Linguistic Borrowing and Translanguaging in Multicultural Obollo Speech Community, Southeastern Nigeria

Historically, the influx of people with different cultural and linguistic backgrounds (e.g., Onitsha, Hausa, Yoruba, and Idoma) in Nigeria to Obollo from 1970s onward led to language contact and its consequences on an unprecedented scale. The influx of people needs sociolinguistic awareness as they develop a complex mosaic of multiple communicative competences. In addition, the mass movement of people associated with globalization, business transactions, high rate of mobility of people, and their linguistic repertoire entails new sociolinguistic configuration of a type not previously experienced. This study therefore explores linguistic borrowing and translanguaging in the superdiverse Obollo region using translanguaging and linguistic borrowing theory. Data from Obollo through semi-unstructured oral interview and participial observation were analyzed descriptively. The article identifies core and cultural borrowing, code-meshing, and translanguaging. The study contributes to translanguaging and linguistic borrowing literature and provides relevant information for education and research into contemporary language use in multilingual contexts.