ABSTRACT

This study, titled “Names and Naming in Alobwed’Epie’s, The Lady with a Beard and the Day God Blinked”, explores name as symbols or signs that convey multiple meanings. These semiotic signs give a variety of information that characterizes the context and content of names. The names stand as indicator of identity in conveying significant messages. Which include historic, honorific, non-honorific, behaviour, purpose and profession. African names are meant to serve the philosophical and spirituality of communities from which they emanate. The names of characters are inseparable from their behaviour. The semantics of the names give them a compelling spirit, in accomplishing certain tasks. Whereas, the prevalence of bearing European Christian names lessens the authority of African names as entities. The data for this work was collected from Alobwed’Epie’s two texts. Using the Black Aesthetics and New Historicist Critical theories, the study reveals that African names depict geographic identity, behaviour, spirit instinct of animal praise names and circumstances surrounding naming. Our findings show that European names fail in conveying such cultural and philosophical aspects of the African communities and that do not carry any semantic core values of African functionality. Hence, the aura of African onomastic is not appropriately simulated in received European Christian names.

Key words:  Bakossi names, Christian names, Gender.

GENERAL INTRODUCTION     

Background to the Study

The author of the two texts (Alobwed’ Epie) under study is a descendant of the Muanengoe tribe of the present day Bakossi. These people are in three geographic locations namely, South West, Littoral and parts of Western Regions. A people’s identity can be telling depending on their names and the surrounding environment. This accounts for the constant use of Kupe and Muanenguba Mountains. These two Mountains are myths of power and wealth in Bakossi cosmic, whose specific attributes has a considerable spiritual ramification on names and naming. This boils down to the fact that names are powerful entities seen in features like brooks, mountains, hills, valleys, positions of houses, persons and those entities which are not seen but which exist in myths, like “Muankum” witches, wizards and mediums. A name in Bakossi cosmic gives meanings to behaviour, profession, duty, events, identity, and location. Some names are given to venerate ancestors, heroic events as well as sad ones. Veneration of ancestors and nature is done through sacrifices with specific names that carry out those rituals. While praise names give prestige, focus, direction, awareness and caliber of personality the bearer is.

According to Ivo Ngade, a lot of Bakossi names refer to versions of traditional Bakossi myths as they contribute in grasping the complete message of Bakossi society. (16)

Alobwed’Epie’s use of names and naming in the texts under study is a denotation of cultural environment and identity in all its ramifications. The names constitute a semiotic mould demonstratisng and reflecting the environmental and cultural realism.

Ambe J. Njoh in a keynote speech delivered to the University of Buea in a workshop on African Music, Arts, and Culture explains that it is easy to brush aside the issue of names and naming in discourse of development. According to him:

However, names have traditionally served as a medium that links its bearers to their     ancestors as well as a critical component of spirituality. Is a name truly a meaningless convention”? my respond is resoundingly in the negative. I am sure colonial authorities, Christians missionaries, and the ambassadors of Islam before them in Africa will agree with me. Otherwise, they would not have gone through as much trouble as they did to assign names routed in their respective cultures to Africans as well as monuments, rivers, lakes and other places of importance in Africa. (11)

Njoh’s message in the above quote means, a name gives the bearer an orientation that controls his personality and behaviour. The two religions cited above are like erasers wiping away the functionality of African names to further marginalize their spirituality.

Alobwed’ Epie demonstrates in his novelistic vision that the use of names is a powerful entity that carries significant meanings in identifying persons, both in the spiritual and in the physical realms. The bearers of these names are carefully carved out to act exactly as per meanings of their names in the texts. Some of the names in the texts include humans, animals, places, objects and beliefs that do take multiple meanings. For example, in Bakossi community (a people of Cameroon) the name Epolle means a traveller, a visitor, a pilgrim, welcoming someone as well as posing a question.

The novelist equally highlights the notion of Bakossi myth, beliefs, cults, restricted brooks, and mountains wherein, the surrounding environment is interlaced with man’s activities where the spiritual controls the physical. Most importantly the cultural ethos of rituals, totems and sacrifices done by some outstanding females whose destinies find a lot of meanings in their given names. The two heroines (Emade in The Lady with a Beard and Lucy Ntang in The Day God Blinked) are living out the essence meanings of their names, in reconciling their names as identities of assigned mission as completers of freedom and liberators.

Alobwed’ Epie’s choice of names is amazing as it fits into the attitude and characterization of the characters.

