Atiku and the Meaning of an “Orphan” in English

[Farooq A. Kperogi]

Sunday, November 25, 2018

Atiku and the Meaning of an “Orphan” in English

By Farooq A. Kperogi, Ph.D.

Twitter: @farooqkperogi

In his pre-recorded initiatory presidential campaign speech on November 19, 2018, former Vice President and PDP presidential candidate Atiku Abubakar described himself as having grown up an “orphan.” “I started out as an orphan selling firewood on the streets of Jada in Adamawa, but God, through the Nigerian state, invested in me and here I am today,” he said.

President Buhari’s social media aide by the name of Lauretta Onochie led a chorus of Buhari supporters on Twitter to pooh-pooh Atiku’s claim to orphanhood. She said Atiku wasn’t an orphan because he didn’t lose both parents. This ignited a frenzied social media conversation about the meaning of an orphan. Below is Onochie’s tweet that set off the debate:

“Atiku cannot be trusted; I started life as an Orphan in Jada”-Abubakar Atiku (BIG FAT LIE)

“ORPHAN-a child whose parents (Father and mother) are dead. In his book, MY LIFE (2013 pg 30) refers [sic]: Atiku said his mother died in 1984. This was when he was 38 years. He was old enough to buy mum a house.

“What’s the point of this lie? To deceive Nigerians and get their sympathy? It’s disrespectful and insulting to Nigerians for a candidate or anyone to lie to them.

“He is saying we are too gullible to find out the truth. No, we are not. President Buhari nor [sic] Vice President Osinbajo will never lie to Nigerians.”

What this semantic contestation captures is a clash of socio-linguistic cultures. As I pointed out in my May 4, 2014 column titled “Q and A on Popular Nigerian English Expressions, Word Usage and Grammar,” my first daughter had a similar argument with her teacher nearly seven years ago. I lost my wife to a car crash in June 2010 in Nigeria and brought my then 6-year-old first daughter to live with me here in the United States the same year.

One day in class, she told her teacher that she was an “orphan.” Her teacher, who knew me, said my daughter couldn’t possibly be an orphan since her father was alive. My daughter, who had become linguistically American but still culturally Nigerian, insisted that the death of her mother was sufficient to qualify her as an orphan. Their argument wasn’t resolved, so she came home to ask me if she was wrong to call herself an orphan.

I told her she was right from the perspective of African cultures and UNICEF’s classification of orphans, but that her teacher was right from the perspective of conventional English.

Different Cultural Significations of “Orphan”

In many African—and other non-Western cultures— an orphan is understood as a child who has lost one or both parents before the age of maturity. In Islam, an orphan is a child who has lost only a father before the age of maturity. The usual Arabic word for an orphan is “yateem” (or al-yateem), which literally denotes “something that is singular and alone.” But the word’s canonical and connotative meaning in contemporary Arabic and in Islamic jurisprudence is, “a minor who has lost his or her father.”

Nevertheless, other rarely used words exist in Arabic to denote an orphan: al-Lateem is a child who has lost both parents while al-'iji is a child who has lost only a mother. Note, however, that yateem is the word used in the Qur’an to refer to an orphan, which is why people who are socialized in Muslim cultures define and understand an orphan as someone whose father died before the age of puberty. Atiku is a Muslim who grew up in a Muslim cultural environment. There is no reason why he should use Western cultural lenses to describe himself.

 Until I relocated to America, I too had no idea that in conventional English, an orphan is generally understood as a child who lost both parents. Curiously, the meaning of the word changes when it is applied to an animal: An animal is regarded as an orphan only if loses its mother, perhaps because animals have fathers only in a reproductive, but not in a biosocial, sense.

Note, though, that in English, an orphan can also be a child who has been abandoned by its living biological parents. That means almajirai (plural form of almajiri in Hausa) are invariably orphans since they don't get to enjoy the care of both parents who are usually alive.

It's also noteworthy that UNICEF, being an international organization that represents the interests of people from different cultures, recognizes the cultural clashes in the conception of orphanhood and seeks a fair sociolinguistic compromise. That is why it has three different types of orphans. UNICEF has a class of orphans its calls “maternal orphans.” This category encapsulates children who lost only their mothers. It also classifies certain orphans as “paternal orphans,” which refers to children who lost only their fathers. Then there are “double orphans,” which refers to children who lost both parents. I think that’s a good cultural compromise. By UNICEF's classification, Atiku was a paternal orphan.

Many contemporary English dictionaries are taking note of and reflecting this shift in the meaning of orphan. For instance, the Merriam Webster Dictionary now defines an orphan as “a child deprived by death of one or usually both parents.” The Random House Unabridged Dictionary also defines an orphan as “a child who has lost both parents through death, or, less commonly, one parent.” And Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged, a British English dictionary, defines it as, “a child, one or (more commonly) both of whose parents are dead.”

 So Atiku’s use of “orphan” can be justified in contemporary, evolving English, but even more so in historical English, as I will show below.

Etymology of “Orphan”

Orphan is derived from the Latin orphanus where it meant a "parentless child." But Latin also borrowed it from the Greek orphanos where it means, according to the Online Etymology Dictionary, "without parents, fatherless." Orphan, ultimately, is derived from the Proto-Indo-European root orbho, which means, according to etymologists, "bereft of father."

This clearly shows that loss of a father, not both parents, is at the core of the signification of the word from its very beginning. In fact, a survey of the earliest examples of the usage of the word in historical writings in English shows that it was used to mean only a child who lost a father. For instance, in Scian Dubh’s 1868 book titled Ridgeway:An Historical Romance of the Fenian Invasion of Canada, we encounter this sentence: “At his birth, he was an orphan, his father having died a few weeks previously.” This shows that in the 1800s, a child was regarded as an orphan only if it lost its father.

It must have been changes in social and cultural attitudes in the West that expanded and limited the meaning of “orphan” to a child who lost “both parents.”

Motherless Babies’ Home or Orphanage?

A place where orphans are housed and cared for is called an orphanage in contemporary Standard English. It used to be called an “orphan house” until 1711. (Orphanage used to mean orphanhood, that is, the condition of being an orphan; the current meaning of the word started from about 1865).

Interestingly, orphanages are called “motherless babies’ homes” in Nigerian—and perhaps West African—English. Does this suggest that our conception of orphanhood is changing from deprivation of a father through death to solely deprivation of a mother through death? Why are there not “parentless babies’ homes”? Or, for that matter, “fatherless babies’ homes”?

Related Articles:

Politics of Grammar Column

Farooq A. Kperogi, Ph.D.

Associate Professor

Journalism & Emerging Media
School of Communication & Media

Social Science Building 

Room 5092 MD 2207

402 Bartow Avenue
Kennesaw State University

Kennesaw, Georgia, USA 30144
Cell: (+1) 404-573-9697
Personal website: www.farooqkperogi.com

Twitter: @farooqkperog

Author of Glocal English: The Changing Face and Forms of Nigerian English in a Global World

"The nice thing about pessimism is that you are constantly being either proven right or pleasantly surprised." G. F. Will

[Ibukunolu A Babajide]

The many Farooq Kperogis of Nigeria destroyed Nigeria with their worthless pseudo-intellectualism.   America made it clear to the European Allied forces as a precondition for helping destroy Germany and the Axis forces that European powers will release their claim on their colonies and the attendant vice-like grip of Europe on the world.  From 1945 when the second world war ended, the new world order architecture designed by many and Mrs. Eleanor Roosevelt added the Trusteeship Council to the United Nations system to take over colonies of defeated German and Axis forces in trust for the United Nations.  In addition ALL European countries agreed to give up their colonies and grant them independence.

The African Germany colonies of Tangayika (held in trust by Great Britain), Burundi and Rwanda by Belgium, South West Africa (now Namibia) by South Africa, Kameroons shared between France and Great Britain (this is the root of the Ambazonian crisis there) and Togo went to France.  In addition to the agitation for independence generally, these African trusteeship entities also had to be decolonised.

Before I digress too far, the colonial powers seeing that the decolonisation was imminent began a systematic programme of brain-washing of local independence agitators by dis-organizing them at home and offering them scholarships.  They brought them to Europe, gave them dysfunctional education and brain-washed them thoroughly (have you ever wondered why most of African leaders collude with Europeans to loot African treasuries?  This is the reason.)  The Senegalese Léopold Sédar Senghor, Ivorien Félix Houphouët-Boigny Kenyan Jomo Kenyatta and the Old Guard were good examples.  Many from Nigeria who went to study in UK  belong to this class of early western educated but brain-washed people.  They were programed to continue colonialism.  They became the safe hands who built neo-colonialism.  Some European countries managed this transition process of colonialism to neocolonialism very well while others botched the process leading to very long wars in North Africa against France, Guinea Bissau, Angola, Mozambique and a few other places against the erstwhile colonial overlords.

