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ANALYSIS OF INDIGENOUS PRACTICES OF SMALL-SCALE PLANTAIN FARMERS FOR APPROPRIATE ALLEY FARMING TECHNOLOGY IN OYO STATE, NIGERIA
Published 1992-10Call Number: Loading…
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Pragmatic Acts in Alms Begging in Lagos State, Nigeria
Published 2012Call Number: Loading…
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Page will reload when a filter is selected or excluded.- Alms begging 1 results 1
- Discourse conditioning acts 1 results 1
- Lagos State 1 results 1
- Pragmatic acts 1 results 1
- Previous studies on alms begging in the fields of medicine, psychology, sociology, journalism, and discourse analysis have depicted the phenomenon as a simple activity of requesting by indigent individuals who were often viewed as linguistically deficient. These studies did not adequately account for the context-driven and implicit communicative acts performed by beggars, thus limiting the understanding of this pragmatic phenomenon in society. Therefore, this study examined alms begging in Lagos state with a view to describing its distinctive pragmatic acts and implications. The study applied a modified version of Pragmatic Act theory, which is suitable for describing and interpreting speeches and communicative behaviours in naturally occurring conversational interactions. Using the observation method, speeches and other communicative behaviours of 100 purposively selected beggars were collected from 4 types of locations (public institutions, venues of social events, vehicle stations, and on the streets) in all the 20 local government areas of Lagos State by tape recording and note taking, in order to have a balanced representation of various types of begging behaviours. The data were subjected to pragmatic analysis. Discourse Conditioning Acts (DCAs) and Purpose Execution Acts (PEAs) are the two distinctive but intertwined pragmatic acts found in alms begging. Discourse Conditioning Acts were executed verbally (indirect speech acts) and non-verbally (psychological and physical acts). Beggars‘ indirect speech acts comprised arguing (attention-seeking, affinity negotiating, claiming, denying, complaining, protesting, questioning and threatening), use of politeness (tact, positivism, quietism, and sympathy) and appropriation of idioms. Beggars‘ psychological acts manifested as strategies of mood variation (weeping, sobbing, hissing and laughing), while their physical acts consisted of the strategies of body moves (posing, gazing, beckoning, nodding, bowing, waving and dancing). Both the psychological and the physical acts were extra-linguistic behaviours which beggars used to reinforce their verbal acts in order to emphasise their goal-driven, situation-constrained desperation. Beggars used DCAs to set-up and co-opt others, thereby compelling their target to give alms. Purpose Execution Acts used in obtaining alms, were direct acts, which included three types of direct speech acts (expressives, commissives and directives) together with their corresponding features of (telling, promising and requesting respectively). On the streets, beggars were inclined to use more PEAs than DCAs but in the other types of begging locations (public institutions, venues of social events, and vehicle stations) they use more DCAs than PEAs because of temporal and spatial contextual advantages. While beggars in Lagos state rely on Discourse conditioning acts to set-up and to co-opt potential alms givers, they employ Purpose execution acts to obtain alms from their targets. Thus, begging in the state is a complex, skilled activity which exhibits a considerable level of beggars‘ pragmatic competence. A comparative pragmatic study of alms begging in the Northern and Southern regions of Nigeria is expected to reveal more pragmatic acts performed by beggars. 1 results 1
- Purpose execution acts 1 results 1
- The limitations of conventional technology development gave birth to Farming Systems Research perspective which look at farming practices from a holistic view. This however has innate flaws in its implementation. Recent emphasis therefore is strengthening the need to appreciate a hitherto neglected indigenous knowledge systems. This indigenous knowledge for instance, has been influencing the indigenous practices associated with small-scale plantain production. Before now Plantain has not received favourable attention despite its economic potentials in the Nigerian economy. This is the main reason for this investigation which described the indigenous practices in its production. It is with an intent to illustrate how Alley Farming Technology should be designed to blend with the indigenous practices of the small-scale plantain farmers. The inquiry was conducted in Irewole and Oranmiyan Local Government Areas (LGAs) of Oyo State (however, since the creation of new states in 1992, these LGAs have become part of Osun State). The objectives of the study were to: describe the socio-economic features of plantain farmers, ascertain their indigenous practices, identify constraints to production, examine their agricultural information sources and determine the impact of certain variables on indigenous practices. A mini-study (or field observation) was conducted on ten small-scale (volunteer- farmers less than 3 ha) plantain plots. The monitoring of these plots for about six months was to field-test certain concepts which were empirically investigated in the follow-up survey. The survey was an interview schedule administered to two hundred and seventy (270) small-scale plantain farmers selected through a multi-stage sampling technique in the two LGAs. Frequency analysis of information obtained from the ten plots indicated that the most common crops intercropped with plantain (26.2%) were cassava, cocoyam, maize and vegetables. Information from the questionnaire revealed that 91% of the respondents had no formal education. Though staking was a practice, recommended spacing and mulching of plantain was not favoured by 98% of the interviewees. Cutlass was frequently used by 99.3% in plantain operations. Male household heads determined planting plantain (99.3%), plots to be used (98.9%) while female household heads/wives of male household heads decided on plantain processing (78.5%), sales (89.6%) and cost of production (69.6%). Constraints to plantain production include declining soil fertility (98.5%), insufficient propagules (95.2%) and inadequate extension service (95.9%). Multipurpose trees (MPTs) known to plantain farmers were Cassia (98.1%) and Gliricidia (97.0%). At a priori P<.05, pearson correlation analysis indicated a significant and positive association between indigenous knowledge and intercropping of plantain (r = 0.25). Use of Radio as a source negatively correlated with staking (r=-0.51) and mulching of plantain (r = -0.23). Stepwise multivariate ^egression showed that 48% of the variation in indigenous intercropping of plantain was explained by six regressors; household size, social participation, alley farming awareness, extension drama method, farm service centres and poor community market prices for plantain. These findings have implications for the adoption of Alley Farming technology in the study area. There is a serious need to involve small-scale plantain farmers in alley species (MPTs) selection, establishment and management. A comprehensive extension educational programme is necessary to make plantain farmers more aware of the alley farming technology. 1 results 1
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