Edited by Azizi Powell
This pancocojams post provides an excerpt of a 2018 pdf entitled "View on the Updating of Nouchi Lexicon and Expressions" by Béatrice Akissi Boutin & Jean-Claude Dodo.
This pdf excerpt is given without citations/notes. Everyone interested in this subject is encouraged to read the complete pdf.
The content of this post is presented for linguistic, cultural, and educational purposes.
All copyrights remain with their owners.
Thanks to Béatrice Akissi Boutin & Jean-Claude Dodo, the authors of this pdf.
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Click https://pancocojams.blogspot.com/2021/06/youtube-video-and-article-excerpts.html for a closely related pancocojams post entitled "YouTube Video And Article Excerpts About The Ivory Coast's Nouchi Language".
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PDF Excerpt: VIEW ON THE UPDATING OF NOUCHI LEXICON AND EXPRESSIONS
From: 2018-Boutin-Dodo-Af-Youth-Lang.pdf
- "January 2018
- Project: African Urban Youth Language
View on the Updating of Nouchi Lexicon and Expressions
Sapienza University of Rome
Jean-Claude Dodo
University "Félix Houphouët-Boigny"
3.1 Introduction
The emergence of mixed urban languages during the past few
decades in Africa results in sociolinguistic reflections of great interest.
Urban multilingualism linked to ‘super-diversity’
all over the world (Blommaert
and Rampton 2011) is a preferred field of sociolinguistics,
combined with formal research on language contact. African urban languages
differ from those of the West through their more radical differentiation
from their underlying languages (Mous 2009). This progressive autonomy
tends to reduce, in Africa more than elsewhere, the impact of
super-diversity on communication, while a new urban identity is emerging, with
its new modes of communication, which have effects on the rest of
the country.
[page] 54
Here, we are interested in Nouchi (Côte d’Ivoire), and
particularly in the updating process of its lexicon, and aim to shed light
on the social significance of the lexical innovation strategies. We want
to show how the updating of Nouchi effectively participates in Ivorian
social life, not only through songs but also through other communication channels
or media.
In this chapter, first we briefly recall the highly
discussed genesis of Nouchi in the scientific and non-scientific literature by
focusing particularly on scholarly and popular representations. Next, we show
the social significance of Nouchi, based on the hybrid lexicon of
Nouchi and other linguistic manipulations which shed light on the swift
emergence of Nouchi in Côte d’Ivoire. Finally, we give an overview of the
use of Nouchi in media and professional communication, in order to confirm
its social
significance.
3.2 Historical and Sociolinguistic
Backgrounds
The true ‘origins’ of Nouchi remain partly a mystery. Dodo (2015) accounts for the most likely origin of Nouchi with facts revealed during a discussion panel entitled ‘Le nouchi, soutrali1 pour la société’ [Nouchi, soutrali for the society] moderated by Gnagra Nazaire, Sahin Polo, and Julien Goualo (proven speakers of Nouchi).2 Gnagra Nazaire, one of the witnesses of the emergence of this language, argues that Nouchi originally means ‘thief’. It would have been created in the 70s in Arras, a neighborhood of the municipality of Treichville, by young Guinean immigrants from the Susu ethnic group. Sahin Polo further argues that this language was a mixture of French and Susu, resulting in a language difficult to understand for lay speakers. […] According to Julien Goualo, the m(ou)roum(ou)rouli (stabbing fight [knife and machete]) in the street was brought [to Côte d’Ivoire] by Guinean thugs. They imposed themselves in the streets by means of violence and were greatly feared by all. ‘But it was necessary to put an end to this terror because it became unbearable,’Gnagra Nazaire stated. Thus, one morning, a big scrap occurred in Treichville between Susus and Ivorians. The Susus were chased
[page] 55
as far as Koumasi where their gang leader, nicknamed le sorcier, was killed at the dawn of the same day. Since the Susu, henceforth, were in minority, the Ivorians then took over Nouchi, and ‘nationalized’ it, at first with the massive integration of words from Dyula, Baule and Bete. Subsequently, words from other Ivorian and foreign languages (African and Western) were also integrated. (Dodo 2015: 3)