Farooq Kperogi continues in the tradition of these brainwashed neo-colonial intellectuals.  Their sole purpose is to knowingly or unknowingly promote the interest of colonial masters.  They wax lyrical with empty and worthless intellectual masturbation and calisthenics.   Can you imagine that we have a Nigerian election coming in a few months that will determine the course of the future of 200 million Nigerians.  On one side, we have a nationalistic and patriotic Muhammadu Buhari.  In the last few years he blocked the neo-colonials from looting the Nigerian treasury and stashing the loot in Western Banks.  On the other side we have Abubakar Atiku the agent of neo-colonialism and the arrow-head of previous neocolonialists who wants to take over power with the sole object of returning to continue looting the Nigerian treasury after 8 years with Olusegun Obasanjo and stashing the loot in Western banks.

The stark electoral choice we must make in a few months will determine whether Nigeria will survive as a country for Nigerians or will continue as a mere source of looted funds for Western countries.  In the heat of this life and death choice for Nigeria, Farooq Kperogi fiddles while Rome burns and delights in self pleasure by writing a worthless self-praising piece on the connotations and denotations of the word "Orphan."  As usual, he thinks he is smart in his silly attempt to promote a looter, neo-colonialist and tested incompetent who as Vice President under Olusegun Obasanjo looted Nigeria to the bone marrow for 8 years.  Please tell me of what value is a primary 6, School certificate first second or third degrees if all they will be used for is to loot on a grander scale,

Farooq Kperogi's waste of time is this.  The meaning of Orphan.  A simple answer is set out below:

"orphan

[awr-fuh n]

noun

1. a child who has lost both parents through death, or, less commonly, one parent.

2. a young animal that has been deserted by or has lost its mother.
3. a person or thing that is without protective affiliation, sponsorship, etc.:The committee is an orphan of the previous administration."

All in his bid to support Abubakar Atiku and his merry band of PDP Looters, he imports culture, imports his daughter who is schooling in America, and writes as Shakespeare was wont to say, "A tale told by an idiot; full of sound and fury; signifying nothing..."  Pray tell me of what value is this foolish piece when any decent dictionary will clarify the position.  So how can the definition of the word "Orphan" with one or two dead parents (both depending on context are correct) affect the fact that Abubakar Atiku who describes himself as an "Orphan" who became a mere poorly Customs Officer who stole Nigeria dry progressively till he became the Vice President and now wants to use the stolen money to buy the Presidency become relevant?

So you see that Farooq Kperogi and his ilk have too much colonial colonial-brainwashed sense but too little gumption!  The choice is stark and it will not be made by those who have access to Internet and social media.  It will be determined by the youths whose future was destroyed by the wanton looting of the Abubakar Atikus of Nigeria.  These are the persons without protective affiliation, sponsorship, etc because the Abubakar Atikus of Nigeria supported by pseudo intellectuals like Farooq Kperogi have stolen money that could have secured a better world and a better Nigeria for us all.  The have stolen enough and NO matter what, they will NOT be allowed to return and steal some more!

Sai Buhari!  Sai Baba!!

Cheers.

IBK 

_________________________

Ibukunolu Alao Babajide (IBK)

(+2348061276622) / ibk...@gmail.com

AN ENGLISH NURSERY RHYME

The law locks up the man or woman

Who steals the goose from off the common

But leaves the greater villain loose

Who steals the common from off the goose

 

The law demands that we atone

When we take things that we do not own

But leaves the lords and ladies fine

Who take things that are yours and mine

 

The poor and wretched don’t escape

If they conspire the law to break

This must be so but they endure

Those who conspire to make the law

 

The law locks up the man or woman

Who steals the goose from off the common

And geese will still a common lack

Till they go and steal it back

 -        Anonymous (circa 1764)

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[Ayotunde Bewaji]

Thanks very much IBK for your carefully written exposure of the perfidy of dishonest intellectualism. What Kperogi seems to have forgotten is how we became a sorry nation, governed by beasts and vampires. I would not describe Kperogi as a paid hack doing a hatchet job. He doesn't need such resources to live a decent life, unless he also craves a penthouse in Dubai, like other deranged bastards who are regarded as animals when they visit with their extended harem to shop.

That said, Kperogi is entitled to his luxuriating indulgence. That is what Abami Eda will call "dabaru" everything with grammar, obfuscating reality with long-winded phraseology that fits perfectly that "tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing".

One thing am happy about, is that when EO and FK peddle their undisguised agendas against the people of Nigeria, through the wordy effusions of scholastic bombast, discerning persons on this forum push back. Even if all we do is just to indicate to them that we see you, and we know what you are doing, an Abatification of our social space, that in itself is enough.

Have a wonderful week, everyone.

Ire o.

Tunde.

Dr. John Ayotunde (Tunde) Isola BEWAJI, FJIM, MNAL
Professor of Philosophy
BA, MA, PhD Philosophy, PGDE, MA Distance Education
Postgraduate Certificate in Philosophy for Children
Department of Language, Linguistics and Philosophy
Faculty of Humanities and Education
University of the West Indies
Mona Campus Kingston 7 Jamaica
Tel:       1-876-927-1661-9 Ext: 3993
             1-876-935-8993 (o)
Fax:      1-876-970-2949
Email:   john....@uwimona.edu.jm      johnayotu...@gmail.com       tunde...@yahoo.com (alternate) 
             tunde....@gmail.com (alternate)

http://www.cap-press.com/books/isbn/9781611630879/Narratives-of-Struggle (2012)
http://www.amazon.com/Black-Aesthetics (2012)

https://rowman.com/ISBN/9780739185032/Ontologized-Ethics (2013)

https://rowman.com/ISBN/9781498518383/The-Rule-of-Law-and-Governance-in-Indigenous-Yoruba-Society-A-Study-in-African-Philosophy-of-Law (2016)

http://www.cambridgescholars.com/the-humanities-and-the-dynamics-of-african-culture-in-the-21st-century (2017)

[Cornelius Hamelberg]

Kperogi's rather tortuous bending and extending of the universal meaning in order to accommodate, explain, “justify” and excuse his boss Atiku's misuse and mishandling of an otherwise plain and generally accepted meaning of the word “orphan” according to Her Majesty's Mother tongue is nevertheless interesting. In whatever given context, whether he Mallam Abu Bakar Atiku the presidential hopeful was holding forth or presenting his argumentum ad misericordiam (“I am also a poor orphan O , a victim of tragic circumstances, therefore please sympathise with me O and give me your vote” etc.) and by “whatever given context” I mean, whether he was speaking German in Vienna or Berlin or Naijan English in Benin or Hausa in Kaduna or Arabic in Sokoto or Medina, one wonders if he could not have used a more local word ( local to him) to convey his exact meaning and thereby without the necessity of any apologies to Modern English by Kperogi his would-be English Language mentor, speech writer, corrector and editor.

Somebody - a Yoruba man - could be specific and say “abiku” for example, if he means abiku, he could call a spade a spade and without any self-appointed & erudite apologist or good-willed explicator and translator having to take recourse to some extended sociological or social anthropological lecture to try to convince us as to exactly what he means, meant or intended.

In this sphere, V.S. Naipaul's elucidations in his “The Masque of Africa”provide very satisfying reading, as with the denouements of a thriller, except that with Naipaul this constant, ongoing unravelling, un-concealment and revelation by the semi- omniscience of the speculator-author is from time to time quite exciting as you travel together with him (Naipaul ) his stimulating a meta-dialogue with you and whether you like your reacting and from time to time finding yourself disagreeing with him, with his words on the printed page, strongly, sometimes very strongly. It's known as interactive reading and that's good, not boring companionship on any pilgrimage through the pages, the tragedy being that the page, sometimes the dead page / pages do not always grant him the right of reply and now that Naipaul has become one with the infinite eternity, that right of reply is substituted by gate gate paragate parasamgate bodhi svaha . Toyin Adepoju, my living crutch over there in darkness by moon at the Lagoon in Lagos, you know what I mean?

But to his credit, Kperogi is no Naipaul – to be sure, the disdain ( and a little tinge of the arrogance too ( the big grammar arrogance, the my brain is bigger than yours, ( my Mercedes too) and MY MIND is also often there with Kperogi, for those who fall short of Her Majesty's Higher language status - as The Last Poets put it,

“Niggers are very untogether people
Niggers talk about the mind
Talk about: My mind is stronger than yours
"I got that bitch's mind uptight!"
Niggers don't know a damn thing about the mind
Or they'd be right
Niggers are scared of revolution “

But putting all or the above aside, dear Farooq Kperogi's latest efforts have had a very positive effect at least on me: he got me scampering after the Holy Quran and checking out some Islamic history for some essential considerations, above all and most importantly the status of orphans in Nigeria !

The Prophet of Islam salallahu alaihi wa salaam , was an orphan from a very early age

The Holy Quran speaks frequently about our duties to orphans and widows

This, very clearly must have contributed to his extraordinary compassion for orphans and widows.

