Abstract:
The study focused on lexical changes and attendant morphological transformations that have occurred with respect to the variety of the Gusii language spoken by the migrant Gusii community of Goseta settlement scheme of Trans-Nzoia County in Kenya. Goseta is one of several settlement schemes in the county that are predominantly occupied by Ekegusii speaking people who migrated from their ancestral homeland in Kisii and Nyamira Counties in the late sixties and early seventies. The study was based on the hypothesis that there are two varieties of the language in existence in the community of study and that they would differ especially on the lexical level given the environmental and other differences between Goseta and the Ekegusii speaking homeland of the respondents in the study. It was supposed that these differences would cause changes in the language as spoken by the respondents. These changes form the focus of this study.The research was conducted as a dialectical survey within the framework of the uniformitarian theory of Language Change and the Social Impact Theory. It entailed collection of data from among Ekegusii speaking residents of Goseta divided into two samples comprising of 50 people. The first sample comprised of 40 Ekegusii speakers aged 10- 40 who were born and brought up in Goseta. The second sample comprised 10 older speakers aged 50 and above who were born in the then Kisii District and migrated to Goseta in the late nineteen sixties and early seventies. Data was gathered using interviews, questionnaires and observation and duly recorded and analyzed for the purpose of compiling this report. In the findings, thus detailed, lexical changes were recorded as having taken place among respondents who were born and raised in the research area. The said lexical changes were accompanied by morphological transformations accruing from the lexical elements identified during the study. The study findings show that the Ekegusii language is rapidly evolving away from the original language spoken by other speakers elsewhere because of the interplay between linguistic, social and economic factors. Ultimately, the changes identified form the basis for concluding that the variety of Ekegusii spoken is an emerging dialect of Ekegusii unique to the area studied. The study recommends further research on the state of the language as spoken in the diaspora.
