The Linguistic Behaviour of Nigerian Hip Hop and Rap Artistes

This is an investigation of the linguistic behaviour of Nigerian Hip Hop and Rap artistes. The study reveals that the artistes skillfully use language alternation strategies to enhance the aesthetic and rhetorical qualities of their music. It is also revealed in the study that the language alternation patterns involve major Nigerian languages and English, and, they interact with elements of the lyrical structure viz the lines, rhymes and stanzas to enhance the musical qualities of the artistes’ works. Language alternations have other connotations as they also bear the qualities of identifying the artistes’ linguistic identity and preferences. It also has semantic significance, as when some lexical items are used to highlight codeswitching occurrences like transfer and borrowing. Language alternation also highlights contrastive and expressive codeswitching as well as reformulations and repetitions. It is also used to achieve a greater audience/participant constellation and greater understanding of the discourse/message of the song.Finally, the work discusses the strategies of language alternation in language planning and policy formulation in Nigeria.