this is our reality. Though I thought she was a good newscaster. I also know a certain media house on cable TV where they all speak through their noses and form cliques amongst themselves. You are valued according to your accent. So everyone wants to belong, whether you grew up there, or you only visited for two weeks, or you went there for your master’s degree; all join, just dey blow foneh dey go. That’s the only way you can be seen as a sophisticated babe or big boy. I remember one time when one of them referred to those of us with Nigerian accent as ‘locals’. Na wa oh!

These led some of my friends in a certain radio station in Lagos to start what they call the LAFA Awards. LAFA stands for Locally Acquired Foreign Accent. It was done to expose on air personalities on radio that never lived outside the country and have a foreign accent. I had a good laugh as they called out the winners and I can’t wait for the next LAFA Awards.

I would also like to ask; I know a lot of white people who have lived in Nigeria for so many years. Some of them were even born here, especially the Lebanese. But how come they don’t have a Nigerian accent? Why is it the other way round?

I think Nigerians should be comfortable with speaking with their Nigerian accent. CNN recently ranked the different accents in the world according to how sexy they sounded and Surprise! Surprise! The disdained Nigerian accent was ranked 5th. It ranked even higher than the American and British accents. I don’t think you need a foreign accent to have a high self-esteem. The people we admire here in Nigeria for their success and all they have achieved did all they did without an American accent and still have a high place in our society. The likes of Aliko Dangote, Mike Adenuga and Femi Otedola don’t have one.

Even in our entertainment industry, Tuface, P square, Wizkid and Asa don’t have foreign accent. Likewise Nneka, D’Banj and Don Jazzy that have lived abroad don’t have it not to talk of Davido who was born abroad. We should learn to embrace the way we speak and be proud of it just like the Americans and the British would never change their accent for anyone.