SIMILARITIES AND DIFFERENCES IN ANY OF THE GRAMMATICAL LEVELS: PHONOLOGY, SYNTAX,

AND SEMANTICS OF ENGLISH AND OGU LANGUAGE

ENGLISH LANGUAGE

English language is a second language in Nigeria. It is a second language because Nigerians

already had their first language or Mother Tongue (L1) before the spread of this foreign
language called ‘English’ into the country. In this instance a foreign language (English) left its
native environment and met with another language or languages (Nigerian indigenous
languages). It is true that the culture and values of the people are embedded in the language
they speak. As such it is said that ‘language is culture’ and none can be separated from the
other. So, when two languages meet, then two cultures have met and there is likely to be a lot
of changes in that society. The changes will affect the culture and the language of the recipient
society or speech community, and the effect will impact on the entire recipients’ society, which
in this instance is Nigeria and its citizenry. English language did not come to Nigeria just on its
own. Its incursion into Nigeria was caused by lots of factors like trading, slavery, colonization
and missionary activities in Nigerian by the Europeans and this was done in phases. As such
English as a language is a borrowed blanket which has been converted to a personal use by the
borrowers so as to suit their purposes.

OGU LANGUAGE

Ogu has been erroneously referred to as Egun (especially by non-natives) over the years.
However, in August 1985, the Ogu Studies Society reaffirmed the correct name as Ogu and the
people as GU or OGU. The language is a member of the Aja-Ewe language group, which in turn
belongs to the West Benue Congo phylum (Williamson and Blench 2000). It is spoken in Togo,
Republic of Benin (formerly Dahomey) and Lagos and Ogun States of Nigeria. It is noteworthy
that Ogu shares some linguistic affiliations with the Aja and Ewe language groups in Ghana and
Togo. Ogu communities in South West Nigeria are, basically, frontier communities, which are
mostly bounded by Yorùbá people. The language of Ogu people is in constant contact with
Yorùbá, which is a privileged language in the Nigerian social-cultural and linguistic milieu. As a
minority language with about 1.5 million people in Nigeria as against Yorùbá with about 20
million speakers, Ogu, as well as its speakers, has suffered socio-economic and political
deprivation and as such its speakers have been shifting to Yorùbá as the more prestigious
language. Language shift from Ogu to Yorùbá remains a consequenceofthelanguagecontact
between both languages as Ogu people, especially the young ones, continue to abandon their
language and culture and embrace Yorùbá. If homogeneity is crucial to language maintenance
(Anthony Brown 2008, 1), in the instance of Ogu, the frontier nature of its communities already
poses a challenge. Moreover, Ogu people in their traditional domains prefer to adopt the
scattered pattern of settlement whereby one travels kilometers apart between two compounds
of two-three houses each. Both in historical and cotemporaneous terms, this traditional
practice is one to which the Ogu still hold tenaciously.

Gugbe is a Western Kwa Language of Niger-Congo language family, kindred of the Gbe language
clusters. The language is otherwise referred to as Ogu while the speakers are also called Ogu.
The need to initiate a project for the preservation of the Ogu language, as the title of this paper
seems to suggest is owing to the fact that the language suffers in the fangs of two dominant
languages in Badagry—English and Yoruba. Badagry is located around Latitude 6½º North of the
equator and Longitude 3¼º East of the Greenwich meridian. It is bounded in the south by the
Atlantic Ocean, in the north by the Yewa territory and in the east; it is hemmed in by the
swampy water of Lagos. It is bounded in the west by the Republic of Benin (Faluyi, 1994).

1. PHONOLOGY

Phonology deals with the sound systems of languages and includes the study of phonemes,
intonation, stress, and pitch. Phonology is the branch of linguistics that studies how languages
systematically organize their phones or, for sign languages, their constituent parts of signs. The
term can also refer specifically to the sound or sign system of a particular language variety.
Phonology is the study of the sound system of languages, including the inventory and structure
of the phonemes.

PHONOLOGY OF THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE

1. Consonants
English has a variety of consonant sounds, which can be categorized by their place and manner
of articulation.

- Plosives: /p/, /b/, /t/, /d/, /k/, /g/

- Fricatives: /f/, /v/, /θ/ (as in "think"), /ð/ (as in "this"), /s/, /z/, /ʃ/ (as in "shy"), /ʒ/ (as in
"measure"), /h/

- Affricates: /tʃ/ (as in "church"), /dʒ/ (as in "judge")

- Nasals:/m/, /n/, /ŋ/ (as in "sing")

- Approximants: /r/, /j/ (as in "yes"), /w/

- Lateral Approximant: /l/

2. Vowels

English vowels are typically divided into short and long vowels, as well as diphthongs.

