Description
This study investigated the lexicographical impact of the Covid pandemic on world languages. This study was informed by the huge surge in novel expressions and new or hitherto uncommon or unknown technical terminologies which have come up in reference to the many facets of the pandemic. This study did a case study of Kalenjin language which like many other world languages lacks the necessary terminology to make reference to the novel expressions and technical terminology which come to the speakers of the language in the form of foreign terminology. The study aimed at unearthing the presence of these terminologies in Kalenjin language repertoire, this study also sought to identify the linguistic accommodation technique employed in adopting the foreign and hitherto unknown linguistic terminologies. The researcher did a survey of the Kalenjin radio and television broadcasts as first hand contact between the speakers of the language and latest information pertaining to the pandemic, the broadcast media was also chosen in that speakers of the language from all over the world and to whom the collective knowledge of the language lies are given the opportunity to make their reflections on global issues known using a language they best know. The researcher purposively collected over twenty novel terminologies and expressions related to the pandemic in English language and using a corpus linguistic analysis correlated the samples with the their equivalents as rendered in Kalenjin media. Using a qualitative approach, the researcher was able to deduce the linguistic accommodation designs employed in accommodating the novel expressions and terminologies to suit the needs and interests of their audiences. This study will go a long way in documenting the dynamics of language change, a universal property of all human languages.
Keywords:
• accommodation
• corpus analysis
• translation techniques
• loan translation
• Coining
• borrowing