In 1986 Nouchi was first discussed in the press, in an article titled ‘Le nouchi, un langage à la mode’ by Alain Coulibaly and Bernard Ahua published in the state-run daily newspaper Fraternité Matin. During the 1970s and 1980s, there was a column in the weekly Ivoire Dimanche ‘Les chroniques de Moussa’, admittedly written in an artificial French, but intended to mirror ‘Popular Ivorian French’ (FPI). However, at the onset of Nouchi during those years, Ivorians were conscious of the existence of a slang variety, a ‘trendy’ youth language, distinct from the ‘French of Moussa’ or the ‘kind of French’ speakers normally learnt. In 1988, the first academic study on Nouchi was conducted, a Mémoire de maîtrise by Lucien Gouedan Aké in Paris: Étude sur les particularités lexicales d’un parler franco-ivoirien national: Nouchi. In Africa, the first scientific work on Nouchi was published by Jeremie Kouadio N’Guessan: Le nouchi abidjanais, naissance d’un argot ou mode linguistique passagère? (1992), following the Dakar International Colloquium on Languages and Cities in 1990. Thereafter, as Nouchi kept on gaining more ground in the urban reality, and was used on the internet and in computer networks, researchers in linguistics, sociology and anthropology started to investigate Nouchi contemporaneously, publishing the results of their work in English, French and German, throughout Europe and other continents.3
From the outset, the words and expressions of the coded
Nouchi used by some youth gangs (known at that time as the nouchis)
associated with not entirely lawful activities in the streets seeped into
other broader youth argot circles. When these words became known outside the
original group, they were replaced by other words in this first
circle of insiders. The question of the denomination of Nouchi then arises as
early as the 1990s. The speakers of borrowings from broader Nouchi
circles started to consider themselves as speakers of Nouchi, while these words
were already
[page] 56
incorporated into various urban languages of the Ivorian French. The extension of Nouchi is therefore twofold: it has to do not only with the form, but also the designation of Ivorian urban languages. Boutin and Kouadio N’Guessan (2015) emphasize this fact and point out that what Ivorian speakers refer to as Nouchi today was referred to in late twentieth century as belonging to Popular Ivorian French.
Some of the first words to become widespread in the 1990s are listed here:
1. Nouchi: street children, doing street jobs, thief
Gawa: dumb
Panneau: bus
Badjam: Abidjan
Grouilling, cherching: resourcefulness
Badou, grailla: eat
Wôro-wôro: shared taxi
Parler carreaux: tell the truth straight away
Les pierres/piars: money
Limer: hit
Damer: ignore, intentional decision not to take something
into consideration
Go [go]:4 girl, lover
The relationship between Ivorian songs and Nouchi has been pointed to in many studies (such as Kouadio N’Guessan 1992; Adom 2012; Dodo 2015). Boutin and Kouadio N’Guessan (2015) quote a few lyrics of ‘Oh Loubard’ (1985) by a band called Woya, founded in 1984 in Divo, in which some words were then perceived as argot or Nouchi.
2. Hm oh loubards hm oh tchatcheurs (×4)
Nous loubards là On n’a pas les pierres pour les hauts gazoils [‘we don’t have money for big parties’]
Ni les pierres pour les hautes go [‘pretty girls from good
family’]
Mais on dégage forcé [‘anyway, we party’]
Mais on dégage au black [‘but we party at night’]
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[…]
Nous loubard là [‘we, the yobs’]
On n’est pas méchants mais plutôt très cool
Ni très bri [brigand] mais super fresh5 [‘trendy’]
Mais attention ça casse
Mais attention ça lime
(‘Oh Loubard’, Les Woya 1985) (Boutin and Kouadio N’Guessan 2015)
We would like to draw attention to the fact that, as early as the 1970s, Ivorian French was already sufficiently advanced in a process of inculturation to present, in addition to a broad diversification, depending on communication situations, an argot of the nouchis and other argots associated with various degrees of incivility. All of these various argots have swiftly been dubbed Nouchi. The social factors that have likely facilitated the expansion and enhancement of Nouchi from the 1970s on have been investigated by Dodo (2015) and Boutin and Kouadio N’Guessan (2015). These are summarized below.
The 1980s were marked by the beginning of a period of economic austerity that was to last a long time. Restrictions were placed, among others, on the special benefits for students.6 It was then, taking the lead in denouncing this policy, that the youth emerged as a visible social category. This denunciation was at first done covertly, especially via zouglou music; it was to become more direct in the 1990s, when a ‘culture’ of violence was becoming established on university campuses. All these factors brought together young students and thugs, coupled with the politicization of the youth. Nouchi was, therefore, promoted by both young people living in ghettos and students. It would be simplistic to say that young pupils and students simply copied Nouchi words and expressions as they began to escape from the confines of a the code of a circle of street children. The connection was made very quickly between these groups, primarily through popular songs.