- Short Vowels: /ɪ/ (as in "kit"), /e/ (as in "dress"), /æ/ (as in "trap"), /ʌ/ (as in "strut"), /ɒ/ (as in
"lot"), /ʊ/ (as in "foot"), /ə/ (as in "ago")

- Long Vowels: /iː/ (as in "fleece"), /ɑː/ (as in "palm"), /ɔː/ (as in "thought"), /uː/ (as in
"goose"), /ɜː/ (as in "nurse")

- Diphthongs: /eɪ/ (as in "face"), /aɪ/ (as in "price"), /ɔɪ/ (as in "choice"), /aʊ/ (as in "mouth"),
/əʊ/ (as in "goat"), /ɪə/ (as in "near"), /eə/ (as in "square"), /ʊə/ (as in "cure")

3. Stress and Intonation

- Stress: English is a stress-timed language, meaning that stressed syllables occur at regular
intervals and unstressed syllables are shorter.
- Intonation: Intonation patterns in English are used to convey meaning, attitude, and emotion.
Rising intonation can indicate questions, while falling intonation often signals statements.

PHONOLOGY OF THE OGU LANGUAGE

Ogu, also known as Egun or Gun, is a Gbe language spoken in parts of Nigeria and Benin. Here’s
a detailed look at its phonological system:

1. Consonants

Ogu has a range of consonant sounds, some of which are similar to those in English, while
others are unique to the language.

- Plosives: /p/, /b/, /t/, /d/, /k/, /g/

- Fricatives: /f/, /v/, /s/, /z/, /ʃ/, /h/

- Affricates: /tʃ/, /dʒ/

- Nasals: /m/, /n/, /ɲ/ (similar to the "ny" in "canyon")

- Approximants: /r/, /j/, /w/

- Lateral Approximant: /l/

- Labial-Velar Consonants: /kp/, /gb/ (these are double articulations involving both the lips and
the soft palate)

2. Vowels

Ogu vowels are categorized by their quality and length. The language typically features:

- Oral Vowels: /i/, /e/, /ɛ/, /a/, /ɔ/, /o/, /u/

- Nasal Vowels: Each oral vowel has a nasal counterpart, indicated with a tilde (e.g., /ĩ/, /ẽ/, / ɛ̃/,
/ã/, /ɔ̃ /, /õ/, /ũ/).

3. Tone

- Tone: Ogu is a tonal language, which means that pitch is used to distinguish word meaning.
Ogu typically has three level tones: high (á), mid (ā), and low (à).

4. Syllable Structure

- Simple Syllable Structure: Ogu syllables often follow a CV (consonant-vowel) or V (vowel)

structure, and complex consonant clusters are rare.

COMPARISON AND CONTRAST

SIMILARITIES

- Consonant Types: Both languages have plosives, fricatives, nasals, approximants, and lateral
approximants.

- Vowel Quality: Both languages feature a range of vowel sounds, although the specific vowels
differ.

Consonant and Vowel Sounds: Both English and Ogu have a rich inventory of consonant and
vowel sounds, including both voiced and voiceless consonants.

Syllable Structure: Both languages can have simple (CV) and complex (CCV, CVC) syllable
structures.

DIFFERENCES

- Tone vs. Intonation: Ogu uses tone to distinguish word meanings, while English uses
intonation to convey meaning and emotion but not to distinguish words.

- Vowel Nasalization: Ogu has a series of nasal vowels, which are not present in English.
- Consonant Clusters: English allows more complex consonant clusters than Ogu, which typically
avoids them.

- Syllable Structure: Ogu primarily uses simple CV and V syllable structures, while English has a
more flexible syllable structure.

- Labial-Velar Consonants: Ogu has labial-velar consonants like /kp/ and /gb/, which are not
found in English.

- Phoneme Inventory: English has a larger number of vowel sounds compared to Ogu. English
has about 20 distinct vowel sounds, while Ogu has fewer.

- Tone: Ogu is a tonal language, meaning that pitch is used to distinguish word meaning, with
high, mid, and low tones. English, on the other hand, is an intonation language, where pitch
variations convey different sentence types and emotional states but do not change word
meanings.

- Consonant Clusters: English allows complex consonant clusters (e.g., "str" in "street"), while
Ogu tends to have simpler consonant clusters or avoids them altogether.

SYNTAX OF THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE

Syntax refers to the rules that govern the structure of sentences in a language. Syntax involves
the arrangement of words and phrases to create well-formed sentences in a language.

1. Sentence Structure

Basic Word Order: English typically follows a Subject-Verb-Object (SVO) word order.

-Example: "The cat (Subject) eats (Verb) the mouse (Object)."

2. Sentence Types

-Declarative Sentences: Statements that provide information.

- Example: She is reading a book.

- Interrogative Sentences: Questions that request information.

- Example: Is she reading a book?

- Imperative Sentences: Commands or requests.

- Example: Read the book.

- Exclamatory Sentences: Sentences that express strong emotion.

- Example: What a wonderful book!

3. Clauses and Phrases

- Independent Clauses: Can stand alone as a sentence.

- Example: She reads.

- Dependent Clauses: Cannot stand alone and need an independent clause.

- Example: When she reads.

Phrases: Groups of words that act as a unit.

- Noun Phrases: The big brown dog.

- Verb Phrases: is reading a book.

