The Igbo Accent

Posted by Felix Okoli on Friday May 31, 2013 at 12:52:14:

During my days in secondary school in South western Nigeria, a few of my mates teased me for speaking English with the Igbo accent, in fact, there was actually one particular Yoruba boy who just like making fun at it and was also a close friend. It was not as if I was ashamed of being Igbo but the fact that I could easily be tagged as Igbo just because of the way I spoke English made me a bit worried.

Well as an Igbo speaking kid going to school in a non-Igbo dominated community, speaking English with an Igbo accent could make you look a bit different from the group but it's also what makes you unique and adds diversity to that group.

Most of those people who teased me were actually Yoruba and it wasn't as if they were smarter than me or spoke better English sentences than I do, in fact I was smarter and more intelligent than most of them in school work so I just ignored the fact that they tagged me as Igbo just because of my accent since it looked basically childish.

Anyway, I've grown up to be proud of my Igbo accent for without it, what else would show that I'm Igbo other than my name. I think every Nigerian ought to have an accent that shows they are Nigerian rather than pretending to be British when speaking the Queen's English. Perhaps, in the old days, it pays to speak the Queen's English using the right phonetics but nowadays in the 21st century when Igbo awareness has awakened, it now pays to have an Igbo accent and to be able to speak Igbo.

The Igbo accent is what someone has if he grows up speaking Igbo. It is very hard to be "Onye na su Igbo" without having an Igbo accent. In fact for someone to erase the Igbo accent, he may just have to stop speaking Igbo.

There is a tone with which Ndigbo normally use when soaking Igbo and it's something one should be proud of because it shows an identity.

The Igbo accent is different from the Yoruba or Hausa accent and what I've noticed is that anyone who speaks a Nigerian language tends to have that accent pop up when speaking other languages like English.