BEYOND RP: VOWEL SUBSTITUTION AND PHONOLOGICAL VARIABILITY IN NIGERIAN ENGLISH

Vowel substitution is common feature of non-native English speech. Speakers often transfer vowels from their native language to English. Non-native speakers of English typically substitute RP vowels with those sharing similar articulatory properties in their native languages. These patterns of restructuring lead to a marker speaker’s accent In Nigerian context, research examining the phonology of English through the lens of Optimality Theory (OT) remains notably scarce, and vowel substitution as an accent marker has not enjoyed scholarly attention in the Nigerian phonology of English. The present study investigated vowel substitution and phonological variability in Nigerian English. The paper adopted the Optimality Theory (OT) framework (Prince & Smolensky, (1993) and employed a qualitative descriptive survey research design. Purposive sampling was used to select four media outlets out of eight electronic media outlets in Bauchi State Nigeria. From the four broadcasting stations selected, 22 news presenters were randomly selected as participants. Audio recording of the news broadcast was used to collect the data and the production test which was conducted by the researcher for the period of 3 months. The findings revealed while the speakers of Nigerian English rank markedness constraints such as: * DIPH _C#*, *IDENT –IO (Low), *COMPLEX CODA, *IDENT-IO (high) and * HIATUS as highly ranked constraints, RP English respects faithfulness constraints such as: IDEP-IO, IDENT-IO (F) and MAX-IO to maintain inputoutput relationship. The differences in the outputs of the two candidates are dialectal variations from the speakers of English. The paper concludes that not every vowel substitution is error. There are instances where vowel substation leads to accent marker on the basis on free variation.