- Adjective Phrases: very beautiful.

- Adverbial Phrases: in the morning.

4. Complex and Compound Sentences

-Compound Sentences: Consist of two or more independent clauses joined by conjunctions
(e.g., and, but, or).

-Example: She reads books, and she writes stories."

-Complex Sentences: Consist of one independent clause and at least one dependent clause.

- Example: She reads books that are interesting.

5. Question Formation

-Yes/No Questions: Formed by inverting the subject and auxiliary verb.

-Example: Is she reading?

-Wh- Questions: Begin with a wh- word (who, what, where, when, why, how).

-Example:What is she reading?

6. Negation

- Negation: Typically formed by adding 'not' after the auxiliary verb.

- Example: She is not reading.

SYNTAX OF THE OGU LANGUAGE

The Ogu language, also known as Egun or Gun, follows its own syntactic rules and structures.

1. Sentence Structure

Basic Word Order: Ogu typically follows a Subject-Verb-Object (SVO) word order, similar to
English.

- Example: "Ọmọ na ra ata." (The child eats an apple.)

2. Sentence Types

- Declarative Sentences: Statements that provide information.

 - Example: Ọmọ na ra ata. (The child eats an apple.)

- Interrogative Sentences: Questions that request information, often marked by intonation or

question particles.

- Example: Ọmọ na ra ata ni? (Is the child eating an apple?)

- Imperative Sentences: Commands or requests.

-Example: Ra ata! (Eat the apple!)

- Exclamatory Sentences: Sentences that express strong emotion.

-Example: Ata wa dun! (The apple is delicious!)

3. Clauses and Phrases

-Independent Clauses: Can stand alone as a sentence.

- Example: O ra ata. (He/she eats an apple.)

-Dependent Clauses: Often introduced by conjunctions and need an independent clause.

- Example: "Nígbà tí o ra ata, mo ri rẹ̀. (When he/she ate the apple, I saw him/her.)

PHRASES: Groups of words that act as a unit.

- Noun Phrases: Ilé ńlá (big house)

- Verb Phrases: ra ata (eat an apple)

- Adjective Phrases: ńlá gan (very big)

- Adverbial Phrases: ní owúro (in the morning)

4. Complex and Compound Sentences

- Compound Sentences: Consist of two or more independent clauses joined by conjunctions

(e.g., ati, sugbon).
 - Example: O ra ata, ati o je e. (He/she bought an apple, and he/she ate it.)

- Complex Sentences: Consist of one independent clause and at least one dependent clause.

-Example: Nígbà tí o ra ata, o je e. (When he/she bought the apple, he/she ate it.)

5. Question Formation

-Yes/No Questions: Often formed by adding a question particle or by intonation.

- Example: O ra ata ni? (Did he/she buy the apple?)

- Wh- Questions: Formed using question words.

- Example: Ta ni o ra ata? (Who bought the apple?)

6. Negation

- Negation: Typically formed by adding the negative particle before the verb.

- Example: O kò ra ata. (He/she did not buy the apple.)

COMPARISON AND CONTRAST

SIMILARITIES

- Basic Word Order: Both languages follow a Subject-Verb-Object (SVO) structure in their basic
sentence construction.

- Sentence Types: Both languages have declarative, interrogative, imperative, and exclamatory
sentences.

- Subject-Verb-Object Order:Both English and Ogu predominantly follow a Subject-Verb-Object

(SVO) word order in declarative sentences. For example:

- English: The boy eats an apple.

- Ogu: "Ọmọ na ra ata." (The child eats an apple.)

DIFFERENCES

- Question Formation: English forms questions by inverting the subject and auxiliary verb or by
using question words, while Ogu often uses question particles and intonation.

- Negation: English typically adds 'not' after an auxiliary verb, whereas Ogu uses a negative
particle before the verb.

- Complex Sentences: The use of conjunctions and dependent clauses can differ in structure and
syntax between the two languages.

- Modifiers: In English, adjectives usually precede nouns, while in Ogu, adjectives typically
follow the nouns they modify.

- Modifiers: In English, adjectives typically precede the nouns they modify (e.g., "big house"),
while in Ogu, adjectives usually follow the nouns (e.g., "ilé ńlá" – house big).

- Question Formation: English forms questions by inverting the subject and auxiliary verb (e.g.,
"Is he coming?"). Ogu typically uses question particles or intonation to form questions without
inversion.

- Verb Agreement: English verbs change form based on subject (e.g., "I eat" vs. "He eats"), while
Ogu verbs often do not change form in the same way, relying more on subject pronouns for
clarity.

CONCLUSION

While English and Ogu share some similarities in their phonological and syntactical structures
due to basic linguistic principles, there are notable differences arising from their distinct
linguistic and cultural backgrounds. English, as an intonation language with a flexible syntax and
a rich vowel inventory, contrasts with Ogu, a tonal language with simpler syllable structures and
different syntactical and semantic conventions influenced by cultural contexts. Understanding
these differences and similarities is crucial for linguists, language learners, and educators
working with these languages.