Article published in:
International Journal of Language and Culture
Vol. 8:2 (2021) ► pp. 218–244

The functions of emotion-referencing names in Ibibio

| University of Calabar and FRIAS | University of Freiburg
| Virginia Commonwealth University
| University of London

In certain societies including the Ibibio of Akwa Ibom State, South-Eastern Nigeria, naming is a distinctive system of communicative practice which is used to express emotion and construct the personhood and identity of the name-bearer. This article examines emotion-referencing names among the Ibibio and adopts an ethnographic approach to investigate the motivations for the name choice, their socio-onomastic significance and the extent of influence they have over their bearers’ ‘selves’. We find that emotion names are bestowed through a range of motivations such as being a reflection of familial problems, death-prevention, religiously inspired and namesaking. We conclude that regardless of these motivations or whether the name has a positive or negative VALENCE, for the Ibibio, emotion-referencing names appear to have a subtle psychological impact upon the name-bearers self-perception. Naming among the Ibibio, therefore, is not only a form of cultural identity but a prominent site to reflect on and interpret emotions.

Keywords: emotion, personal names, personality, psychology of identity, selfhood, linguistic ideology, Ibibio
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Name, identity and psychology
  • 3.Methods and participants
  • 4.Data analysis and discussion
    • 4.1The Ibibio naming tradition
    • 4.2Emotion-referencing names
  • 5.Conclusions
  • References
Published online: 20 September 2021
https://doi.org/10.1075/ijolc.19009.men
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