An Analysis of Phonological Nativisation of English Loanwords in Olunyole: An Optimality Theoretic Approach

Abstract

This study aims to explain how Olunyole nativises English loanwords into its phonological system. The specific objectives are to describe the phonological strategies involved in the nativisation of English loanwords in Olunyole, and to provide an Optimality theoretic account of the phonological strategies involved in the nativization of English loanwords in Olunyole. The study is anchored within the Optimality theoretic framework (OT). OT is a constraints-based approach which argues for competition between inputs that are parsed through universal and language specific constraints to arrive at a well-formed output in a language. A corpus of 170 English loanwords in Olunyole forms the basis of analysis in this study. This data was collected from native speakers of Olunyole in Luanda Township and Wamasiolo sub-location in Luanda Sub-County-Kenya. Data was collected using Semi-Structured Interviews, Note Taking, and Audio Recording. The findings of this study show that English loanwords are fully nativized into Olunyole grammar through four main ways. First, English sounds that lack a counterpart in the Olunyole sound system are replaced by native Olunyole sounds through substitution. Secondly, vowel epenthesis is used to resolve the incidence of syllable codas in English loanwords. Additionally, consonant clusters in syllable onsets are banned, and such occurrence is resolved through vowel epenthesis. Finally, phonotactic gaps native to Olunyole are maintained in loanwords through segment preservation strategies. The findings of this study show that that Olunyole grammar heavily constrains the nativization of English loanwords. The implications of this study from the analysis of data indicate that the nativisation process in Olunyole is motivated by the phonological system of Olunyole and thus peculiar to Olunyole language, and has little to do with the internally motivated phonological rules of the source language, in this case, English.