Published Article

ABSTRACT

The paper investigates the form, content and use of proverbs as personal names among the Igbo people in Nigeria. It specifically examines the morpho-syntactic, pragmatic and ethnographic structures of this unique class of naming system as well as the derivational methods for shortening the names. A total of 100 proverbs were collected for data analysis from Igbuzo-Igbo language consultants, library sources and supplemented by the researcher-speaker intuition. The paper reveals that proverb-names which are indigenous to the language abound in Igbo and share significant stylistic features with other proverbs; most proverb names are rarely rendered in full; they are abridged, truncated or restatements of the full proverbs. Though they are de-sententialized nominals, (that is, nouns derived from sentences), competent speakers of the language intuitively recognize their full forms. Unlike some non-proverb personal names, the intended meaning of proverb-names typically realized metaphorically. Furthermore, the strategies employed for clipping reveal that initial and final clipping are most frequently employed. The paper concludes that proverb names which reflect the ethnolinguistic values, general world-view and social consciousness of the people are fast disappearing, and giving way to the new-generation names.

KEYWORDS: Proverbs, Names, Morpho-Sytactic, Pragmatic, Ethnolinguistic, Metaphor and Clipping