Apart from all the tittle-tattle about the meanings of these words, since it's a more pressing concern, we should like to see this compassionate consideration for orphans and widows reflected in official Nigerian state policies :

It's a n interpretational problem, especially in Muslim counties where as a result of the wanton decimation of whole populations through war and terrorism, especially in countries like Iraq , Afghanistan, the Palestinian territories, the  orpnas and widow casued by Boko haram, and of late through the horrific Saudi bombings in Yemen , the result has been numberless orphans and widows who Islamically speaking at the very least are our responsibility. One could preach  about this extensively but I'm sure that in your hearts, you've got the gist 

Of relevance when it comes to mother tongue eulogies to the departed ; Tribute To Burstic Kingsley Bassey

[Farooq A. Kperogi]

Hahaha! This one, too, wants to impress with the ill-digested, barely understood phrases he recently memorized. " Kperogi is entitled to his luxuriating indulgence." LOL!!! What the heck does that mean? Doesn't it hurt your sense of self-worth when you make a fool of yourself in a public forum? Perhaps, you never had one to start with. I can't, for the life of me, make heads or tails of the wild drivel you wrote.

Farooq A. Kperogi, Ph.D.

Associate Professor

Journalism & Emerging Media
School of Communication & Media

Social Science Building 

Room 5092 MD 2207

402 Bartow Avenue
Kennesaw State University

Kennesaw, Georgia, USA 30144
Cell: (+1) 404-573-9697
Personal website: www.farooqkperogi.com

Twitter: @farooqkperog

Author of Glocal English: The Changing Face and Forms of Nigerian English in a Global World

"The nice thing about pessimism is that you are constantly being either proven right or pleasantly surprised." G. F. Will

[Farooq A. Kperogi]

Ibukola,

First go learn basic English grammar. Maybe, just maybe, you will then earn a place to join this sort of conversation, which is clearly above your mental paygrade. If my 8-year-old son were to grade this farrago of irremediable nonsense you wrote, you would score an F. I couldn't even read past the first three paragraphs before I gave up. Ask your intellectual superiors to help you decipher my essay. You clearly have no clue what it's about. This knee-jerk twaddle you wrote is embarrassing.  Nigeria's investment in your education is a total waste. You should be ashamed of yourself. If I remembers correctly, you say you're a lawyer. Hahaha! Na wa o.

Farooq

Farooq A. Kperogi, Ph.D.

Associate Professor

Journalism & Emerging Media
School of Communication & Media

Social Science Building 

Room 5092 MD 2207

402 Bartow Avenue
Kennesaw State University

Kennesaw, Georgia, USA 30144
Cell: (+1) 404-573-9697
Personal website: www.farooqkperogi.com

Twitter: @farooqkperog

Author of Glocal English: The Changing Face and Forms of Nigerian English in a Global World

"The nice thing about pessimism is that you are constantly being either proven right or pleasantly surprised." G. F. Will

[Toyin Falola]

To the Trio:

Do please keep to the debate and avoid unnecessary asides.

There is nothing unusual in having favorite political candidates but it damages both ourselves and the candidates by insulting one another.

Moderator

Sent from my iPhone

[Ayotunde Bewaji]

Ojogbon Agba Oloye Jaburata Falola,

May I respectfully object to being grouped in/with that uncivil "trio"?

Professor Farooq Kperogi is in a zero sum escapade, where there are no alternatives to his effusions. It is either you take it or leave it. 

That kind of attitude grates. It is unacceptable. So, culturally, am now an "orphan", because my Mom transitioned to greater glory just a few years ago, about a decade after my father joined our ancestors?

What is the point of that kind of cultural shenanigan, as some kind of premeditated justification for defense of an old man claiming to be an "orphan" after his mother died at his age 38? Was he selling firewood at that time to make ends meet, or had he swindled enough people through his juicy position in Customs to own 100 houses all over Nigeria?

Then that thing about grading by his 8 year old daughter is so condescending and undeserved from a so-called Professor of Queen's English. If there is need for civility and keeping to issues, this should first attend to our Professor of Queen's English. I did not see any abuse in either IBK's write up or my admiration of the write up.

So, Ojogbon Agba, Oloye Rekereke, is it possible to enlighten our Professor of English Language that a thousand flowers can bloom, without some claiming to be the real flowers and others mere petals of leafstalk?

May I just add: the only constituency I defend is Nigeria. Political parties either serve that interest and gain my confidence, or, when they had four concurrent mandates (16 whole years) and they only destroyed Nigeria, then I owe an obligation to the country that sacrificed to give me what I have today and the people of my town who supported me, to stand up and be counted against the enemies of my country, in whatever guise they come. The least that rational human beings can do is at least to give APC, now without the migrant rogues who have gone back to their decadent homes, a second term. That seems decent to me. If by 2023 the trajectory of progress that PMB is on does not lead anywhere, then I will be the first to say, to your tents o, Nigerians; what portion have we in APC, we have no inheritance in the scions of PMP.

More anon.

Ire o.

Tunde.

Dr. John Ayotunde (Tunde) Isola BEWAJI, FJIM, MNAL
Professor of Philosophy
BA, MA, PhD Philosophy, PGDE, MA Distance Education
Postgraduate Certificate in Philosophy for Children
Department of Language, Linguistics and Philosophy
Faculty of Humanities and Education
University of the West Indies
Mona Campus Kingston 7 Jamaica
Tel:       1-876-927-1661-9 Ext: 3993
             1-876-935-8993 (o)
Fax:      1-876-970-2949
Email:   john....@uwimona.edu.jm      johnayotu...@gmail.com       tunde...@yahoo.com (alternate) 
             tunde....@gmail.com (alternate)

http://www.cap-press.com/books/isbn/9781611630879/Narratives-of-Struggle (2012)
http://www.amazon.com/Black-Aesthetics (2012)

https://rowman.com/ISBN/9780739185032/Ontologized-Ethics (2013)

https://rowman.com/ISBN/9781498518383/The-Rule-of-Law-and-Governance-in-Indigenous-Yoruba-Society-A-Study-in-African-Philosophy-of-Law (2016)

http://www.cambridgescholars.com/the-humanities-and-the-dynamics-of-african-culture-in-the-21st-century (2017)

[Farooq A. Kperogi]

Oga Falola,

IBK and Bewaji have no capacity for reasoned argumentation. All they know how to do is throw impotent, childish tantrums, especially when issues transcend their limited cognitive abilities. This is a straightforward issue about the usage, etymology, evolution, and varying cultural significations of the term "orphan." Atiku grew up in a Muslim culture where an orphan is understood as a child who lost his or her father, so he used the term as he understood it. What's complex about that? If you want to disprove my point, let me read your scholarly and logical disputation. Let's have a respectful conversation. After all, that's the whole point of sharing the article here. Is yateen not the word used in the Qur'an for an orphan? Doesn't it mean a child who lost a father? Doesn't UNICEF classify orphans as paternal orphans, maternal orphans, and double orphans? Didn't Atiku qualify as a paternal orphan going by this UNICEF classification? Aren't modern English dictionaries capturing the shifting meaning of orphan in ways that justify Atiku's use of the term? And, finally, doesn't the etymology of the term suggest that it initially referred to a child who lost a father?

These are the issues, but these folks are too dense to comprehend them, so they launch vulgar, illiterate attacks on my person because they lack the intellectual sophistication to wrap their little heads around the issues. I don't suffer fools gladly. Certainly not nescient twerps who should be learning insteading of conversing. If I have free time, like I do now, I'll alway take on angry, butthurt ignoramuses like IBK and Bewaji. The other alternative is to block their emails like I've done to a few people here who can't discuss issues without gratuitous ad hominems.

Farooq 

Farooq A. Kperogi, Ph.D.

Associate Professor

Journalism & Emerging Media
School of Communication & Media

Social Science Building 

Room 5092 MD 2207

402 Bartow Avenue
Kennesaw State University

Kennesaw, Georgia, USA 30144
Cell: (+1) 404-573-9697
Personal website: www.farooqkperogi.com

Twitter: @farooqkperog

Author of Glocal English: The Changing Face and Forms of Nigerian English in a Global World

"The nice thing about pessimism is that you are constantly being either proven right or pleasantly surprised." G. F. Will

[Adeshina Afolayan]

As far as i am concerned, any response that stoops to the level of insults and abuse, for those who claim to be intellectuals, reduces our worth. For those who responds to any posts with insults and those who retort with further insults, what is the essence of your education, and of scholarship? Is it impossible to tolerate opposing and alternative and alternate viewpoints? If i find a viewpoint execrable and indigestible, why not just spew it out and remain silent? If my viewpoint is lampooned, why not just keep silent or, at best, respond with the utmost respect. That is maturity. Do we know how many people read what we write? Do we know what we have become in the eyes of some others, silent and not silent, on this forum? Haba! So, Kperogi writes something and then you are almost certain what will follow will be insults and abuses. No wonder we have read about transforming this listserv into a purely Nigerian arena. So what if Kperogi decides to do a linguistic and etymological analysis of "orphan" and "orphanages"? Some of us learn from all these. And if we are put off, we simply shake our heads and delete (thank god for the delete button!). So what if Kperogi is a paid hack working for a particular political personage? He can do all these and we have no right to impugn his person, only his arguments. There is no ad hominem that that dignifies a scholar. Indeed, no scholar who feels so angry as to respond in kind to a perceived or real insult is also dignified. So, how does Kperogi feels after writing all the terrible things in response to an insult? How do you feel after sending it? Satisfied? Fulfilled? Smug?

