Annang Proverbs New Perspectives: The Introduction

CHAPTER ONE INTRODUCTION My interest in this area of Syntax was developed by the need to have more of documented Annang expressions than the mere oral renditions that come and go in their short-lived forms. In the course of my investigation, I soon realised that not much has been done on Annang Proverbs besides identification and translation with assumed explanation attached to them. It became necessary for me to attempt a Syntactic analysis of these language forms as a means of leaving a permanent record to posterity, especially the educated class who would find the book handy as a resource material. The materials for this book, Annang Proverbs New Perspectives, are a result of many years of gathering Annang proverbs through various sources. I have had occasions to go along with a note pad with which I usually jotted down the proverbs as they are rendered first hand by Annang elders and other bilinguals. It is important to note that these proverbs have some Ibibio variants which differ slightly not in content or meaning but in pronunciation. Since Annang and Ibibio languages are from the same language phylum according to notable authors such as Okon Essien (2010), Owulette (2017) and Umoh Faithmann (1999), there is mutual intelligibility among these groups of speakers in Akwa Ibom State.