Diphthongs in Igbo? Language Contact in the Igbo and Anaang Borderlands

Abstract This study examined Anaang substratum influence on Igbo, and how it relates to socio-cultural biographies (such as trade, intermarriage and small-scale migration) amongst Igbo and Anaang speakers in the borderlands. Drawing on ethnographic observation, semi-structured and sound-elicitation interviews with 20 informants made up of Igbo and Anaang speakers, the study identified Anaang substratum influence on Igbo involving the transfer of “vowel-glide” sequences in Anaang to Igbo, which we analysed as “imposition,” and which may build up to the process of diphthongisation in the Igbo language. There are signs of incipient structural diffusion or convergence as revealed in the adoption of the Anaang “glide-vowel” phonotactic feature (for example, occurrence in medial and final positions and co-occurring with plosives and fricatives) in the version of Igbo spoken in the borderlands, as well as occurrence of some “glide-vowel” sequences in initial positions (which goes against Anaang phonotactics) in the version of Anaang spoken in the borderlands. It is concluded that complex linguistic outcomes in the borderlands reveal the typological distance between languages in contact.