SOCIOLINGUISTIC ANALYSIS OF NONVERBAL MEANS OF COMMUNICATION AMONG IGBO PEOPLE

ABSTRACT

This project is a sociolinguistic analysis of the nonverbal means of communication among the Igbo. The aim of the study was to examine and analyse the sociolinguistic nonverbal means of communication in Igbo from a sociolinguistic perspective. It also accounted for the instrumental, animal, iconographic and visual modes of communication. Data for this study were drawn from several field and participant observation such as funeral and marriage ceremonies etc to get a fair account of the use of nonverbal means of communication the Igbo people. The sources of data were both primary and secondary. The primary data was collected from competent native speakers of the Igbo language by personal communication. Secondary data comprises published and unpublished materials on the nonverbal means of communication of the Igbo people. In the course of data analysis, the study employed the descriptive and adopted the ethnography of communication framework by Hymes (1962). The study found out that Igbo people operate the instrumental, visual, iconographic and animal communication. It was observed that communication is a very vital form in any community because without interaction people, oneness, progress and the development in the community will not be achievable. Nonverbal means of communication communicates various meanings in the Igbo socio-cultural context, how the symbols are a means of complex communication that often have multiple levels of meaning; how the symbols are used to express specific ideologies, social structures as well as a means of representing aspects of their specific cultures.