In the 2000s, during the Ivorian political and civil crisis, everything was ready for the youth to come to the forefront in terms of identity and national claims. Music genres such as reggae, rap, zouglou, Youssoumba,
[page] 58
and coupé-décalé, became the broadcast channels of Nouchi, concurrent with Nouchi being the vehicle of a new Ivorian identity claim. The quest for and affirmation of new values began to emerge. This is discussed in the next section. From the point of view of form or structure, the links between Nouchi and French are much more obvious than those between Nouchi and Dyula, or Baule or Bete. Yet Nouchi is the outcome of an Ivorian urban multilingualism that has been in existence for several decades. The French used as the syntactic base of Nouchi is a French which has long been marked by the African languages of the Côte d’Ivoire, and is already independent from European French. Nouchi stems from the designated ‘Popular Ivorian French’(FPI)7 to the point that all the characteristics of FPI are present in Nouchi. Only words borrowed from other African and Western languages, and the linguistic manipulations (phonetic and morphological) are specific to Nouchi. Like an argot, only the lexicon is innovative, and even that only partly (Calvet 2007). This specificity of Nouchi gives it a lack of a clear border with French, as, in productions designated as Nouchi, the lexicon is seldom fully Nouchi, and the syntax is that of ‘popular’ French. Thus, it is not possible to analyze as Nouchi–French code switching a statement containing French that is immediately intelligible and identifiable by any French speaker, and Nouchi words or words borrowed from Ivorian languages via Nouchi, which are neither intelligible to nor identifiable by a non-initiated French speaker. The following examples illustrate the continuum between French and Nouchi.
3. C’est toujours les mêmes qui bouffent et c’est toujours le ‘the people’ [le people qui soffrir’]. On doit jeu-de-jamber le système. On doit yougouyaga le système. [It is always the same [people] who fatten up and it is always the people who suffer. We have to improve the system. We have to put an end to the (old) system.] (Les Salopards, 1997)
4. Tu as préféré suivre ces vagabonds pour vivre n’importe comment. Tu es toujours dans l’allée sans grigali gars. Pendant que d’autres vendent des lalés [téléphones portables] seulement pour s’en sortir. [You have chosen to follow these wanderers to live anyhow. You are always in the streets doing nothing, while others (your peers) live on selling mobile phones.] (Yabongo Lova 2012) (See Dodo and Allou 2016)
[page] 59
Nouchi presents itself today as a set of practices rooted in Ivorian multilingualism, with variable use of a set of features also variable on their own. But Nouchi is not just an unstable set of varying features. Its stability is conferred by FPI and borrowings from Ivorian languages. Rooted in Ivorian multilingualism, Nouchi is clearly distinguishable from the various code switching practices of Ivorian bi/multilinguals, as described by Boutin (2016) for example. 3.3 Lexical Innovation Strategies and Their Social Significance
The innovation of Nouchi is not trivial. Indeed, Nouchi is backed by a broad social movement, with its own activists and distribution channels, including songs and new communication technologies. Nouchi is subject to two trends: on the one hand, words and phrases from various languages are scrambled and coded, but on the other hand, they are explained and taught in their new meanings. This is to give meaning to the transgression, or use the transgression to convey an innovative mindset. That is how Nouchi appears to be the vehicle of youth participation in social life, as much by its forms as the use that is made of it by young people through media. Subsequently, we develop that opinion further by providing a detailed account of the various processes used, which deserve our particular attention.
Affixal derivation and hybrid compounding are probably the lexical construction processes of Nouchi that most strongly reproduce and demonstrate the mixing of the Ivorian population. The productivity of these suffixes to build new words could be seen as evidence of the successful mixing of the population. The hybridization between a stem and an affix of a different origin is frequent in Nouchi. A prevalence of French affixes can be observed, coupled with original French stems and also stems from other origins. There is one prefix dé-, and nine suffixes: -ment, -age, -ade, -ure, -oir, -able, -ier, -aire/eur, and -er. They have an identical semantic value with the French prefix and suffixes.
[page] 60
5. moisi(r) [mwazi] (‘lacking money’) > démoisi(r) [demwazi] (‘Give some money to someone’). Bra faut me démoisi (‘My friend, give me some money’)
6. crou [kru] (‘Hide’, ‘lower’) > décrou [dekru] (‘show’,
‘disclose’)
7. maga [maɡa] (‘steal’) > magayeur/magayaire [maɡajɛr] (‘thief’). Les po ont sri des magayaires (‘The policemen caught the thieves’)
8. science [sjãs] (‘attitude’, ‘behavior’, ‘conduct’) > sciencer [sjãse] (‘Think’, ‘look at’, ‘please’, ‘apologize’). Quand je sassa ma life, ça me fait sciencer (‘When I look at my life, it makes me think’)
(See Dodo 2015: 104)
There are also suffixes borrowed from English via French in Nouchi: particularly -man, and -ing, now superseded by -ment (as seen above).
