Language and identity (re/de)construction through Cameroon French neology from the MINSEP - FECAFOOT saga

Abstract

The new linguistic dispensations in emerging postcolonial contexts proffer propitious breeding grounds for the investigation of diverse phenomena. Language users in such multilingual and pluriethnic settings gainfully exploit available sociolinguistic resources and their artistry to come up with interesting features such as neoterms through which identities are (re/de)constructed. Informed by Kozinets (2010) Netnographic Approach which accounts for linguistic behaviour in online cultures and communities, this write-up uses the qualitative design and the descriptive analytical research approaches. The dataset exemplifies different identity shades, viz., individual identity, collective or group identity, place identity and phenomenal identity as culled from a computer-mediated social network platform - DETACHEMENT MINESUP, which regroups Ph.D holders, former Ministry of Secondary Education staff, who were eventually recruited by the Ministry of Higher Education. The study attests to the (re/de)construction of individual, group, place and phenomenal identities through novel forms of expression thanks to a plethora of stylistic and linguistic resources such as affixation, compounding, blending, initialisations, borrowing, synecdoches and metaphors. The study establishes that French neoterms are an inevitable linguistic phenomenon attesting to the legitimacy of Cameroon French as a non-native variety in its own right.