International Journal of Language & Linguistics

Identifying Scam E-Mails through Nigerian English Features
Mansur Isah Buhari

Abstract
The purpose of this paper is to examine the features of Nigerian English (henceforth NE) in one form of fraudulent e-mails; the all-pervading Nigerian scam letter commonly known as 4-1-9 informally called “Yahoo-Yahoo”. The existence of a variety of English called Nigerian English has been a subject of academic debate among scholars, researchers and students of the language alike. This gave birth to the “variation” and “deviation” positions on the matter. This paper aligns with the former, capitalising on the Variationist theory. The findings revealed that there is a chunk of Nigerian English features in so many scam e-mails which resulted in the conclusion that understanding the nature of this variety of English could help in avoiding being a victim of the scam.

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