In “A Literary Anthroponomastics of Three Selected African Novels: A Cross Cultural Perspective”, Theresah Patrine Ennin and Nancy analyze anthroponomastics in three selected novels, Fragments, The Joys of Motherhood, and Woman at Point Zero, from a cross cultural perspective.  They opine that Anthroponomastics as a branch of onomastics has been explored in different contexts. To them, there are two main branches of onomastics known as anthroponomastics and toponomastics. Anthroponomastics deals with the study of personal names while toponomastics deals with the study of the names of places. They further explain that researchers’ attention to the study of personal names may be as a result of the significance of personal names in any culture or society. Notable among research on personal names are studies by Agyekum (2006), Ansu-Kyeremeh (2000), Al Zumor (2009), Exner (2005), Obeng (1988), Oha (2009), and Udoye and Cyril (2012). These studies have shown that, names are not only markers of identity and arbitrary, but a source of a variety of information (Agyekum, 2006; Al Zumor, 2009; Ogunwale, 2012). The use of names in a literary text is also a very important tool for the identification of characters. It is therefore not surprising that anthroponomy has also been applied to literary works. This has also been looked at by researchers such as Adams (2011), Butler (2010), Croft (2009), Dalen-Oskam and Haag (2005), and Wamitila (1999). The use of personal names in literature has a suggestive potential which is based on the message writers intend to convey to readers (Felecan, 2012).  Ennin and Nkansah concludes their analysis by stating that, literary onomastics helps in the discovery of meanings which has a contribution to the interpretation of a text. It should be pointed out that, studies on onomastics in general have concentrated on single cultures of particular groups of people. There is therefore the need for further research on literary texts, specifically, African novels as representations of different African cultures in order to ascertain the similarities and differences in the naming system.

African literature is an important area for a discussion on names and their relevance for literary analysis. In many African societies, names are not randomly assigned to people; they are given for specific reasons. For example, a woman whose babies die a few days after birth continuously will have recourse to giving subsequent babies death prevention names. Quoting Obeng S. G, Ennin and Nkansah asserts that, death prevention names have the ability to assure the child bearers’ survival. They also feel that, death prevention names are names of strangers or migrants, destructive or dangerous animals, objects associated with low status or jobs, and expressions of emotions and requests. Pragmatically, Ennin and Nkansah emphasizes that, death prevention names are culturally meaningful because they provide the life experience of a people and also show the emotions, belief systems and opinions of the givers of the names. Similarly, Ansu-Kyeremeh in “Communicating Nominatim; Some Social Aspects of Bono Personal Names”, indicates that, Bonos (a people of Ghana) have a two-name system, which comprises the ascribed and given names. Ansu-Kyeremeh further explains that the ascribed is the name derived from the birthday of the child and the given name is the name given by the father of the child. In order to always satisfy the two-name system, substitutes are provided for given names through month names, birth order names, nicknames or appellations, and circumstantial names and even the adoption of Christian and Islamic names. Ascribed and given names are usually gender indicative but some substitute given names are gender neutral. Kyeremeh concludes his discussions on names by arguing that functionally, names identify the person in the area of his ethnic or cultural background, serve as a reminiscence to some pleasant and unpleasant experiences which may have some sociocultural implications. Names also serve as a linkage between the physical state and spiritual state. (70-71)

Statement of the Problem

 There have been several debates whether Africans should maintain and retain their African names in the context of the proliferation of churches in the continent. This poses a real threat to the collective existence and survival of African culture of naming. In the early 1950s and late 1960s, there was a revolution in names across African continent. Some African writers like Chinua Achebe and Ngugi wa Thiong’o suppressed their Christian names. Achebe and Ngugi had as their Christian names, which were, Albert and James respectively. In respect of this revolution, Ngugi wa Thiong’o in Homecoming (1972) argues that, Christianity and colonialism are twin brothers and capitalism is their first cousin. In this regard, the agenda of colonialism was to replace African names with western names forgetting that these African names carry with them powerful ideological, cultural and aesthetics messages. This study argues that, names denote and connote cultural identity. Names have both physical and spiritual attributes which are culturally relevant, because they tend to influence the character and behavioural patterns of persons that bear them.

Research Questions

 In view of the statement of the problem started above, the following questions provide a searchlight to this study:

(1)        Do Bakossi names assigned to characters in Alobwed’Epie’s selected novels condition their behavioural pattern?

(2)        What are the parameters that guide naming in the culture from which the novels setting is based?

(3)        Is there a link between the European names and the author’s use of African names?

Hypothesis

 In view of the statement of the problem and research questions stated above, this work is based on the hypothetical premise that, names in Bakossi belief constitute a semiotic mould as they carry with them very powerful socio-cultural messages. In other words, they denote and connote identity which is presumably culturally bound with physical and spiritual representations and experiences which are reflected in the bearer’s character traits, attitude and behaviour.