Language ideologies in contexts of small-scale multilingualism : repertoires, language attitudes and use in Lower Fungom (Cameroon)

The present sociolinguistic study focuses on language ideologies, which are any set of beliefs about language and social relationships. It investigates how language ideologies shape repertoires, language attitudes, and language use in the Lower Fungom area, said to be a context of small-scale multilingualism in Northwest Cameroon. Moreover, the vast majority of studies conducted in urban spaces and outside Africa obscures a fuller understanding of sociolinguistic dynamics in rural areas that also enjoy considerable linguistic diversity and individual multilingualism. For instance, there is a lack of prominence concerning more rural-oriented research methods and data types, particularly in the adaptation of sociolinguistic tools, such as questionnaires and the matched-guise test to match locale-specific situations and meanings. Finally, issues relating to individual multilingual repertoires, language attitudes and language use have been explored independently in individual studies in past research on African settings, but none of them has tried to take the results obtained at one level of analysis to illuminate all other levels. This work used multiple research tools to gather data from Lower Fungom in 2012, 2017 and 2019, namely, questionnaires, the matched-guise test, sociolinguistic documentation, and participant observation. The data sets obtained were all informed by the adoption of an ethnographic approach in Lower Fungom. The study population came from the 13 villages (i.e., Munken, Missong, Abar, Ngun, Biya, Mufu, Mundabli, Buu, Kung, Ajumbu, Fang, Koshin and Mashi) of Lower Fungom. Out of the 174 multilingual individuals who responded to the ethnographic inquiries, 31 Missong residents were tested for their attitudes towards languages (i.e., the Missong, Munken and Ngun language cluster and Mashi) using a culturally adapted matched-guise test. The choice of Missong was because of its unique internal cultural distinctions as opposed to Munken and Ngun. Furthermore, 35 Lower Fungom members were documented interacting in the market. The study showed that language ideologies constitute an integral part of sociolinguistic behaviours, i.e., repertoires, language attitudes and language use of Lower Fungom inhabitants, which was uncovered thanks to an ethnographic approach. The self-reports about multilingualism gathered from multilingual individuals through ethnographic questionnaires indicate that multilingual repertoires are developed far away from diglossic models and dwell more on the multilingual speaker’s relationship with others. For language attitudes, unlike what is found in the literature, the main factors shaping Missong speakers’ language attitudes are not stereotypical categorizations but, rather, considerations of relational qualities that capture locally salient features. I concluded that code choice during transactional interactions makes up an essential element of the linguistic practices of Lower Fungom multilinguals. Moreover, code choices are deliberate actions to index ideological associations to the local codes. These choices are associated with village affiliations for economic favours during market transactions and doing this without compromising one’s face or a relationship. Furthermore, to signal neutrality and conceal belonging to one of the villages in this multilingual context, interactants often use Cameroon Pidgin English (CPE). This Pidgin further serves as an emergency language to break communication barriers. This study adds to the literature on Lower Fungom identified as an area where small-scale multilingualism is practised. Furthermore, it questions the validity of existing scholarly discourses, especially on using research tools weighted with diglossic frameworks in investigating people’s multilingual repertoires, language attitudes, and language use. This work, hopefully, proposes other ways of designing research tools that allow one to capture the realities of an existing context as the locals see them.