Abstract
One of the features of a living language is that it constantly
changes with new words finding their way into the vocabulary of the
language. Languages’ vocabularies grow from time to time as a result of
new innovations that continuously spring up in different sectors of life
and human endeavour; one of which is the Global System for Mobile
Communication (GSM), in the recent century. This study, therefore,
explores the various processes employed by Nigerian Short-Message
Service (SMS) writers in generating new words, by critically sampling
and analysing some of these new words to see the processes employed by
these GSM users. It is discovered in this paper that these GSM users
have the capability of reducing any form of expression to the starkest
abbreviation. Generally, the new words analysed are in one way or the
other in their reduced forms and this may not be far from the
characteristic SMS requirement of limited number of characters.
Index Terms—word formation, GSM, SMS, clipping, alphanumeric and coinages
I. INTRODUCTION
The current computer literacy level in the society has made
text-based communication, which comes in various forms; assume a vital
position among many people. These text-based communication techniques
include chat on-line, text messaging, e-mail, among others. This form of
communication (text-based communication) comes with its peculiar style
of writing, creating and re-creating new ways of writing. This paper is
an attempt in analysing the various word formation processes employed by
Nigerians using the Global System for Mobile Communication (GSM) in
text messaging.
GSM, which is an abbreviation for Global System for Mobile
Communication, is a communication system that does not use wires and
cables. It rather uses radio waves according to Homby (2001), and as
such, it can be carried about and be used anywhere. Though GSM can be
used for many purposes, it is majorly used for call making and
text-messaging. However, this paper focuses on text massages.
Temple (2013) observes that technical ideas (with respect to GSM)
from various numbers of sources are gathered over the period from
1982-1985. According to him, Europe produced the very first GSM
Technical Specification in 1987, which marks the birth or the pivotal
year of GSM. However, GSM was introduced in Nigeria in 2001following the
January 2001 auction for GSM which attracted mobile phone operators
like MTN Nigeria, Econet Wireless Nigeria (now Airtel), MTEL, Globacom
and Etisalat to operate digital mobile service in the country. Econet
Wireless Nigeria and MTN Nigeria launched their GSM on 7th and 8th of
August 2001 respectively. Obviously, GSM subscription rate and phone
calls were extremely expensive at inception. However, with the advent of
days, they have become relatively affordable that an average household
in the country can afford to own as many GSM phones as the number of
persons in the household. This makes it possible for young people (even
children) to have access to GSM. Consequently, from observation there
are innovative ways/styles of writing that accompany the use of GSM to
compose text messages, especially by the younger generation in order to
reflect local colouration and to, save time, space and cost. In this
paper, we look at these innovative styles to find out the word-formation
processes employed by Nigerian users of this information technology
gadget in their text messages.
Short Message Service (SMS) is a text messaging service component of
web, phone or mobile communication systems that makes use of
standardised communication protocol which makes it possible for fixed
lines or mobile phone devices to exchange short text messages. SMS sends
and receives messages of up to 160 characters per page to and from GSM
handsets. In other words, there is a limited number of characters that
can be sent or received through SMS. This may explain the need to create
and re-create new words. This study is inspired by this new form of
writing and the styles with which it comes.
Language is in constant change with new words coming into it almost
on a daily basis. Though not every new word survives, some eventually
find their ways into the vocabulary of the language. Word formation is
simply the creation of new words in a language. Fromkin, Rodman and
Hyams (2011) observe that new words have quite a number of ways by which
they can enter the language. Scholars like Fromkin, Rodman and Hyams
(2011); Aronoff an Fudeman (2008); Gries (2006); Peña (2010), among
others, have identified these various processes of word formation to
include: ISSN 1799-2591
Theory and Practice in Language Studies, Vol. 4, No. 11, pp. 2215-2222, November 2014
© 2014 ACADEMY PUBLISHER Manufactured in Finland.
doi:10.4304/tpls.4.11.2215-2222
© 2014 ACADEMY PUBLISHER
compounding, derivation, coinage, acronym, blending, clipping,
back-formation, etc. However, the focus of this paper is on how Nigerian
mobile phone users employ these and other processes in forming new
words as are evident in their test messages.