I suspect that a true scholar would not be so riled as to insult or respond with insults. Mba! A true scholar learns from all sorts of posts, odious and pleasurable.  

We all just keep damaging our intellectual worth when we fight naked and bloodied in the marketplace. 

 

This is just from a small boy who knows nothing, and who keeps hoping to learn from the big masquerades on this platform.

Adeshina Afolayan, PhD
Department of Philosophy
University of Ibadan

+23480-3928-8429

[Salimonu Kadiri]

Thank you Professor Farooq Kperogi for lampooning Ibukola and not Ibukunolu who did not write, "If I remembers correctly, you say you're a lawyer." Well, English language is not our mother tongue and as long as the information being conveyed by a sender in a foreign language is understood by the receivers, grammatical errors are inconsequential. After all the primary purpose of communicating, either on this forum or elsewhere, is to understand one another and not to pass English language grammar test to be rewarded with a certificate.

S. Kadiri

---

Från: usaafric...@googlegroups.com <usaafric...@googlegroups.com> för Farooq A. Kperogi <farooq...@gmail.com>
Skickat: den 26 november 2018 15:27
Till: usaafric...@googlegroups.com
Ämne: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Atiku and the Meaning of an “Orphan” in English

 

[Ibukunolu A Babajide]

Dear Salimonu Kadiri,

Please ignore Farooq Kperogi.  This is his consistent behaviour when he is exposed for who and what he is a paid hack who writes for the highest bidder.  The man is so egocentric and self-conceited that when he is exposed he reacts with unadulterated narcissism.  His beloved Atiku will lose and he will write another useless collage of worthless words in the defence of his chosen thief.

The man has no substance.  He is a mere neo-colonial pawn in a game he will never intellectually decipher or decode.  Kindly ignore him.  The blowing breeze has exposed the private of the chicken.  He is an intellectual chicken.

Cheers.

IBK

_________________________

Ibukunolu Alao Babajide (IBK)

(+2348061276622) / ibk...@gmail.com

AN ENGLISH NURSERY RHYME

The law locks up the man or woman

Who steals the goose from off the common

But leaves the greater villain loose

Who steals the common from off the goose

 

The law demands that we atone

When we take things that we do not own

But leaves the lords and ladies fine

Who take things that are yours and mine

 

The poor and wretched don’t escape

If they conspire the law to break

This must be so but they endure

Those who conspire to make the law

 

The law locks up the man or woman

Who steals the goose from off the common

And geese will still a common lack

Till they go and steal it back

 -        Anonymous (circa 1764)

[Ibukunolu A Babajide]

Farooq Kperogi,

This man was very gentle and kind to you.  However, in your blind hatred for Buhari and your gushing and pathetic Nwabueze-type embrace of Atiku you will not see those who are undeservingly kind to you.  What you call drivel is very open and clear.  It simply means you have been exposed for what you are - a cheap paid hack who writes for the highest bidder.  An intellectual prostitute - no more no less.

Cheers.

IBK

_________________________

Ibukunolu Alao Babajide (IBK)

(+2348061276622) / ibk...@gmail.com

AN ENGLISH NURSERY RHYME

The law locks up the man or woman

Who steals the goose from off the common

But leaves the greater villain loose

Who steals the common from off the goose

 

The law demands that we atone

When we take things that we do not own

But leaves the lords and ladies fine

Who take things that are yours and mine

 

The poor and wretched don’t escape

If they conspire the law to break

This must be so but they endure

Those who conspire to make the law

 

The law locks up the man or woman

Who steals the goose from off the common

And geese will still a common lack

Till they go and steal it back

 -        Anonymous (circa 1764)

[Farooq A. Kperogi]

Oga Adesina,

You have a way of nicely guilt-tripping people😁. I responded to IBK and Bewaji the way I did because they probably imagined that I would ignore their ignorant vitriol. I want to show them that two can play that game. We all embody a multiplicity of personalities. I can be calm, subdued, and respectful when the occasion calls for it, and I can be brusque, coarse, and rhetorically violent when someone says something to me that invites that. I make no pretenses to being a uni-dimensional, sober, imperturbable scholar. As Fela sings, "I no be gentleman at all o!" I am an imperfect human who doesn't suffer fools gladly. When people ignore the substance of my contribution and advertise their malicious illiteracy in their bid to attack me over things they don't understand, I'll come for them--if I have time, like I do now.

Thanks,

Farooq

Farooq A. Kperogi, Ph.D.

Associate Professor

Journalism & Emerging Media
School of Communication & Media

Social Science Building 

Room 5092 MD 2207

402 Bartow Avenue
Kennesaw State University

Kennesaw, Georgia, USA 30144
Cell: (+1) 404-573-9697
Personal website: www.farooqkperogi.com

Twitter: @farooqkperog

Author of Glocal English: The Changing Face and Forms of Nigerian English in a Global World

"The nice thing about pessimism is that you are constantly being either proven right or pleasantly surprised." G. F. Will

[Farooq A. Kperogi]

Bewaji,

Atiku's father died WHEN ATIKU WAS A CHILD! That was why he called himself an orphan from the perspective of Islam. UNICEF would call him a paternal orphan. His mother lived until he was in his late 30s, so he wasn't a maternal orphan, nor did he claim to be one. So talking about his mother entirely misses the point. If you don't know the facts, ask--or find out. Don't argue because you're driven by unschooled, preprogrammed impulses. Read, understand, and digest the issues first before you join the conversation. If you had done that, you would have saved yourself this embarrassment.

I welcome disagreements with my views. That's why I share them there. What I don't welcome--and that I'll resist--is people joining a conversation they have no knowledge of, particularly when they do so with pitifully toxic ignorance. 

Farooq

Farooq A. Kperogi, Ph.D.

Associate Professor

Journalism & Emerging Media
School of Communication & Media

Social Science Building 

Room 5092 MD 2207

402 Bartow Avenue
Kennesaw State University

Kennesaw, Georgia, USA 30144
Cell: (+1) 404-573-9697
Personal website: www.farooqkperogi.com

Twitter: @farooqkperog

Author of Glocal English: The Changing Face and Forms of Nigerian English in a Global World

"The nice thing about pessimism is that you are constantly being either proven right or pleasantly surprised." G. F. Will

[Julius Eto]

Thanks Professor Falola for this great forum. May God continue to bless, guide and protect you for your selfless service (s) to black people worldwide, that is Africans on the continent and in the diaspora.
Sir, while i regard our brothers Kperogi, IBK and others in this argument highly, i am surprised and disappointed that they are rooting for APC and PDP/Buhari and Atiku which/who have been rejected by a majority of Nigerians that have figured out their hypocrisy, opportunism, greed/looting and nepotism. The millenial voters will deal both incompetent and barely literate duo (a) big blow (s) to the bewilderment of their paid agents by embracing other presidential candidates since there is no difference between the APC and PDP both of which have failed the people..
--------------------------------------------
On Mon, 11/26/18, Farooq A. Kperogi <farooq...@gmail.com> wrote:

Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Atiku and the Meaning of an “Orphan” in English
To: usaafric...@googlegroups.com
Date: Monday, November 26, 2018, 5:47 PM

Oga
Adesina,
You have a way of
nicely guilt-tripping people😁. I responded to IBK and
Bewaji the way I did because they probably imagined that I
would ignore their ignorant vitriol. I want to show them
that two can play that game. We all embody a multiplicity of
personalities. I can be calm, subdued, and respectful when
the occasion calls for it, and I can be brusque, coarse, and
rhetorically violent when someone says something to me that
invites that. I make no pretenses to being a
uni-dimensional, sober, imperturbable scholar. As Fela
sings, "I no be gentleman at all o!" I am an
imperfect human who doesn't suffer fools gladly. When
people ignore the substance of my contribution and advertise
their malicious illiteracy in their bid to attack me over
things they don't understand, I'll come for them--if
I have time, like I do now.
Thanks,Farooq

Farooq A. Kperogi, Ph.D.Associate ProfessorJournalism & Emerging

Media
School of Communication &

MediaSocial Science
Building Room 5092 MD
2207402 Bartow Avenue

Kennesaw
State University
Kennesaw, Georgia, USA
30144
Cell: (+1) 404-573-9697

Personal website: www.farooqkperogi.comTwitter: @farooqkperogAuthor of Glocal English: The Changing Face and Forms

of Nigerian English in a Global World

"The nice thing about pessimism is that
you are constantly being either proven right or pleasantly
surprised." G. F. Will


On Mon, Nov

26, 2018 at 11:16 AM 'Adeshina Afolayan' via USA

Africa Dialogue Series <usaafric...@googlegroups.com>
wrote:

On Monday, November 26, 2018, 3:48:37 PM

GMT+1, Farooq A. Kperogi <farooq...@gmail.com>

wrote:





Ibukola,
First go
learn basic English grammar. Maybe, just maybe, you will
then earn a place to join this sort of conversation, which
is clearly above your mental paygrade. If my 8-year-old son
were to grade this farrago of irremediable nonsense you
wrote, you would score an F. I couldn't even read past
the first three paragraphs before I gave up. Ask your
intellectual superiors to help you decipher my essay. You
clearly have no clue what it's about. This knee-jerk
twaddle you wrote is embarrassing.  Nigeria's
investment in your education is a total waste. You should be
ashamed of yourself. If I remembers correctly, you say
you're a lawyer. Hahaha! Na wa o.
Farooq
Farooq A. Kperogi,

Ph.D.Associate ProfessorJournalism & Emerging

Media
School of Communication &

MediaSocial Science
Building Room 5092 MD
2207402 Bartow Avenue

Kennesaw
State University
Kennesaw, Georgia, USA
30144
Cell: (+1) 404-573-9697

Personal website: www.farooqkperogi.comTwitter: @farooqkperogAuthor of Glocal English: The Changing Face and Forms

"orphan[awr-fuh n]nouna child who has lost both parents through death, or, less commonly, one parent.a young animal that has been deserted by
or has lost its mother.a person or thing that is without protective affiliation, sponsorship, etc.:The committee is

Alao Babajide (IBK)(+2348061276622) / ibk...@gmail.comAN ENGLISH NURSERY RHYME

and the Meaning of an “Orphan” in EnglishBy Farooq A. Kperogi, Ph.D.

