Forgetting Igbo

The Documentary Podcast

BBC

Society & Culture, Documentary, Personal Journals

4.3 • 2.6K Ratings

🗓️ 26 April 2016

⏱️ 27 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

BBC presenter Nkem Ifejika cannot speak Igbo the language of his forefathers. He wants to know why he was never taught Igbo as a child and travels to the Igbo heartland in the south-east of Nigeria to explore the demise of a once proud language. He discovers that recent history has had profound effects on Igbo culture and identity. He discovers too that some Igbos are seeking to reassert their language and culture.

Transcript

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0:00.0	This is a BBC podcast. You can get all our podcasts and our terms of use at BBCWorld Service.com slash podcasts.
0:10.0	We are constantly telling me off and not pronouncing some things correctly.
0:15.0	I think I usually mix up the uw and the ou.
0:18.0	In what? I don't know, like ukku or something like that.
0:20.0	Yeah, don't say that again. What you're doing is your bar pronunciation. It's not uku. What you want to say is ouco.
0:27.0	No point in denying it. I'm just not up to speed on my spoken eboe, even though it's the language of my own people back in southeastern Nigeria,
0:36.4	and even though I'm married to an indefatigable Eboe woman.
0:40.0	I can't be bothered to teach you anymore.
0:42.4	It's not my job. It's my job to teach her.
0:48.0	Guinea-bo-Aze. Guinea-Bois-Aze?
0:51.0	Fish.
0:52.0	Very good.
0:52.5	Ginnabo Efle, nabbeke.
0:55.0	Plate.
0:56.0	Ginnabo
0:59.0	Our five year old son Anikamba is far more promising with our native languages you can gather.
1:04.7	But here's the thing, he's the exception and people like me are becoming the norm.
1:12.0	I'm in Ken Ifijka and this is Forgetting Eboe, part of our identity season here on the BBC World Service.
1:19.0	In this program, I want to find out why one of West Africa's biggest ethnic groups are losing touch with their own language
1:27.0	a language some say might now even become extinct so I'm going back to Nigeria.
1:34.0	I've got a lot to discover.
1:37.0	What's happened to the Igboe language?
	...

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