A Comparative Analysis of Nigerian Linguistically-Naïve Native Speakers and Nigerian Linguist Native Speakers Categorising Four Accents of Nigerian English

Umar Muhammad-Gombe; Peter French; Eleanor Chodroff

doi:10.17469/O2110AISV000006

Authors

Umar Muhammad-Gombe Department of Language and Linguistic Science, University of York, United Kingdom https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6846-4704
Peter French JP French Associates, United Kingdom and Department of Language and Linguistic Science, University of York, United Kingdom https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7124-8896
Eleanor Chodroff Department of Language and Linguistic Science, University of York, United Kingdom & Department of Computational Linguistics, University of Zurich https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4549-5919

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.17469/O2110AISV000006

Keywords:

Accent classification, Linguist native speakers, Language analysis, Asylum seekers, National origin

Abstract

In the field of LAAP (Language Analysis in the Asylum Process), there has been debate over who should undertake the task of inferring a speaker’s country and region of socialisation from their language and dialect. This chapter investigates whether native speaker linguists perform more accurately than native speaker non-linguists in determining the first language of Nigerian speakers of English. Eighty non-linguist and 25 linguist speakers of Hausa, Igbo, Kanuri and Yoruba were recruited. They listened to 30-second recordings of Nigerianaccented English, and assigned each to an L1 (Hausa, Igbo, Kanuri, Yoruba or non-Nigerian). Listeners of both groups were most accurate in classifying accents of their own L1. Linguists did not differ significantly from non-linguists in accuracy. The results provide empirical support for having educated non-linguist native speakers involved in LAAP casework.