Elements of Synecdoche in Hausa

Abstract

This paper examines elements of synecdoche in Hausa. Synecdoche is a literary device by which a part is put for the whole (as fifty sails for fifty ships), the whole for a part (as society for high society) or the name of the material for the thing made (as boards for stage). The method used in generating data for this study are observation and interview. At the level of observation, participant and non-participant approaches were employed. At the interview level, some Hausa native speakers, representing diverse individuals were randomly selected and interviewed. The theoretical framework adopted for the analysis is the Speech Act Theory as profounded by Austin (1962) and advocated by Searle (1979) and Adegbija (1982) among others. Findings show that Hausa synecdoche that relate to the container for the contained are mostly vague. This is because, it is often difficult for a person to pinpoint the actual item that is contained in a container as in the Hausa sentence, Maryam ta sha kofi biyu, meaning, Maryam drank two cups. In this regard, the content of what Maryam drank could be water, tea, milk, gruel, etc. The lack of specification of what has been taken makes the action vague. Furthermore, the paper finds out that synecdoche is often used as a kind of personification by assigning human attribute to a non-human, as exemplified in the sentence, ya fa]a mugun hannu, meaning, he has fallen into wicked hand. Hannu (hand) which stands for wicked person is, thus personified by assigning human attribute to it.