For clarity of purpose, this paper is divided into five sections,
with the first and the second sections bordering on introduction and
views of various authors on the topic respectively. In the third
section, the methodology adopted in the paper is discussed, while the
various word-formation processes, alongside the resulting new words as
identified in SMS, are provided and discussed in the fourth section.
Finally, the fifth and sixth sections respectively summarise and
conclude the paper.
II. WORD FORMATION PROCESSES: AN OVERVIEW
A word-formation process may be either or all about the following: a
way in which an entirely new word comes into a language and/or a way in
which a speaker creates complex words from already existing simpler
word(s). In line with this view, Lieb (2013) defines word formation as
forming new lexical words from already existing words using a
word-formation process.
Bryson (1990) cited in Peña (2010) identifies six ways of creating
new words which include: by adding to them, by subtracting from them, by
making them up, by doing nothing to them, by borrowing from other
languages and by mistake. This paper is not interested in the mechanism
of doing nothing to them because it is an aspect of historical
semantics. Moreover, in addition to the six mechanisms identified by
Bryson (1990), Peña (2010) adds another which is: by combining them.
Peña (2010) further explains that when we talk of adding to existing
words, we mean the use of processes like derivation and compounding.
Scholars like Peña (2010); Fromkin, Rodman, and Hyams (2011); Aronoff
and Fudeman (2008); etc posit that derivation and compounding are the
more productive ways of adding new words into English. Subtracting from
them refers to word formation process as clipping; then borrowing and
mistake refer to backformation or misspelling while combining them has
to do with acronyms and blending or portmanteaus.
Peña (2010) asserts that blending is a word formation process that
involves the removing and joining of residues of two or more words in
order to create a new word that has form and meaning, which have
resemblance with the source words. The meanings and sounds of the two
words combined; and the combination may or may not be in their full
forms. Little wonder, Gries (2006) and Aronoff and Fudeman (2008) while
observing that blending is a highly creative word-formation process
explain that this is so, because it is a process that does not adhere to
any specific productive rule. In the same vein, Bauer (1983) opines
that the blender is actually free to take either as little or as much as
he deems necessary to form a blend. Consequently, one can rightly say
that blending is the most unpredictable process of word formation.
Peña (2010) also defines borrowing as a process that involves the
copying of a word from one language (to which it originally belongs) to
another. For there to be a case of borrowing, the two languages involved
must have come in contact with each other. Borrowed words often do not
remain the way they are in the original/source language. However, they
are modified to adhere to the phonological, morphological and syntactic
patterns of the borrowing language. Languages that are in contact with
one another tend to take-on terms they lack from each other.
In the case of compounding, Olsen (2007) calls the process of forming
compounds, composition and posits that two stems from the vocabulary
are combined to form a new word. On the other hand, Katić (2013) notes
that initialisms and acronyms are shortenings which are derived from the
initial letters in a phrase or name, explaining that
… while acronyms are pronounced as “single words” (NASA, AIDS),
initialisms are pronounced “as a sequence of letters” (DNA, USA). The
difference between these two types lies in how the resulting word is
pronounced in spoken language, namely letter by letter or without
intermission, (p. 3).
In essence, Katić (2013) is saying that initialisms (also called
alphabetisms by Zapata 2007), and acronyms are words that are formed
from the initial letters of words, (usually names of organisation or a
scientific term, etc), which are pronounced as sequences of letters and
as words respectively.
Clipping as another word-formation process, according to Peña (2010),
is a process that involves the deletion of a part (usually, one or more
syllables) of a word and leaving a certain part of the said word. In
clipping, the deletion may take place at any position, initial, final or
medial. In other words, any part of the word can be clipped off. Shahla
and Amir (2013) posit that it involves abbreviating an already existing
word.
