The Nweh narrative genre

People use talk in marked and varied ways to make sense of the world. This has constituted one of the major themes in humanistic and social scientific thought since the mid-twentieth century. This book discusses the defining elements of the study of these themes (Discourse Analysis), throws more light on the narrative discourse showing its implications on the pedagogic role of translation. The major interest of this study lies in the belief that mere descriptive accounts of sentences are insufficient in connected discourse. One needs to go beyond the surface realisation in order to attain the intended meaning. Thus, it is not enough to describe the internal structure of the elements in a sentence or a discourse; the ‘why’ and the ‘where’ these elements should be used is equally important. It is for this reason that the study draws from Functional Grammar and Relevance theoretical frameworks to identify and characterize the constituents of the Nweh narrative genre and to portray the relevance of such a study in Discourse Analysis to translation, both as a discipline and as a pedagogic tool in Second Language Acquisition contexts. It is hoped that language teachers and translators will use the suggestions in this book to ameliorate their performances. This study challenges Nweh speakers to work towards the standardization and development of the Nweh Language and invites other scholars to continue to promote research in African languages at large and Cameroon national languages in particular. It is through such commitment that the much-needed preservation of Cameroon’s multilingual heritage can be achieved. Professor Gabriel Mba