Twitter: @farooqkperogi
In
his pre-recorded initiatory presidential campaign speech on
November 19, 2018, former Vice President and PDP
presidential candidate Atiku Abubakar described himself as
having grown up an “orphan.” “I started out as an
orphan selling firewood on the streets of Jada in Adamawa,
but God, through the Nigerian state, invested in me and here
I am today,” he said.
President
Buhari’s social media aide by the name of Lauretta Onochie
led a chorus of Buhari supporters on Twitter to pooh-pooh
Atiku’s claim to orphanhood. She said Atiku wasn’t an
orphan because he didn’t lose both parents. This ignited a
frenzied social media conversation about the meaning of an
orphan. Below is Onochie’s tweet that set off the
debate:

Ph.D.Associate ProfessorJournalism & Emerging

Media
School of Communication &

MediaSocial Science
Building Room 5092 MD
2207402 Bartow Avenue

Kennesaw
State University
Kennesaw, Georgia, USA
30144
Cell: (+1) 404-573-9697

Personal website: www.farooqkperogi.comTwitter: @farooqkperogAuthor of Glocal English: The Changing Face and Forms

[Farooq A. Kperogi]

IBK,

Go look up the word "projection" and let an educated person explain it to you because I know your cognitive deficiencies and insufficient education would stand in the way of your understanding it. You are engaging in projection. It’s an ego defense mechanism, which disposes certain people to attribute to others the unconscious and (sometimes conscious) negative traits and emotions that dwell in them.

So people who are compulsive liars always suspect that others are lying. People who have no capacity for altruism, who are self-serving narcissists, can’t understand that anyone can criticize an incompetent, clueless, bungling, unprepared, lying, propagandistic government without ulterior motives. They project their immorality, ethical deficiencies, ethno-regional and religious anxieties onto others.

They project all of their inadequacies onto others because they lack the internal moral resources to appreciate truth, justice, and fair play without the burden of their own moral frailty. They are victims of what psychoanalysts call “projection of a severe conscience,” which causes some people to, without evidence, make false accusations against others and to impute negative emotions to other people’s actions.

You, IBK, are obviously an incompetent, low-IQ paid hack doing the bidding of Tinubu and imagine that other people who write to rail against bad government are paid to do so like you. But you're a bad investment because your crying nescience is such an embarrassment. You are an ethically degenerate, irascible, ignorant thug. Look here, no one on earth is rich enough to pay me for my opinions, not because I am Bill Gates but because I cherish my independence of thought and because I have honor. If Atiku were to become president, I'd do to him exactly what I am doing to Buhari: hold his feet to the fire. I did the same to Jonathan and even to Obasanjo in whose administration I worked for nearly two years. But I know you have no capacity to understand the concepts of honor and independence of thought.  Talking about these high-minded principles with you is like casting pearls before swine.

Farooq

Farooq A. Kperogi, Ph.D.

Associate Professor

Journalism & Emerging Media
School of Communication & Media

Social Science Building 

Room 5092 MD 2207

402 Bartow Avenue
Kennesaw State University

Kennesaw, Georgia, USA 30144
Cell: (+1) 404-573-9697
Personal website: www.farooqkperogi.com

Twitter: @farooqkperog

Author of Glocal English: The Changing Face and Forms of Nigerian English in a Global World

"The nice thing about pessimism is that you are constantly being either proven right or pleasantly surprised." G. F. Will

[OLAYINKA AGBETUYI]

Moderator.

Please let us call a spade a spade. You may as well join me in the quartet, sir, since some of us will not simply quietly go to a corner and die because Farooq cannot brook opposition to his ideas before hurling demeaning insults to shut down opposition and describing professors and professionals alike as not understanding simple English.  We can for the moment ignore attacks on me whom he describes as his student, what about those who are not his students?  This is the kind of language he dares not use on his American 17 year old  freshmen students  who will give him a stinking rebuke in their end of semester report. I think it is the cathartic effect of what he is prevented from doing on campus that he is letting out in the forum. Farooq needs to be brought to heel. It's as simple as that.  He does not have a mint of English in his backyard and no matter what qualifications in English he has he is categorised as just a user of English as a second language like those he routinely attacks (and over whom he habitually stands in judgement), and not a native speaker in the manner he wants to project.  Debates have rules especially if held by academicians.  Insults are not part of the rules.  We won't always agree during debates; so what!

I wanted to comment on Farooqs attack on the President and his staff for copying a logo from a US university but  I was heavily tied up in the past week or so.

First in the area where I grew up in Nigeria the street name College Crescent was borrowed from a street from the same name in Finchley London.  No eyebrows have been raised since more than 60 years when it was adopted.  Everyone knows Broad Street in Lagos. It was lifted from Haringey in London.  Several areas in London have areas twinned with other sections of cities in Europe e.g. Barnet. No big deal.

Now when it comes to President Buhari its damn him if he does and damn him if he doesn't. I have no personal links with Buhari and nobody in my family does.  But in one breath Buhari is provincial and does not appreciate academic values. In the same breath when he and his advisers are reaching out to the American academic community through symbolism it is odious and theft of intellectual property that must be condemned in an on going ruthless crusade even when the writer admits its not copyrighted material.  Only because Muhammadu Buhari is involved.  Haba!  When attacks on govt become so routine they lose their value.

OAA

Sent from my Samsung Galaxy smartphone.

-------- Original message --------

From: Toyin Falola <toyin...@austin.utexas.edu>

Date: 26/11/2018 17:19 (GMT+00:00)

To: usaafric...@googlegroups.com

Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Atiku and the Meaning of an “Orphan” in English

This message is eligible for Automatic Cleanup! (toyin...@austin.utexas.edu) Add cleanup rule | More info

To the Trio:

Do please keep to the debate and avoid unnecessary asides.

There is nothing unusual in having favorite political candidates but it damages both ourselves and the candidates by insulting one another.

Moderator

Sent from my iPhone

[Cornelius Hamelberg]

Everyone is waiting: Baba Kadiri has still not weighed in on the matter in his own inimitable fashion and when he does, it should bring it all to a boil and hopefully, after the catharses it should all simmer down

Whilst the ogas may passionately dis-agree with Don Kperogi , few would entertain any rudimentary disagreement with “ I have no name” / “Joy is my name” or much else when it comes to Blake's view of children and two sides of the coin illustrated in songs of innocence / songs of experience .

Nor should there be any fundamental disagreement about tackling what is and should be of much greater concern: the problem of orphans and widows created by all kinds of circumstances, such as the current insecurity in the country, the rising death toll from Boko Haram and those fighting them.

I daresay that if there was an unconditional amnesty given whereby all Boko Haram prisoners of war were to be freed, that would bring the endless round of retaliatory violence , bloodshed , carnage to a stop.

Unfortunately, and this may sound cynical, the opposition is banking on a deterioration on the security posed by Boko Haram thus giving them the opportunity of laying all the blame squarely on President Buhari and promising the electorate that they would do better...

[Ibukunolu. A. Babajide]

Adeshina Afolayan,

You miss the point. I did no ad hominem on Farooq Kperogi. He is too inconsequential to deserve such attention from me. 

I simply wrote about a trend. I gave his useless veiled Atiku praise and worship piece as an example of the pseudo-intellectualism that is afoot in Nigeria and is destroying Nigeria. Worse than this, there is also anti-intellectualism where the buffoons (like Donald Trump) gain the upper hand based on racism over people like Barack Obama.  That is also gaining ground in Nigeria. 

Without any proof a man weaves a cacophony of baseless lies and thinks he can push it when all he wants to do is promote a thief who is his preferred candidate?  The definition of an orphan has no cultural dimension. You either know it as loss of one parent or you know it as loss of both. The definition admits both meanings. 

So if that is the case what is the need for this hypocrisy of clothing a pitch for Atiku in the garb of senseless academic writing. In 1979 Walter Ofonagoro invaded our television screens and did the same justifying the NPN rape of our democracy with the veneer of legitimacy. Barefaced lies. He coined the “Son of the Soil” syndrome and so many similar cliches to cover naked NPN rigging. 