In back formation, which is another word-formation process, Shahala
and Amir (2013) say that it is a word-formation process where a shorter
word (base) is being formed by deleting a supposed/imagined affix from
an already existing word in a language. This type of word-formation
process is, for instance, used to create verbs from nouns ending in
‘-tion/-sion’ or ‘-or/-er’. Kwary (nd.) says it is a creative reduction
of a word due to wrong morphological analysis. This is a process of
forming a new word by deleting what looks like a typical affix in the
language. Shahla and Amir (2013) later summarise their view by saying
that back formation is a process that is motivated by analogy.
Furthermore, Gries (2006) studies the underlying mechanisms for the
coining of intentional morphological blends and complex clipping where
he asserts that the two word-formation processes are clearly different
in relation to the extent to which the source words they involve relate
to the output. While the absolute magnitude of this effect is
specifically strong in speech, complex clipping behaves nearly like a
random word pair when it comes to writing. He states that:
2216 THEORY AND PRACTICE IN LANGUAGE STUDIES
© 2014 ACADEMY PUBLISHER
(i) the formation of blends is in fact substantially correlated with corpus-derived SPs (Selection Points) and that
(ii) a superficially very similar word-formation process, complex clipping, does not exhibit such a tendency, (p. 549).
Furthermore, Gries (1989) opines that this is an indication that “the
intentional creation of blends at least suggests that their coiners
make use of a general mechanism involved in the comprehension of words
when they form a neologism, as if trying to anticipate comprehenders’
strategies” (p. 549).
As it concerns the empirical findings of other scholars, Peña (2010)
carries out a contrastive study of word-formation processes in the
English and Spanish languages with a view to contrasting the mechanisms
used by the two languages in coining new words. She does this by
describing each of the processes with examples in order to determine the
frequency and productivity of the mechanisms in each of the languages.
The work shows that both languages have corresponding coinage mechanisms
which vary in frequency and productivity. Peña (2010:408) goes on to
state,
These processes are derivation, compounding, clipping, borrowing,
backformation, acronyms and blending. Derivation and borrowing are
highly prolific mechanisms in both languages; compounding is very much
used in English but not so common in Spanish; the rest are less prolific
and more or less equally frequent in both languages.
Shahla and Amir (2013) have carried out a comparative study of the
different word-formation processes used in Ilami, a dialect of Kurdish
and that of the English language to see if there are similarities or
differences in the ways these two languages form new words. By looking
at different strategies of word formation like derivation, compounding,
blending, abbreviation, etc, they discover that Kurdish makes use of
compounding more than English. They also observe that Ilami makes less
use of derivation to form new words. In addition, other processes of
word formation were discovered to be rarely or never used in Ilami.
Shahla and Amir (2013:83) believe that “Kurdish (as a whole and Ilami as
a dialect of it), unlike English does not have a written form and is
not an official language; these factors remarkably decrease the level of
word-formation productivity in this language (and dialect).” Therefore,
they are of the view that since word- formation processes have some
kind or relation with written language, it should not be surprising that
these processes are rare in Ilami.
Plag (2002) writes on word formation processes in English computer
mediated communication (CMC and SMS). The summary of his findings show
the following:
a. that native languages/dialects influence patterns of writing in CMC and SMS
b. that pronunciation spelling (which usually manifests in SMS/CMC)
is not considered as a method of creating new words, but non-standard
orthographic representation of words motivated by mother tongue
interference
In conclusion, there are various ways by which new words find their
ways into the vocabulary of a language – by adding to them (through the
use of a processes like derivation and compounding); by subtracting from
them (through the use of process like clipping); borrowing; mistakes
(which involves a process like back-formation) and combining them
(through processes like blending and acronyms). We can also have
outright coinage, where an entirely new word is coined. In this case, it
does not involve an already existing word. On this basis, as we can see
above, linguists have carried out researches on word-formation
processes in different languages of the world and also in various
aspects of language.
