THE LANGUAGE OF TECHNOLOGICAL ADVANCEMENT: A CASE STUDY OF MANDARIN AND YORÙBÁ

Abstract

In the world of today, for a country to thrive, it must possess the ability to maintain an equilibrium-leveled potential in its political, military, science, technological and economic development. The sustenance of these potentials in a nation does not elude the power of the language of that nation. Thus, no nation grows without the adequate capacity of its language. The paper is descriptive in nature and it focuses on the comparison between Yorùbá (a Kwa language of the South-western Nigeria) and Mandarin (a Sino-Tibetan language of the People’s Republic of China (PRC)) in terms of strategies employed by both languages to localize science and technological terms in order to promote technological advancement and enable creative productivity in both countries. It has been observed that while the developmental impact of Mandarin on PRC is global, the effect of Yorùbá in respect to the development of Nigeria is dwindling. Judging from the maturity of both languages, it is shown that the word formation processes used in bringing in new words to both languages are capable of bringing about sustainable growth to Science and Technological advancement of their respective countries. The paper finalizes that a fast-paced science and technological development of Nigeria can be aided by a purposeful step of all stakeholders to bring home new words in forms which are easy for all to understand.