INTERPERSONAL AND TEXTUAL MEANING OF THE LANGUAGE OF YORÙBÁ RIDDLES

Abstract

Riddle, a form of literary art in which a speaker employs formulaic expressions to test someone’s wit on a veiled phenomenon, is deployed in languages (including Yorùbá) to express peoples’ experiences about their environment. Previous studies on Yorùbá riddles focused mainly on literary classification and stylistic features, with little attention paid to interpersonal and textual meaning of the language of Yorùbá riddles. This study was, therefore, designed to investigate interpersonal and textual meaning of the language of Yorùbá riddles, with a view to describing the riddle type, interaction indices, mood types and cohesive devices in the riddles. M. A. K. Halliday’s Systemic Functional Grammar was adopted as the framework, while the interpretive design was used. Three texts on Yorùbá riddles- Abío̩ ̩́dún Àjàyí’s Ìtúpalè̩ Àló̩ Àpamò̩, Adésuà Adéle̩ ̩́ye̩ ’s Àló̩ and Akínye̩ mí Akíntúndé’s Orature and Yorùbá Riddles-were purposively selected based on their richness in riddles. Three hundred riddles (100 from each text) were randomly sampled. The data were subjected to stylistic analysis. Two types of riddles were identified, namely derived and non-derived riddles. Derived riddles begin with topicalised unit of information, while the non-derived riddles start with un-topicalised unit of information. The logico-semantic relationship between the riddle’s information units and the experiential participants determines the content proposition of both types. Seven interaction indices were deployed: opening-phrase, personal names, vocatives, pronouns, tense shift, proponent’s evaluative comments and mood types. Opening-phrase ‘Àló̩ o (it is time for riddles); Àlò̩ (let riddles begin) express interlocutors’ readiness for riddling. Personal names and vocatives signal a discreet identity of riddle objects. Pronouns N/mo(I), a (we) and won (they) reflect the proponent’s perception of the relationship between himself and respondents. Mo (I) refers to proponent excluding respondents, while a (we) refers to the group, including the respondent as participant in the unfolding of events that predicate the riddles’ propositions. Tense shift between present and past forms, together withhigh tone syllables. The clause ó gbà á (You are right) or ó ò gbà á together with kùnńǹ (you are wrong) are used by proponent in confirming or rejecting answers to riddles. Declarative mood defines proponent as the producer and respondents as the recipient of information. Interrogative mood assigns recipient and provider roles to the proponent and respondents respectively. Jussive mood defines proponent as the reporter and the respondent as the recipient of the information. The established grammatical cohesive devices are reference, with exophoric and endophoric possibilities; conjunction sùgbó̩n (but), tún (also)and bé̩ e ̀̀ ni (and); verbal ellipsis; and nominal substitution, which conserves the truism between riddles and their solutions. Deployment of lexical cohesion is prominently preserved through reiterative processes: repetition, synonym, antonym and super-ordination typified metonyms and hyponym. The interpersonal and textual meaning of the language of Yorùbá riddles express interactivity and textual compactness in conveying attributive information about the identity of a concealed experience.