III. METHODOLOGY
This study is a descriptive survey. The researchers engaged the
assistance of six field assistants. Two persons each were appointed for
the three locations that serve as the areas of the study. Moreover, the
youths (within the age bracket of 15-35) make up the population of the
study. The youths are purposely chosen because they are more involved in
the use of ICT. The researchers observe that these ‘new words’ in
Nigerian SMS are common among the youths and do not necessarily cut
across the entire GSM users. With the use of purposive cluster random
sampling method, the researchers sampled two urban and one rural area
within the southern, northern and western parts of the country. Data
were collected from these locations viz: Enugu (for the South) and Kano
and Lagos (for North and West respectively), with SMS from mobile phones
serving as the primary source of data. The respondents were approached
and they granted the researchers and field assistants access to the text
messages they sent out within a period of two weeks. Additionally,
library and the internet serve as secondary sources from where books,
articles and papers relating to the topic were reviewed.
Within the selected locations, five respondents were randomly
selected; making a total of fifteen respondents in each area. Eight
hundred and ten messages (messages in the English language) were
extracted from their phones. This number gives an average of about ten
messages per respondent. However, only one hundred and forty (140) items
were seen to contain the kind of words the paper is interested in,
(i.e. words that are not in normal Standard English forms).
Consequently, 140 words were used for this study. The data so collected
were descriptively analysed, viz.: clipping, sound reduction involving
deletion, alpha-numeric, and initialisms involving abbreviations. In the
analysis, emphasis is on what actually happens to the source word (the
words from which the new ones emanate). In other words, the analysis
focuses on the patterns adopted by the respondents in creating the ‘new
words’ from the already existing ones.
IV. WORD FORMATION PROCESSES IDENTIFIED IN NIGERIAN SMS
A. Clipping
THEORY AND PRACTICE IN LANGUAGE STUDIES 2217
© 2014 ACADEMY PUBLISHER
1. cred credit 12. coz/bcos because
2. oft often 13. takia/tkia take care
3. sis sister 14. bhind behind
4. val Valentine 15. bday birthday
5. gen generator 16. pple people
6. esp especially 17. lil little
7. moro tomorrow 18. hols holidays
8. ope hope 19. abt about
9. ave have 20. pix picture
10. api happy 21. bros brother
11. xtian (clipping involving sound deletion) Christian
A look at items 1 – 19 above suggests that there is a pattern by
which some letters are laid off and others retained for the respective
clips to be formed. 1 – 6 above show that what is clipped off are
letters that are at the end of the words with the consequent clip coming
from the remaining part of the word-initial letters,
back-clipping/apocopation; while in examples 7 - 10, what are clipped
off are letters that are at the beginning of the respective words,
fore-clipping/aphaeresis, retaining the final part. It is important to
note here that example 10 does not adhere strictly to this rule. Apart
from reducing the double ‘p’ to a single one, the letter ‘y’ is also
substituted for ‘i’, depicting its sound. In examples 11 - 16, clipping
takes the form of the first letter of the first syllable (or a letter
that sounds like it as in example 11 above) and the whole of the
subsequent syllable or a representation (what sounds like it as in 12-13
above) of the syllable. However, in examples 17-19 above, clips are
formed by taking letters partly from the beginning as well as the ending
of the words. On the contrary, there is no exact pattern involved in
forming clips in examples 20-21 above except that the first, second as
well as the first, second and third letters in the respective words are
retained. It is also noteworthy to point out that ‘pix’ and ‘bros’ in
the context of SMS in Nigeria can be used for both singular and plural.
Summarily, in all the instances, words are reduced to some of their
parts.
