ABSTRACT
This study is the first of its kind to work on Edo body parts. The objectives of this study, is to provide a detailed and illustrated description of the Edo body parts terms. It is also to determine the organising principles within the semantic domain of the body parts terminology in Edo. Also to evaluate the linguistics usage of the body parts terminology within the Edo language grammar. While the Aim of this work, is to investigate the body part terminology of the Edo language. The descriptive model used in this work is ‘Mark Dingemanse 2006’ in his work titled “The Body in Yoruba”.
The method of data collection that was relied on in this project is comprises of both oral and documental data, the oral data was collected from competent speakers and user of Edo language so as to ascertain the structure and proper pronunciations of the names of body parts in Edo. The primary source of data collection is for observation and a structured and organise interview. The instrument used for the data collection is the voice recorder and a writing material. The recorder was used to extract words (raw pronunciation) from the indigenous speakers of Edo language. The data were collected from seven (7) competent speakers of Edo language which are two (2) females and five (5) males, they are within the age of forty-five to sixty-two years (45-62). This was supposedly done by the researcher because the aged people in a community tend to use the language more fluently and appropriately than the younger speakers of the language. The secondary source of data collection is mainly from textbooks, journals and online materials.
The findings of this work can be observed that the body parts in Edo language are contextual, that is, the context in which they are used is to determine their meaning and linguistics expressions. The findings in this study reviews that body parts in Edo are contextual in nature. This study analyses the metaphorical uses of body parts in Edo. In the cause of this study, it was discovered that Edo people uses body as a religious function in reference to their worshippers. It was also discover that body parts can also be used negatively in the economic aspects.
In conclusion, this work has explored body parts in Edo language. This work present a conceptual reveal of related terms used in body parts.
