Context-Based Analysis of Anaañ Palm Wine Folk Poetry

Abstract: There is a substitution of the traditional lyrics of Anaañ palm wine songs
with the hybridized form in recent times. The songs as rendered in recent times
depended more on the lyrics of Christian's songs. This affected the cultural values
attached to the palm wine songs in the olden days; resulting in the gradual
disappearance of the traditional palm wine songs. This therefore attracted the
researcher to work on these areas in order to unravel the lyrics of the olden-day palm
wine songs for proper validation. The study presented a decontextualizationAnalysis
of Anaañ Palm Wine folk poetry, to provide insights into the lyrical gaps that existed
in the modern-day Anaañ palm wine songs. The study adopted a descriptive research
design. Fifty (50) male adult respondents within the age range of 35 years to 55 years
were purposively selected for data collection from Ikot Ekpene, Obot Akara and
Essien Udin areas of Anaañ. Interview sessions and group discussion methods were
used to elicit information on the contexts of Anaañ palm wine folk poetry for this
study. Data was also collected from secondary sources like library resources. The
data collected were recorded using ----. The data were further transcribed
orthographically, collated, classified and analysed, using the framework of
decontextualization. Findings from the study showed that there existed a gap in the
lyrics in the olden days and modern-day palm wine poetry inAnaañ. Olden-day palm
wine songs provided insights into the cultural values, beliefs and superstitions of the
Anaañ people. The present-day palm wine folk poetry is adulterated and is being
influenced by ever-changing modernization, communication systems, migration to
urban areas, changes in lifestyle, white collar jobs, the influence of Christianity on
both men and women and lack of government policy on the teaching of Anaañ
cultural practice. This work is relevant in the preservation of the cultural practices
embedded in Anaañ folk poetry, which in turn, shall be a source of language
preservation when the contents of the Anaañ palm wine songs are documented based
on the olden days context.