B (i) Sound reduction involving deletion of letters
22. wit with 43. dis this
23. wat what 44. dat that
24. wen when 45. dem them
25. wud would 46. fada/moda father/mother
26. wot what 47. dey they
27. fon phone 48. dose those
28. tym time 49. tanx thanks
29. gal girl 50. eva ever
30. tot taught 51. ova over
31. kip keep 52. tite/tyt tight
32. kia care 53. nite/nyt night
33. kot caught 54. shud should
34. skul school 55. buk book
35. bak back 56. luv love
36. unik unique 57. xpanñ expansion
37. gud good 58. evry every
38. hapi happy 59. b be
39. beta better 60. n and
40. laf laugh 61. u you
41. suxes success 62. y why
42. pis/pisful peace/peaceful 63. c see
In the group of words above (examples 22 – 63), ‘new words’ are
formed based on the sounds that make up the individual words. Though
they are not exact transcription of the ‘original words’ (the words from
which they are formed), the pronunciations of the ‘newly formed words’
represent typical Nigerian phonemic realisations of the said words
(applied linguists may call this pronunciation – spelling error. For
instance, Plag (2002) classifies words in example (Bi) as a product of
pronunciation spelling based on the respondents’ native
language/dialect). Here, ‘wh’ is represented by ‘w’ (see examples 32 –
36 above); ‘c’, ‘ch’, ‘ck’ and ‘que’ are simply represented by ‘k’ since
they are pronounced /k/ in the words where they occur. Interestingly,
‘th’ which is pronounced as /ð/ in 43 – 48 and /θ/ in (49), is
represented by ‘d’ and ‘t’ letters respectively. This may likely be as a
result of the absence of the two interdental fricatives in Nigerian
languages; hence, the sounds are always mispronounced as /d/ and /t/
respectively, using the nearest equivalent in their native languages.
Therefore, it is not a surprise that GSM users in Nigeria would do such
substitution as we see in examples (43 – 49) above. The reduction of
somewhat complex spellings with the nearest letter that also depicts
pronunciation is also evident in group B(i) above. Words in examples 59 –
63 are seen as depicting sound because they are intended to be realised
when pronouncing the letters used in representing them and, as such,
the letters then stand for the words. We should also note that examples
B(i) (59 - 63) do not fall into a neat category. They 2218 THEORY AND
PRACTICE IN LANGUAGE STUDIES
© 2014 ACADEMY PUBLISHER
also belong to another category (observe example C below). However,
we will not also be wrong to present and analyse them as abbreviations
of the original words. Observe B (ii) below.
B (ii) Sound reduction involving deletion and alphanumeric
64. 2 to/too 74. 4 for
65. 2giv to give 75. 4eva forever
66. 2d to the 76. 4giv forgive
67. 2day today 77. 4c fore-see
68. 2suxes to success 78. b4 before
69. 9ce nice 79. 4rm from
70. 9ite/9t night 80. 8 ate
71. 1 won 81. gr8 great
72. som1 someone 82. 0 nothing
73. any1 anyone
The final products from examples 64 – 81 are instances of neologism
involving alphanumeric. It involves the special use of numerals to
represent sounds in words, such that when the numeral is pronounced
(sometimes, alongside other letters), the intended word (or something
close to it), is realised. The figures ‘1, 2, 4, 8, and 9’ have been
observed as being used to represent the words, ‘to’ - /tə/, ‘one/won’ -
/wʌn/, ‘night’ - /naɪt/, ‘four/for/fore’ - /fɔ:/ or /fə/ and ‘ate/eight’
- /eɪt/ respectively. These figures are consequently added to form part
of spellings of the words where such sounds they represent are found.
In (82), SMS senders reduce ‘nothing’ to ‘0’, which is its equivalent in
figures.
C. Initialisms involving abbreviations (Coinages)
83. y why 111. gf girlfriend
84. b be 112. bf boyfriend
85. d/di the 113. sth something
86. u you 114. swthrt sweetheart
87. r are 115. fym for your mind
88. n/nd and 116. oyo on your own
89. hr hour 117. IJN in Jesus name
90. bt but 118. asap as soon as possible
91. nt not 119. ftf face to face
92. rd road 120. cwot complete waste of time
93. frnd friend 121. np no problem
94. pls please 122. dnt do not
95. jst just 123. omg oh my God
96. wk week 124. cul see you later
97. bk back 125. btw by the way
98. hw how 126. lol laugh out loud/lots of love
99. yr year 127. pcm please call me
100. wr were 128. idnts I don’t think so
101. rm room 129. b4n bye for now
102. ur your 130. hand have a nice day
103. bdy body 131. mu I miss you
104. nxt next 132. ltns long time no see (colloquial)
105. msg message 133. hru how are you
106. urs yours 134. ruok are you okay
107. mth month 135. idd I don die (pidgin English)
108. bc because 136. txt text
109. a/c account 137. brb be right back
110. av/v have 138. tlc tender loving care
139. hml happy married life
140. lwkmd laugh wan kill me die (pidgin)
In example C, some of the renditions are acronyms while most of them
are not. When we consider ‘nd’ in (88) and (89 – 105), we discover that
the abbreviations are formed by simply retaining the consonant letters
or sounds in the original words while deleting the vowels by that
effect. Examples (111 – 114) are formed from the first letters of the
two words that respectively make up the compound words. Others (like 106
– 110) are ordinary abbreviations that do not actually have a specific
pattern. Moreover, we can also see examples (83 – 87) and ‘n’ in (88) as
abbreviations that can be pronounced to realise the words they
represent, by ordinarily pronouncing the letters as if in isolation
(also observe examples 59-63 above). Moreover, phrases, clauses and even
whole sentences are also reduced to abbreviations (see 115 -140 above
for illustrations).