9. gbongbo [ɡbɔ̃ɡbo] (‘handgun’, ‘shotgun’) > Gbongboman
[ɡbɔ̃ɡboman]
(‘robber’, ‘bandit’). La PJ a couché un gbongboman dans l’allée (‘The criminal police has killed a robber in the street’).
10. grouiller [gruje] (‘struggle to earn one’s living’, ‘hustle’) > grouilling [grujı̃ɲ] (‘hustling’, ‘resourcefullness’), replaced by grouillément [grujemã] now.
11. percer [pɛ:se] (‘achieve social success’) > percing [pɛ:sı̃ɲ] (‘achieving social success’), replaced by percément [pɛ:semã] now. (See Dodo 2015: 99)
Finally, there are two Dyula nominal suffixes in Nouchi, -li (12) and -ya (13), which are widespread and used with all kind of stems.
12. kpata [kpata] (‘beautiful’, ‘pretty’) > kpatali
[kpatali] (‘beauty’, ‘prettiness’). Cette tchoffe est réelle. Son kpatali est
sans tchatcholi8
(‘This woman is beautiful. Her beauty is without bleaching products’)
13. vagabond [vagabɔ̃] (‘wanderer’) > vagabond-ya [vagabɔ̃ja]
(‘wander’).
Grouillément est mieux que vagabond-ya (‘Hustling to earn
one’s living is better than wandering’)
(See Dodo 2015: 99)
All these suffixes indicate the mixed identity of the Ivorian population, and at the same time account for global integration through international languages such as French and English. The same is true for the compounding process, which mainly works through metaphors. Nouchi combines, for instance, Noun + preposition + noun (14), Noun + noun (15–17), Verb + verb (18).
14. bôrô d’enjaillement (‘great pleasure’, ‘ecstasy’, ‘euphoria’, ‘thanksgiving’), from bɔrɔ (bag) (Dyula) and enjailler [ãʒaje] (‘content’, ‘please’, ‘enjoy’) from enjoy (English). Eh gboho Bôrô d’enjaillement à tous les môgô dans le tinguiguitang man. (‘Thank you to all the men who struggle to earn their living.’) (from ‘Sois krakra’, a song by RAS)
15. akpani-school (‘evening school’), from ‘flying fox’ in Baule and ‘school’ in English
16. baba-tchê [babatʃe] (‘wealthy man’), with cɛ (‘man’ in Dyula). Son grando bara à la BAD, c’est un vrai babatchê (His senior brother works at the African Development Bank, he is a wealthy man)
17. gbongbo-plan (‘robbery’), de gbongbo (see example 9)
18. entrer-dja or entrer-coucher (single-bed room for rent, very low standing studio), with dja (kill, bed down, sleep) (See Dodo 2015: 116)
The construction of simple words and compound words through the hybridization of several Ivorian and Western languages represents the mixed Ivorian identity, and at the same time promotes Ivorian languages by pairing them with Western languages. Furthermore, the humor that results from some (word) compounding shows the capacity for selfmockery of the creators and speakers of Nouchi.
The processes of suffixation, conversion, compounding, and clipping can be seen as a participation in the overall change of French in the world. Some linguistic manipulations, such as clippings, primarily directed towards students, associate Nouchi with the argots of the mainland France, as these kinds of manipulations of French are either classically made (examples 20 and 21), or are part of the recent habits of the youth (example 19).
[...]
[page] 63
Once these words are borrowed from the Ivorian languages, their promotion comes about in particular through songs (see examples 4 and 14) and new communication technologies. Moreover, borrowings from other African languages express, at a minimum, the bridging of African cultures, and beyond that, foster an ideal of pan-Africanism. The following borrowings, for instance, are widespread in the current Nouchi lexicon. Some are quite stable, as the result of their use in Nouchi for decades, namely bengué or yomo, which had been used in FPI before the existence of Nouchi.9 25.
Aboussouan/abouss:
‘my friend, my buddy’ (Agni/Twi, kwa language)
Azonto: ‘urban dance, being
trendy in Nouchi’ (Ghana, urban language)
Bouka: ‘break’ (Congo, Lingala)
Chap-chap: ‘quick, swiftly’ (Nigeria, urban language)
Gba: ‘merchandise,
deal/business’ (Nigeria, Yoruba)
Mbengué/bengué: ‘Europe’ (Cameroon, Douala)10
Mbongo/bongo: ‘money’ (Congo, Lingala)
Tchop: ‘eat’ (Nigeria, Naijá/Cameroon,
Camfranglais)
Atalaku: ‘praises’ (Congo, argotic Lingala)
Yomo: ‘black dye for
hair’ (Ghana)
Many semantic constructions in Nouchi are imbued with
sociocultural context and resonate with it. Thus, they assist the social
integration of young people by familiarizing them with their socio-cultural
environment. It is noted in the following examples that the semantic shift is
done through metonymy.
