International Journal of Language & Linguistics

Phonological Foregrounding in Chimamanda Adichie’s Purple Hibiscus
Ebi Yeibo, Comfort Akerele

Abstract
Writers generally utilize a wide range of linguistic and paralinguistic devices which include graphetic/ graphological, phonetic / phonological, semantic, lexical and syntactic, to communicate textual meaning and also enhance the artistic texture and flavor of their works. With M.A.K. Halliday’s Systemic Functional Grammar, particularly the textual metafunction, as the analytical template, this study focuses on how sound or phonic elements such as alliteration, assonance and onomatopoeia are systematically organized or patterned in Adichie’s Purple Hibiscus, to foreground stylistic meaning and serve aesthetic ends. The study demonstrates the fact that writers deliberately deploy lexemes not only because of their senses or signifying potentials but also as result of the suggestive power of their sounds in relation to context of situation and textual function. It, therefore, concludes that, as an integral or constitutive layer of language, phonic elements function as a veritable part of textual organization and are as useful and fundamental as other levels of language study in the construction of literary texts.

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