V. SUMMARY OF THE FINDINGS
THEORY AND PRACTICE IN LANGUAGE STUDIES 2219
© 2014 ACADEMY PUBLISHER
This paper looks at how GSM users manipulate words and spelling
symbols to re-create new words while writing their text messages. The
previous section shows that GSM users make use of clipping,
sound-reduction and initialisms involving abbreviation in forming these
words. Example ‘A’ above shows that clipping in text messages comes in
various forms. While some can be said to have a pattern, others are
without any identifiable pattern. However, they are understood by the
communicators. This can be proved by the communication flow observed in
the data extracted from the respondents.
Again, there is a notable difference as well as irregularities that
exist between the English sounds and their corresponding spellings.
This, from the result of the findings, may be the reason behind the new
form of writing exemplified in B above. Here, new words are formed on
the basis of one-to-one correspondence between the pronunciation of
words and their spelling. It is worthy of note to state that what is
done is not outright transcription but a rendition of words is a typical
Nigerian pronounceable way that still portrays the original word.
Typically, the nearest letters that depict the speech sounds of the
words are chosen in the representation and this is usually clear where
the actual sound segment is not present in any of the native languages.
As observed earlier, Plag (2002) sees it as pronunciation spelling which
is not considered as a word creating process, rather to represent
non-standard orthographic variants. But our findings see it as a word
creating process. This conclusion was reached by observing other text
messages (still within the 810 messages collected) sent by the same
group of respondents to their elder ones and official colleagues. In
these official text messages, the above instances of clips,
abbreviations, alphanumeric, etc were written in Standard English forms.
This is a clear indication that the respondents are not motivated by
non-standard spelling. Furthermore, B (ii) shows a pattern of
sound-reduction, which can be called alphanumeric, where numerals like
1, 2, 4, 8 and 9, are used to represent sounds. These can either be used
in isolation or alongside other letters in the original word to form
words in the language of Nigerian SMS users.
This study also discovers that there is a wide range of abbreviations
in use among the SMS writers in Nigeria. As against the general notion
that initials are being formed from names of organisations and technical
names, we see these GSM users’ ability to reduce almost anything they
desire to initials. These abbreviations range from single words to
phrases, clauses, as well as sentences. Therefore, we can say that
Nigerian GSM users reduce both simple and complex expressions to the
starkest abbreviation.
It is also evident from the data presentation and analysis that what
we have are all forms of reducing words and expressions because of lack
of space, (which may not be far from the characteristic limited number
of characters that are required in SMS), impatience on the part of GSM
users to type full words (obviously to save time), and cost. As it
concerns cost, it was only last year (2013) that the Nigerian
Communication Commission (NCC) reached an agreement with network
providers that inter network SMS charge be a flat rate of N4.00 per SMS.
Before 2013, it costs N15.00 and above.
