Word stress in Cameroon and Nigerian Englishes

Abstract

ABSTRACT: The purpose of this paper is to study the strategies used by Cameroonians and Nigerians to cope with the notorious complexity of English word stress. Stress placement is similar among these two groups, but differs significantly from what obtains in traditional native English speech, received pronunciation (RP), for example. Some of the stress placement strategies used by Cameroonians and Nigerians, for some words, are the same as those used by RP speakers, while others are parallel and/or completely innovative. In fact, the strategies can be seen as the speakers’ behaviour with regard to a number of internalized rules or constraints. The constraints identified include the backward stress (BWS) and antepenultimate stress (APS) constraints, the reverse forward stress constraint (FWS) more characteristic of CamE/NigE, noun‐verb alternation (NVA), final obstruent verbal stress (FOVS), affix stress property (ASP), and many more. For example, in CamE/NigE, the observance of BWS and APS accounts for the stress pattern of ?assassin, ?lieutenant, ?opponent, ?umbrella; the observance of FWS accounts for car?ton, mat?tress, sa?lad, pet?ty; NVA accounts for ?applause, ?extent, ?success; FOVS accounts for embar?rass, inter?pret, (verb) kid?nap; the observance of ASP (which RP violates in this particular case) accounts for spi?ritual. In fact, the paper shows that, in a large number of words, (CamE/NigE) stress placement results from competition between several constraints, in which the winning constraint is often different from what obtains in RP. The approach used in the analyses is eclectic, but draws substantially on generative phonology and somewhat on optimality theory.