LINGUISTIC NUANCES AND CREATIVE TECHNIQUES IN CHIKA UNIGWE'S SELECT NOVELS

Abstract

This paper examines the practical application of linguistic and creative tools in Chika Unigwe’ s On Black Sisters’ Street and Night Dancer. This study relies significantly on the notion of stylistics, with its creative and linguistic naunces, to enhance a more holistic understanding and appreciation of the select texts. Based on linguistic evidence, the novels reveal the physical and psychic effects of the postcolonial realities on the post-colonial subjects. The descriptive system of the texual analysis shows that the artistic values of the novels are illuminated primarily through the language and creative techniques employed by the author in the select novels. Unigwe’s creative manipulation of languages in the select texts shows that most Nigerian writers in particular have eventually arrived at a linguistic compromise between the target and the indigenous languages as well as pidgin. This does not just reflect the dexterousness of the author as a story teller with exciting linguistic, stylistic, and structural awareness but indeed, the nature of Nigeria as a dense linguistic ecology. The author’s skillful manipulation of the English language in such a way that it still encapsulates the indigenous knowledge and culture, as well as the striking creative techniques employed makes her message vigorous and captivating to the readers since they invoke clear mental pictures, code variation, linguistic appositioning/substitution, transliteration, narrative framing and other stylistic peculiarities, all for linguistic foregrounding, artistic beauty and signification. It is the opinion of this paper that more African writers, especially young and developing writers should creatively use the languages both foreign and indigenous at their disposal not just to suit the African milieu or experience but to promote the indigenous languages, and also widen and deepen the aesthetic taste of their artistic productions.