Furthermore, this paper discovers that these ‘new words’ are
generally interpreted in context. For instance, what is obtainable in
the Nigerian context may be different from the Ghana or American context
and vice versa. Also, the manner in which words are shortened in the
sampled SMS shows that, except within context (i.e., context of use
now), these expressions may not be understood. Even though
interpretation of SMS is outside the scope of this paper but the
analysis reveals that context is the major factor that provides lucid
interpretation of these new created forms of writing, which people
usually refer to as ‘the language of the GSM.’ Again, (though it is not
within the scope of this paper), it is equally important to note that
the users of these short forms are mostly youths. Adult GSM users, most
times, do not understand this “new language”, and are not usually
involved in it. Therefore, the usage is more among the youth, who
apparently understand the language. Again, new words are not actually
created in that sense of word formation. What we have is a unique
writing system in Nigerian SMS that involves the recreation of existing
words through clipping, alphanumeric, and sound reduction and deletion.
VI. CONCLUSION
Every human society depending on its needs require new words from
time to time to satisfy such needs. Therefore, new innovations make it
needful for new words to come into a language in order to name new
things and take care of their present communication needs. Every
language needs new words almost every day. However, these words are got
by borrowing, derivation, conversion, etc. The most important thing is
that new concepts are taken care of in the vocabulary of a language.
This is why language cannot remain static – since innovations will not
cease. Hence, language keeps growing and developing to meet up with the
changes in the society. In recent times, many words have entered the
vocabularies of many languages as a result of many innovations; for
example, the turn-around in the information communication technology
(ICT) requires a great deal of new words to meet the demands of the
industry since the words we have presently are not adequate to take care
of the new things that come with it. ICT makes it necessary for new
words like ‘internet, website, ping, cookies, blog, bookmark, download,
etc to enter the vocabulary of the English language as well as for old
words like web, surf, and bug, etc., to acquire new meanings. Also,
there is need to reduce the number of characters in a text since the
number of characters in a mobile phone is restricted. This encourages
the use of clipped words, abbreviations and the reduction of series of
letters to a single letter or figure that will take care of the sound(s)
represented by the series of letters as we saw in the paper. Of all the
processes of word
2220 THEORY AND PRACTICE IN LANGUAGE STUDIES
© 2014 ACADEMY PUBLISHER
formation available, Nigerian GSM users make use of clipping,
initialisms, abbreviation, alphanumeric, sound-reduction and deletion to
create ‘words’ in their SMS.
REFERENCES
[1] Aronoff, M. & Fudeman, K. (2008). What is morphology. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing.
[2] Balteiro, I. (2011). Awareness of L1 and L2 word-formation
mechanisms for the development of a more autonomous L2 learner. Porta
Linguarum, (15) 25-34.
[3] Bauer, L. (1983). English word-formation. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
[4] Bryson, B. (1990). Mother tongue: The English language. England: Penguin Books.
[5] Cannon, G. (1989). Abbreviations and acronyms in English word-formation. American Speech, 64 (2) 99-127.
[6] Fromkin, V., Rodman, R. & Hyams, N. (2011). An introduction to language, (9th Ed.). Boston:Wadsworth, Cengage Learning.
[7] Gries, S. TH. (2006). Subtractive word formation: A corpus-based perspective. Cognitive Linguistics, 17(4), 535-558.
[8] Katić, M. (2013). New words and word formation processes in
renewable energy sources vocabulary field. A paper presented at the 6th
PSU-UNS international conference on engineering and technology
(ICET-2013), Novi Sad, Serbia, May 15-17, 2013, University of Novi Sad,
Faculty of Technical Sciences.
[9] Kwary, D. A. (nd.). Word formation. Available in: http://www.kwary.net. Assessed: 10/10/2013.
[10] Lieb, H. H. (2013). Towards a general theory of word formation:
The process model. Berlin: Freie Universität Berlin, (An open access
publication).
[11] Olsen, S. (2007). Compounds: Introduction. BA-modul 11/Hauptseminar. Humboldt University, Zuberlin.
[12] Peña, M. D. M. M. (2010). English-Spanish contrastive analysis
on word-formation processes.” Memorias Del Vi Foro De Estudios En
Lenguas Internacional. ISBN: 978-607-9015-22-0. 396 - 409.
