Sukuma Person Names: Social-Behavioural Perspectives
Abstract
The study examined personal names, especially those associated with social and behavioural challenges among the speakers of the Sukuma speech community of Tanzania. The study was motivated by a lack of comprehensive analysis of the topic under discussion. The study was guided by accommodation theory, which describes the dynamic semantic theory of context change known as accommodation analysis. It focuses on accommodating the communicative patterns they believe are characteristic of their interactants. Thus, social events and behaviour of a person accommodate communicative interactions in socio-cultural contexts. The study used a case study design in the scope of the interpretivism paradigm, which believes that reality and the organisation of meaning are obtained from the natural contexts. Six (6) Sukuma native speakers were selected purposively from the Njigami village of the Geita region as they are purely native speakers of the language. Semi-structured interviews, non-participant observation and documentary analysis were the methods of data collection. In the process of data analysis, the study used a discourse analysis method of a qualitative nature, which involved accentuating data that occurs naturally in the context in which the language is used. It was revealed that socio-challenges and persons' behaviour trigger name nominations in the Sukuma speech community. War, death, hunger, mischievousness, disease, poverty, lies, and hyperactivity are significant social behavioural challenges that result in a person being named in the community. The study concluded that all this information has practical significance and functions in the community, as it can either accommodate social interactions in the styles of coherent interactions or distances in the human life circle.
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