A PHONOLOGICAL STUDY OF IGBO-ENGLISH DICTIONARIES

Abstract

Dictionary is a language tool which serves as a guide to both learners and native speakers of the language. This paper aims at ascertaining the phonological components of the selected Igbo dictionaries. Four Igbo English dictionaries are selected for this paper which are; English-Igbo Dictionary by Michael Echeruo (2001), Dictionary of Ònìchà Igbo by Kay Williamson (1972), Igbo-English Dictionary by Egemba, I. (1999), and OGAM/IGBO VCV DICTIONARY by Catherine Acholonu (2007). The paper adopts descriptive approach in its analysis. It is observed that three dictionaries paid attention to tone marking, whereas one did not; all the dictionaries neglected phonetic/phonemic transcription, and three dictionaries paid attention to diacritic marks, whereas one did not. It is concluded that phonological components ought to be part of a dictionary to aid the learners of the language.