THE IMPACT OF SOCIAL CLASS ON THE IGBO LANGUAGE USE

Abstract

This is an expository research that focuses on social class and the use of the Igbo language. Social class is a group of people within a society having something in common. In most any of the following: socioeconomic status, educational level and even sex could be used to differentiate one social class from the other. Igbo language use has some unwritten rules guiding the usage of some words. There are ways child should speak while addressing an elder and there are some words not expected from an adult. The theory considered suitable for a research of this kind is William Labov’s theory of language variation. Labov, (1972) He investigated the relationship between language and society. He has developed a field known as Variationist sociolinguistics. The same applies to men and women, titled men and untitled men. The purpose of this research is to bring to the knowledge of the young ones the way the Igbo language is operated in order to maintain the culture that guides the use of the language. In doing this, the researcher first reviewed some previous researches made on social class and language use. Some articles were consulted. The methodology used was participatory observation hence the researcher is a native speaker of Igbo language. In this research, it is observed that social class influence the Igbo language use among the Igbo native speakers. There are some words that are taboo for some class of people to use while some use them normally. Again the educated tend to speak more of the standard Igbo language while the illiterates speak more of their dialect.