The guild system as an ethnolinguistic marker of identity in Ẹdo

Abstract

Over the last four decades, several studies have originated on the premise of social identity, ideology and discourse structure. Based on the pioneering efforts of Tajfel (1974, 1975), Giles et. al. (1977), Tajfel and Turner (1986), (Gumperz (1982), the different dimensions of situated talks and social constraint on language use have been explored. The present paper demonstrates some aspects of these linguistic situations in the Ẹdo society through the social institution of established crafts (trade professions) which we refer to as the ‘guild system’ in this study. The paper employed primarily the qualitative method of data collection and analysis due to the nature of the objects of investigation. The method of content analysis was used to analyze the data obtained through interviews (with a view to portraying the linguistic identity and ideology characteristic of the guilds) while the performative translaton methods were employed to analyze the data obtained through the non-participant observation. The study revealed that the guild system as practiced in the Ẹdo society constitutes a viable social group with its own variety of the Ẹdo language employed in the course of group interaction/discourse.