Omoruyi was the brain behind Ibrahim Babangida’s never ending transition to nowhere. Option A4 and all that wasteful a little to the right and a little to the left nonsense.  Today we all can see the evil effects of that period in our polity.

My point is why are Nigerians unable to speak truth to power. Why do we pretend and behave like hypocrites?  If Farooq Kperogi wants to support the Devil that is his choice. He will not be the first or the last to do so. His elaborate contrived write up that is a mere Atiku campaign sloganeering is not required. He will not succeed in passing off a dog as a monkey!

In conclusion, the real politik in Nigeria today is a contest between Buhari and Atiku. No other candidate can upstage these two come 2019.  You are free to support anyone else but these are the two front runners. Votes cast in any way will simply result in the emergence of one of these two. 

Cheers. 

IBK

Sent from my iPhone

[OLAYINKA AGBETUYI]

Wise wòrds  You are indeed a scholar in the serious use of that word.  A true philosopher   But I still insist the onerous responsibilityto exercise restraint fslls on the person who provoked and invited respinses by their posting.  

The responders are in fact doing him a favour by their responses no matter in what form otherwise he would be engaged in a monologue. If he organizes debates in class as part of his teaching duties and one of his students produces his responses in this forum what would he say?  It is a cardinal axiom of teaching that you can't teach what you don't know.  It is not sufficient to say I no be gentleman. Fela was no professor..(even though he once came to our campus with staff logging dozens of tomes of nook on African culture to lecture us when all he was invited to do was play music!)

OAA

Sent from my Samsung Galaxy smartphone.

-------- Original message --------

From: 'Adeshina Afolayan' via USA Africa Dialogue Series <usaafric...@googlegroups.com>

Date: 26/11/2018 17:17 (GMT+00:00)

To: usaafric...@googlegroups.com

Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Atiku and the Meaning of an “Orphan” in English

This message is eligible for Automatic Cleanup! (usaafric...@googlegroups.com) Add cleanup rule | More info

As far as i am concerned, any response that stoops to the level of insults and abuse, for those who claim to be intellectuals, reduces our worth. For those who responds to any posts with insults and those who retort with further insults, what is the essence of your education, and of scholarship? Is it impossible to tolerate opposing and alternative and alternate viewpoints? If i find a viewpoint execrable and indigestible, why not just spew it out and remain silent? If my viewpoint is lampooned, why not just keep silent or, at best, respond with the utmost respect. That is maturity. Do we know how many people read what we write? Do we know what we have become in the eyes of some others, silent and not silent, on this forum? Haba! So, Kperogi writes something and then you are almost certain what will follow will be insults and abuses. No wonder we have read about transforming this listserv into a purely Nigerian arena. So what if Kperogi decides to do a linguistic and etymological analysis of "orphan" and "orphanages"? Some of us learn from all these. And if we are put off, we simply shake our heads and delete (thank god for the delete button!). So what if Kperogi is a paid hack working for a particular political personage? He can do all these and we have no right to impugn his person, only his arguments. There is no ad hominem that that dignifies a scholar. Indeed, no scholar who feels so angry as to respond in kind to a perceived or real insult is also dignified. So, how does Kperogi feels after writing all the terrible things in response to an insult? How do you feel after sending it? Satisfied? Fulfilled? Smug?

I suspect that a true scholar would not be so riled as to insult or respond with insults. Mba! A true scholar learns from all sorts of posts, odious and pleasurable.  

We all just keep damaging our intellectual worth when we fight naked and bloodied in the marketplace. 

 

This is just from a small boy who knows nothing, and who keeps hoping to learn from the big masquerades on this platform.

Adeshina Afolayan, PhD
Department of Philosophy
University of Ibadan

+23480-3928-8429

[Farooq A. Kperogi]

IBK,

You obviously don't know the meaning of the expression "ad hominem," which is not surprising, given your notoriety for double-dyed idiocy. Next time, when an article is beyond your ken, stay way from it--or ask questions-- and not make a fool of yourself.

Farooq

Farooq A. Kperogi, Ph.D.

Associate Professor

Journalism & Emerging Media
School of Communication & Media

Social Science Building 

Room 5092 MD 2207

402 Bartow Avenue
Kennesaw State University

Kennesaw, Georgia, USA 30144
Cell: (+1) 404-573-9697
Personal website: www.farooqkperogi.com

Twitter: @farooqkperog

Author of Glocal English: The Changing Face and Forms of Nigerian English in a Global World

"The nice thing about pessimism is that you are constantly being either proven right or pleasantly surprised." G. F. Will

[Ibukunolu A Babajide]

Dear Farooq Kperogi,

You are the self appointed gatekeeper of the English language.  I can see that you also now double as the Gatekeeper of Latin!  Enjoy your gatekeeping duties.  I am absolutely certain that you do enjoy the thankless and worthless gatekeeping that is of no value.

Cheers.

IBK

_________________________

Ibukunolu Alao Babajide (IBK)

(+2348061276622) / ibk...@gmail.com

AN ENGLISH NURSERY RHYME

The law locks up the man or woman

Who steals the goose from off the common

But leaves the greater villain loose

Who steals the common from off the goose

 

The law demands that we atone

When we take things that we do not own

But leaves the lords and ladies fine

Who take things that are yours and mine

 

The poor and wretched don’t escape

If they conspire the law to break

This must be so but they endure

Those who conspire to make the law

 

The law locks up the man or woman

Who steals the goose from off the common

And geese will still a common lack

Till they go and steal it back

 -        Anonymous (circa 1764)

[Toyin Falola]

I now have to stop this thread. It has become an intellectual Boko Haramizing, in which words on all sides replace bullets.

Moderator.

[OLAYINKA AGBETUYI]

Well done!

OAA

Sent from my Samsung Galaxy smartphone.

-------- Original message --------

From: Toyin Falola <toyin...@austin.utexas.edu>

Date: 27/11/2018 17:24 (GMT+00:00)

To: usaafric...@googlegroups.com

Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Atiku and the Meaning of an “Orphan” in English

This message is eligible for Automatic Cleanup! (toyin...@austin.utexas.edu) Add cleanup rule | More info

I now have to stop this thread. It has become an intellectual Boko Haramizing, in which words on all sides replace bullets.

Moderator.

 

From: dialogue <usaafric...@googlegroups.com> on behalf of Ibukunolu A Babajide <ibk...@gmail.com>

Reply-To: dialogue <usaafric...@googlegroups.com>
Date: Tuesday, November 27, 2018 at 9:06 AM
To: dialogue <usaafric...@googlegroups.com>

[Salimonu Kadiri]

Please, Professor Toyin Falola, rather than stopping this thread, stop publishing uncouth posts from BÓLÈKAJÀ Intellectuals.

S. Kadiri

---

Från: usaafric...@googlegroups.com <usaafric...@googlegroups.com> för Toyin Falola <toyin...@austin.utexas.edu>
Skickat: den 27 november 2018 17:21
Till: usaafric...@googlegroups.com
Ämne: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Atiku and the Meaning of an “Orphan” in English

 

[Salimonu Kadiri]

In order to uncover Farooq Kperogi's level of latent prejudice against the APC and Muhammadu Buhari, in particular, I must start from his post on this forum from Saturday, 17 November 2018, out of many he has posted on Buhari's APC government in the last three years. In his post: Ethnic and Religious Bigotry as Buhari's 2019 Campaign Strategy of 17 November 2018, Farooq wrote among other things, "But after (APC) ascending to power, ….//…. They chose, instead, to govern or, more accurately un-govern, in drama - drama of endlessly flippant blame games, ceaselessly brazen falsehoods, tedious propaganda, unremorseful bigotry, crass hemorrhaging of the economy, crippling national fissiparity, in-your-face hypocrisy and fraud, setting the bar of governance to the lowest imaginable watermark, and embarrassing idiocy at the highest reaches of government." Farooq Kperogi did not share with us, his readers, which blame games and falsehoods Buhari's led APC government have committed and how APC has haemorrhaged  the economy. The heart of Nigerian economy is crude oil export from which Nigeria under the 16 years of PDP government (1999-2015) earned $ 862 billion (US dollars). The breakdown is as follows: under Obasanjo and Yar'Adua, 1999-2009, Nigeria earned $481 billion from crude oil export while under Jonathan, 2010-2015, it was $381. Under Buhari from June 2015 and hitherto, Nigeria has earned $112 billion. 

