ISCA Archive SpeechProsody 2002
ISCA Archive SpeechProsody 2002

The prosody of Nigerian English

Ulrike Gut, Jan-Torsten Milde

Nigerian English is a variety of English which has often been suggested to differ significantly from other varieties of English, especially in the area of prosody. This paper analyses the prosody of Nigerian English and compares it to the prosody of British English and three West African tone languagesi. Read and semi-spontaneous speech was analysed acoustically. Significant differences were found in speech rhythm, where Nigerian English groups between the West African languages Anyi, Ega and Ibibio and British English. Furthermore, Nigerian English syllable structure is different from that of British English, and the tonal structure of Nigerian English is more similar to that of a tone language than an intonation language.