[13] Plag, I. (2002). Word formation in English. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
[14] Portio Research (2012). Available in:
http://www.portioresearch.com/en/reports/current
portfolio/mobile-messaging-futures-2012-2016.aspx. Accessed: 28/11/2013.
[15] Shahla, S. & Amir, K. (2013). A comparative study of word
formation processes of Ilami, Kurdish and English. Open Journal of
Education, 1 (3), 83-90.
[16] Temple, S. (2013). Who created GSM? Available in: http://www.gsmhistory.com. Accessed: 06/12/2013.
[17] Zapata, A. A. (2007). Types of words and word-formation
processes in English. Inglés IV, Universidad de Los Andes, Facultad de
Humanidades y Educación, Escuela de Idiomas Modernos.
Okeke, Chukwuma Onyebuchi was born on the 11th of April, 1978 at Awgu
in Enugu State of Nigeria. His educational background runs thus:
2004 – 2006: The University of Nigeria, Nsukka, Enugu State, Nigeria. M.A. (socio-Linguistics)
2008 –Till date: The University of Nigeria, Nsukka, Nsukka, Enugu State, Nigeria. Ph.D. (semantics) in progress
2013 (Spring): The Virtual Linguistics Campus
(www.linguistics-online.com), Marburg, Germany. Statement of
Accomplishment in Linguistics
2013(July): African Linguistics School, Ibadan, Nigeria, Testimonial of Participation in Linguistics
He is a lecturer in the University of Nigeria, Nsukka. Presently, he
is participating in African Humanities Programme (AHP) organized by the
American Council of Learned Society (ACLS) to complete his Ph.D.
dissertation. Some of his publications include:
a. Okeke, C.O. (2012). Traces in the Igbo language. The Journal of West African Languages XXXIX (2), 3-19.
b. Mbah, E.E. & Okeke, C.O. (2013). Vowel raising in Nkpor dialect: A pattern of sound change. Linguistik Online, 59, 1-11.
c. Okeke, C.O. & Obasi, G.T. (2014). Semantic content of Igbo
traditional non-verbal modes of communication. International Journal of
Linguistics and Literature (IJLL). 3(2), 47-62.
He is interested in the core areas of Linguistics via phonology,
morphology, syntax and semantics. Currently, he is working on the
cognitive domains of some Igbo verbs in the AHP fellowship.
Mr. Okeke is Member, Igbo Studies Association (Member Editorial
Board), Member, Linguistics Association of Nigeria, Member, West African
Language Congress, Member, Acoustical Society of Nigeria and Fellow,
African Humanities Programme. Mr. Okeke has the following awards: (a)
Best Graduating Student in the Department of Linguistics, Igbo &
Other Nigerian Languages, University of Nigeria, Nsukka, 2003, (b) Best
Graduating Student in Faculty of Arts, University of Nigeria, Nsukka,
2003.
Obasi, Gloria Tochukwu was born on the 20th July, 1983 at Ajalli in
Anambra State, Nigeria. She attended the University of Nigeria, Nsukka
and graduated in 2008 with a B.A. (Linguistics) Second Class Honours
(Upper Division). In 2013, she registered for her master’s degree and
graduated with an M.A in Applied Linguistics.
She is a lecturer in the University of Nigeria, Nsukka. One of her publications is:
Okeke, C.O. & Obasi, G.T. (2014). Semantic content of Igbo
traditional non-verbal modes of communication. International Journal of
Linguistics and Literature (IJLL). 3(2), 47-62.
She is interested in applied linguistics and linguistics in general.
Presently, she is working on the morphology of place names in Igbo in
the University of Nigeria, Nsukka.
THEORY AND PRACTICE IN LANGUAGE STUDIES 2221
© 2014 ACADEMY PUBLISHER
Ms. Obasi is Member, Igbo Studies Association, Member, Linguistics
Association of Nigeria, Member, West African Language Congress, and
Member, Acoustical Society of Nigeria. Ms Obasi was the best graduating
student in the Department of Linguistics, Igbo and Other Nigerian
Languages, University of Nigeria, Nsukka in 2008. 2222 THEORY AND
PRACTICE IN LANGUAGE STUDIES