When APC ascended power in 2015, the international price of crude oil per barrel had fallen from over $100 to under $30. Buhari met purposeless transactions totalling $359 million and he inherited $63 billion foreign debt from Jonathan. Boko Haram was physically occupying 50, 000 square kilometers land area in Nigeria and since 24 August 2014, had declared Gwosa in Borno State as the Capital of their Islamic Caliphate. Billions of dollars meant to buy weapons and to equip Nigerian soldiers to fight insurgents had been shared by PDP politicians and Service Chiefs of the Armed Forces. Although there was general economic recession in the world, the dependency of Nigeria's economy solely on crude oil export made the recession worst in Nigeria. Most of the States could not pay their workers because the incoming Governors met empty treasuries. At the same time that Buhari reorganised the Armed Forces and equipped them to drive out Boko Haram insurgents from occupied Nigerian territories, he was forced to take foreign loans for bailouts of bankrupt states' government so that they could pay their workers and maintain essential services. In the midst of all the problems Buhari inherited from  Jonathan era, serious illness befell him. Had Buhari disclosed the cause of his illness to Nigerians, he would have earned the sympathy of all good-hearted Nigerians. In spite of the hopelessness of the economic situation, worsened by dwindling crude oil export earning, Boko Haram has been incapacitated from holding any territory in Nigeria even though they can still launch sporadic attacks from their hideouts along Nigeria's volatile borders with Cameroon, Chad and Niger Republics. That is neither falsehood nor tedious propaganda but the truth. It is not a blame game either by Buhari's led APC government to endlessly ask the PDP leaders that governed Nigeria for 16 years what they did with $862 billion US dollars Nigeria earned from crude oil exports during their era. What economic haemorrhage is Farooq Kperogi talking about when the PDP regime spent $50 billion US dollars on power to produce darkness for Nigerians? Going by the title of his 17 November 2018 essay, Farooq Kperogi inferred that Buhari's led APC government had done nothing in the past three and a half year and thereby proclaimed a chest beating balloon of prophecy that Buhari's 2019 campaign strategy would be ethnic and religious bigotry. He backed up his prophecy thus, "In a December 2017 video, for example, Buhari thanked Kano people for coming out en masse to welcome him and said, 'saboda yan kudu su san har yanzu inada gata.' Rough translation. '...so that Southerners can see how favoured I still am." How genuine was the December 2017 video cannot be verified and for those of us who are not verse in Hausa language, we must be very sceptical about Farooq's rough translation of the purported statement of Buhari in Hausa language in Kano. That is even more so if we remember that in his post of 4 November 2018, he claimed that the word JÀMBÁ in Yoruba language is a corrupt word derived from the Hausa language ZAMBA, meaning fraudulent.  Yet the true meaning of JÀMBÁ in Yoruba language is havoc, or calamity, or mishap. However, few days later, the APC punctured Professor Farooq Kperogi's chest beating balloon of prophecy by making public what it called NEXTLEVEL. It stated, "We are committed to deepening the work we started in this first term, such that Nigeria's assets and resources continue to be organized & utilized for the good of the common man. Join @ Prof Osinbajo and I on this journey to the NEXT LEVEL of a prosperous, strong and stable Nigeria." Disappointed professor Farooq Kperogi reacted.

On Saturday, 24 November 2018, professor Farooq Kperogi titled his essay as : APC's Next Level of Fraud, Incompetence, and Sorrow. Commenting on the cartoon with the inscription : WE ARE ALL GOING HIGHER, Farooq wrote, "Buhari appears as a clumsy, clueless leader who can't even get his steps right, unlike Osinbajo, he skips a step on the staircase as he leads Nigerians to what seems like bottomless perdition. Buhari is two metres tall in hight and with his long legs, it is biologically and physiologically reasonable, if not compelling, that he should skip over a step on the staircase unlike the short-sized Osinbajo who must skip a step at a time unless he desired to overstrain himself. And not so surprising, the star gazer sees Buhari leading Nigerians to bottomless perdition through the APC ROAD MAP - NEXT LEVEL. About Buhari, Kperogi wrote, "The only quality Buhari proclaims is an inscrutable integrity …. yet his government was ranked the second worst in the world in 'government integrity' in 2018 by the US-based Heritage Foundation." What a patriotic Nigerian would have demanded to know from the Heritage Foundation is why the US is keeping over $600 billion (US dollars) stolen by Nigerian officials beginning from the era of Ibrahim Babangida and kept in the US banks and why is the US government demanding that the Nigerian government should engage the services of American lawyers to approach American Courts for decisions before the stolen Nigerian assets can be repatriated to the Nigerian government? Is Heritage Foundation not aware that American lawyers were demanding two-third (2/3) of the stolen amount to be repatriated to Nigeria as fees, a behaviour which professor Farooq Kperogi would have described as in-your-face hypocrisy and fraud if Heritage Foundation were to be a Nigerian based organisation? Are lions credible when they lament over the deaths of impalas? Probably, Farooq Kperogi would agree with the US-based Heritage Foundation that US government is ranked best in the world in government integrity in 2018 even though Black Americans are protesting daily, under the hashtag : Black Lives Matter, against being systematically murdered and persecuted on racial ground.

On 26 November 2018, the definition and meaning of the word orphan was twisted by Farooq Kperogi in favour of the PDP presidential aspirant, Atiku Abubakar, in the 2019 Presidential election. He quoted the PDP presidential aspirant, Atiku Abubakar, as having said on 19 November 2018, as follows, "I started out as an orphan selling firewood on the streets of Jada in Adamawa, but God, through the Nigerian State, invested in me and here I am today." Nigerian puritans and absolutists objected to Atiku's reference to himself as an orphan because he did not lose both parents as a child and his mother died when he was 38 years. They regard Atiku's claim to being an orphan as a political gimmick aimed at hoodwinking Nigerian voters. Clipping the tail of the fox like that in the public attracted the ire of Farooq Kperogi and caused him to exhibit what psychologists classify as three objectionable character traits - hyper-choleric disposition, disdain for other persons and excessive flaunt and application of bombastic English vocabularies. During the time Atiku Abubakar was selling firewood as an orphan, he was not the only orphan in Adamawa, not to talk of entire Nigeria. There is no evidence that he was the most brilliant orphan in Adamawa at that time which is why he said that 'but God, through the Nigerian State invested in me.' The fate of all Nigerian children either as orphans or not is up till today decided by absurd raffle-draws among identical and brilliant children whereby few are selected to be educated while majority are denied education. Why should God make the Nigerian State to educate Atiku Abubakar and not other children in his situation at that time? Atiku Abubakar, like most Nigerians educated with public funds, considers himself a lottery winner and he has utilized every opportunity in public service to satisfy his gluttonous appetite for overconsumption of Nigeria's wealth. He was the first Deputy Director General of Nigerian Custom Service to become a millionaire. In 1999, President Obasanjo made Atiku not only his Vice but head of privatisation of public enterprises. Quarrel soon began between Obasanjo and his vice who apportioned to himself lion shares of the privatised public properties and he, Obasanjo, getting only fox shares. Among foraging gluttons there is no code of conduct. Obasanjo and Atiku's fight was dirty and open to Nigerians. I still have Nigerian newspapers' cuttings from 2006 where Obasanjo accused Atiku Abubakar of stealing public funds and the latter charged back that Obasanjo should explain his source of wealth since his bank account contained only twenty-thousand naira when he came out of Abacha's gulag in 1998 and his Otta farm was in total ruin. By the time their two terms of eight years constitutional tenure expired in 2007, Obasanjo blocked Atiku's chance of partaking in PDP's presidential primary. During their tenure in office, Olusegun Obasanjo and Atiku Abubakar spent $16 billion on electricity but by the time they left office in 2007, they had invented a dozen of acronyms for electricity with which they succeeded to envelope Nigerians in constant darkness. In year 2000, the duo of Obasanjo and Abubakar led federal government signed the Millenium Development Goal initiated by Western World controlled UN. Therein, Nigeria accepted responsibility that all Nigerian children of school age would have access to compulsory and free primary education by the year 2015. Although they left office in 2007, PDP continued to govern Nigeria until 29 May 2015 and there were no free primary education for all Nigerian children of school age even when funds sourced internationally and internally for the project disappeared. While Olusegun Obasanjo built his private Bell University in Ogun State, Atiku Abubakar erected his American University in Adamawa where ordinary Nigerians cannot gain admision, no matter how brilliant they are. 

Having explained that people who are socialized in Muslim culture understand an orphan as someone whose father died before the age of puberty, Farooq Kperogi averred, "Atiku is a Muslim who grew up in a Muslim cultural environment. There is no reason why he should use Western cultural lenses to describe himself." Nigeria is not a theocratic state governed by priests of the supposedly dominating religious creeds in Nigeria, Islam and Christianity, and through Sharia and Mosaic Laws. The constitution of Nigeria does not compel citizens wishing to engage in politics to present testimonial of their religious creed and practice. Atiku's choice of Islam as his religion is his private affair that has nothing to do with how he is going to govern Nigeria, should he become President. In this case, Atiku is not canvassing to become Sultan of Sokoto or Emir of Adamawa but President of Nigeria. It must be noted too that the people of Sokoto and Adamawa are not Arabs. Therefore, official communication with the people of Sokoto and Adamawa from Atiku on any issue cannot reasonably be conducted in Arabic language. While it might be a worthwhile mission to teach us what is the meaning of an orphan in English language, the mission was betrayed with mischievous intent when the teaching turned out to be about what is the meaning of an orphan in Arabic language. To be fair to Atiku, he did speak in Arabic on 19 November 2018, but English which is the official language of governance in Nigeria. Farooq Kperogi is touting Atiku Abubakar as 'a Muslim who grew up in a Muslim cultural environment' which is another way of saying that 'he grew up in Northern Nigeria.' The same Farooq who in his 17 November 2018 article had suspected that Buhari's 2019 campaign strategy would be ethnic and religious bigotry is now projecting Atiku Abubakar, the Presidential candidate of the PDP, as a Muslim Northerner to Nigerians. It is high time to stop this fraudulent claim that office holders in Nigeria hold positions on behalf of their ethnic groups and religious congregations when constitutionally and legally they are responsible and accountable to all Nigerians for their actions and inactions.