26. Gbagbo: ‘small towel’/Gbagboter: ‘walk lengthily’.
It originated from Laurent Koudou Gbagbo, former Ivorian Head of State. When he
was part of the opposition and leading peaceful protest marches, he used to
hang a towel around his neck.
Liverpool: ‘1000 FCFA banknote’ in reference to
the red color of Liverpool Football Club’s jersey. Tchatcho: ‘to bleach’, like
the founding father of Congolese Rumba, Koffi Olomide who wrote a song with
that title.
[page] 64
Tauraco
or touraco: ‘10,000 FCFA banknote’ on the back of which the picture of two
turacos is printed. Kouamé Adigri: ‘articulated bus’, named after the Ivorian
accordion player Kouamé Adigri. The joint of the bus looks like an accordion.
Kouadjo: ‘student grant’, and name of the first accountant of the CNOU (a
university institution in charge of coordinating university students’ social
services), responsible for paying student grants. Günter: ‘wealthy’ like Günter
Sachs. (See Dodo 2015: 108)
Proponents of Nouchi give it a didactic role: while
Nouchi contributes to the ‘between ourselves’ relationship by coding the
language, it is also an educational medium through which the art of living and
the art of being are taught. The rap group Les Wahi, for instance, posted on
their Facebook page:
27. Dans les années 80 à 90, le Nouchi a franchi le cap de
langage [sic], c’est devenu une Science c’est à dire une manière de penser, de
s’habiller, d’agir, de se comporter en un mot, le Nouchi est devenu une
philosophie.
https://fr-fr.facebook.com/officialziguehiwahi/posts/454354407932188 (‘In the
1980s to 1990s, Nouchi has turned from language, to become a science, that is
to say a way of thinking, dressing, acting, and behaving. In short, Nouchi has
become a philosophy.’)
Dodo (2015) points to some of the virtues promoted in songs through Nouchi. His primary aim in expressing this opinion is to extinguish the prejudice that portrays Nouchi as the language of thugs. Aside from this, it is question of asserting and claiming the specificity of Nouchi by pushing aside the French language, and demonstrating that it is possible to exist and be prosperous without knowing the language of Molière. Advocates of Nouchi point to virtues, such as honor, pride, dignity, perseverance in the face of difficulties, and courage at work. These virtues are present in the lyrics of those singers who promote Nouchi, namely the rap group RAS, Nooka le Dashiba,11 the reggae singer Tangara Speed Goda, and the multi-genre artist Julien Goualo, to name a few (Dodo 2015). The
[page] 65
full lyrics of the title ‘Sois krakra’ by the group RAS consist of an exhortation to work. A Noussi (or Nouchi, ‘speaker of Nouchi’) identifies with courage, self-sacrifice, and determination to earn a living through hard work. A true Noussi does not back away because the situation is difficult. A true Noussi is a winner.
28. Eh gboho, bôrô d’enjaillement à tous les môgô krangba dans le tinguitinguitang man (‘Eh! Big thanks to all the men who struggle to earn their living’) Faut grigra sinon la vie va pas te soutra man (‘One should struggle to earn one’s bread. Otherwise, life will not treat anyone kindly’)
… Et si tu dèbè, reguigui toi sois krakra, grigra (‘And it takes getting up when you fall down, be brave, battle to earn your living’) (‘Sois krakra’, a song by RAS; see Dodo 2015: 67)
So far we have looked at the active role of speakers/creators of Nouchi through lexical creations and the use of Nouchi expressions to put across messages in songs. Nash, in her interview with Koaci (free online Ivorian television) on 19 November 2009 said:
29. Tout Ivoirien se retrouve
dans le rap ivoirien, quand je dis rap ivoirien je parle du nouchi, le nouchi
qui est parlé par presque toute la Cote d’Ivoire […] À travers le nouchi
j’essaye de vendre ma culture, de faire la promotion de mon pays (Nash, Kaoci,
19 November 2009) (‘Every Ivorian identifies himself/herself with the Ivorian
rap (music), talking about Ivorian rap, I am referring to Nouchi. The Nouchi
that is spoken by almost the whole country (Côte d’Ivoire) […] Through Nouchi,
I am trying to promote my culture, to promote my country’). In fact, popular
songs offer a significant exposure to Nouchi, since Nouchi is a mass media
product.12"...
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