While Atiku Abubakar was still the Vice President to Olusegun Obasanjo in 2006, he joined the Action Congress (AC), the political party led by Bola Ahmed Tinubu, in order to contest the 21 April 2007 Presidential election. He came third in that election with a total vote of 2,637,848 against Umaru Musa Yar'Adua (PDP) who won the election with 24,638,063 votes. When Yar'Adua fell sick and it became obvious that even if he recovered, he would not be able to contest in 2011, Atiku abandoned AC and returned to the PDP in early 2010. Following the demise of Yar'Adua, Vice President Goodluck Jonathan became the substantive President. Atiku and his cohorts had thought that Jonathan would only complete the remaining two years left of the joint ticket with Yar'Adua before power returned to the North according to PDP internal arrangement of rotational presidency between North and South. Atiku contested PDP presidential primary election in December2010, against Jonathan and lost. Jonathan won the presidential election of 16 April 2011 and Atiku and his clique thought that federal government power would return to what they term the North in 2015. Meanwhile, CPC, ACN, and part of APGA had collapsed into a new political party called APC in 2013 to challenge the PDP hegemony to power in the 2015 presidential election. Towards the middle of 2014, Jonathan had proclaimed his constitutional rights to two terms à four years presidential tenure and the hope of PDP advocates of power returning to the North was dashed. Once again, Atiku left PDP and joined APC where he contested presidential primary election in 2014 against Buhari which he lost to Muhammadu Buhari who subsequently became President. He stayed in the APC for a while and waited until it became apparent to him that Buhari would seek second term and he crawled back into PDP for the third time to purchase the Presidential ticket of the party. Atiku Abubakar's slogan should be : A serial political harlot for President. 

S. Kadiri  

     

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Ämne: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Atiku and the Meaning of an “Orphan” in English

 

Sunday, November 25, 2018

Atiku and the Meaning of an “Orphan” in English

By Farooq A. Kperogi, Ph.D.

Twitter: @farooqkperogi

In his pre-recorded initiatory presidential campaign speech on November 19, 2018, former Vice President and PDP presidential candidate Atiku Abubakar described himself as having grown up an “orphan.” “I started out as an orphan selling firewood on the streets of Jada in Adamawa, but God, through the Nigerian state, invested in me and here I am today,” he said.

President Buhari’s social media aide by the name of Lauretta Onochie led a chorus of Buhari supporters on Twitter to pooh-pooh Atiku’s claim to orphanhood. She said Atiku wasn’t an orphan because he didn’t lose both parents. This ignited a frenzied social media conversation about the meaning of an orphan. Below is Onochie’s tweet that set off the debate:

“Atiku cannot be trusted; I started life as an Orphan in Jada”-Abubakar Atiku (BIG FAT LIE)

“ORPHAN-a child whose parents (Father and mother) are dead. In his book, MY LIFE (2013 pg 30) refers [sic]: Atiku said his mother died in 1984. This was when he was 38 years. He was old enough to buy mum a house.

“What’s the point of this lie? To deceive Nigerians and get their sympathy? It’s disrespectful and insulting to Nigerians for a candidate or anyone to lie to them.

“He is saying we are too gullible to find out the truth. No, we are not. President Buhari nor [sic] Vice President Osinbajo will never lie to Nigerians.”

What this semantic contestation captures is a clash of socio-linguistic cultures. As I pointed out in my May 4, 2014 column titled “Q and A on Popular Nigerian English Expressions, Word Usage and Grammar,” my first daughter had a similar argument with her teacher nearly seven years ago. I lost my wife to a car crash in June 2010 in Nigeria and brought my then 6-year-old first daughter to live with me here in the United States the same year.

One day in class, she told her teacher that she was an “orphan.” Her teacher, who knew me, said my daughter couldn’t possibly be an orphan since her father was alive. My daughter, who had become linguistically American but still culturally Nigerian, insisted that the death of her mother was sufficient to qualify her as an orphan. Their argument wasn’t resolved, so she came home to ask me if she was wrong to call herself an orphan.

I told her she was right from the perspective of African cultures and UNICEF’s classification of orphans, but that her teacher was right from the perspective of conventional English.

Different Cultural Significations of “Orphan”

In many African—and other non-Western cultures— an orphan is understood as a child who has lost one or both parents before the age of maturity. In Islam, an orphan is a child who has lost only a father before the age of maturity. The usual Arabic word for an orphan is “yateem” (or al-yateem), which literally denotes “something that is singular and alone.” But the word’s canonical and connotative meaning in contemporary Arabic and in Islamic jurisprudence is, “a minor who has lost his or her father.”

Nevertheless, other rarely used words exist in Arabic to denote an orphan: al-Lateem is a child who has lost both parents while al-'iji is a child who has lost only a mother. Note, however, that yateem is the word used in the Qur’an to refer to an orphan, which is why people who are socialized in Muslim cultures define and understand an orphan as someone whose father died before the age of puberty. Atiku is a Muslim who grew up in a Muslim cultural environment. There is no reason why he should use Western cultural lenses to describe himself.

 Until I relocated to America, I too had no idea that in conventional English, an orphan is generally understood as a child who lost both parents. Curiously, the meaning of the word changes when it is applied to an animal: An animal is regarded as an orphan only if loses its mother, perhaps because animals have fathers only in a reproductive, but not in a biosocial, sense.

Note, though, that in English, an orphan can also be a child who has been abandoned by its living biological parents. That means almajirai (plural form of almajiri in Hausa) are invariably orphans since they don't get to enjoy the care of both parents who are usually alive.

It's also noteworthy that UNICEF, being an international organization that represents the interests of people from different cultures, recognizes the cultural clashes in the conception of orphanhood and seeks a fair sociolinguistic compromise. That is why it has three different types of orphans. UNICEF has a class of orphans its calls “maternal orphans.” This category encapsulates children who lost only their mothers. It also classifies certain orphans as “paternal orphans,” which refers to children who lost only their fathers. Then there are “double orphans,” which refers to children who lost both parents. I think that’s a good cultural compromise. By UNICEF's classification, Atiku was a paternal orphan.

Many contemporary English dictionaries are taking note of and reflecting this shift in the meaning of orphan. For instance, the Merriam Webster Dictionary now defines an orphan as “a child deprived by death of one or usually both parents.” The Random House Unabridged Dictionary also defines an orphan as “a child who has lost both parents through death, or, less commonly, one parent.” And Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged, a British English dictionary, defines it as, “a child, one or (more commonly) both of whose parents are dead.”

 So Atiku’s use of “orphan” can be justified in contemporary, evolving English, but even more so in historical English, as I will show below.

Etymology of “Orphan”

Orphan is derived from the Latin orphanus where it meant a "parentless child." But Latin also borrowed it from the Greek orphanos where it means, according to the Online Etymology Dictionary, "without parents, fatherless." Orphan, ultimately, is derived from the Proto-Indo-European root orbho, which means, according to etymologists, "bereft of father."

This clearly shows that loss of a father, not both parents, is at the core of the signification of the word from its very beginning. In fact, a survey of the earliest examples of the usage of the word in historical writings in English shows that it was used to mean only a child who lost a father. For instance, in Scian Dubh’s 1868 book titled Ridgeway:An Historical Romance of the Fenian Invasion of Canada, we encounter this sentence: “At his birth, he was an orphan, his father having died a few weeks previously.” This shows that in the 1800s, a child was regarded as an orphan only if it lost its father.

It must have been changes in social and cultural attitudes in the West that expanded and limited the meaning of “orphan” to a child who lost “both parents.”

Motherless Babies’ Home or Orphanage?

A place where orphans are housed and cared for is called an orphanage in contemporary Standard English. It used to be called an “orphan house” until 1711. (Orphanage used to mean orphanhood, that is, the condition of being an orphan; the current meaning of the word started from about 1865).

Interestingly, orphanages are called “motherless babies’ homes” in Nigerian—and perhaps West African—English. Does this suggest that our conception of orphanhood is changing from deprivation of a father through death to solely deprivation of a mother through death? Why are there not “parentless babies’ homes”? Or, for that matter, “fatherless babies’ homes”?

Related Articles:

Politics of Grammar Column

Farooq A. Kperogi, Ph.D.

Associate Professor

Journalism & Emerging Media
School of Communication & Media

Social Science Building 

Room 5092 MD 2207

402 Bartow Avenue
Kennesaw State University

Kennesaw, Georgia, USA 30144
Cell: (+1) 404-573-9697
Personal website: www.farooqkperogi.com

Twitter: @farooqkperog

Author of Glocal English: The Changing Face and Forms of Nigerian English in a Global World

"The nice thing about pessimism is that you are constantly being either proven right or pleasantly surprised." G. F. Will