Philippine E-Journals

RELATIVE CLAUSES IN AMAKA AZUIKE’S ‘VIOLATED’

Innocent Nasuk Dajang | Patricia Nathan Bwai

 

Abstract:

This study examined the usage of the rela7ve clause as a wealthy, crucial and complicated syntac7c procedure in modern English Literature through the examina7on of Amaka Azuike’s Violated, a short play. The study determined the use of rela7ve clauses in terms of their frequency of occurrence and type used, and it showed that English language speakers mostly aEempt to use the "easier" type of the rela7ve clauses to combine sentences for clarity of relaying messages. The paper extracted examples of rela7ve clauses from Violated to determine its aim of iden7fying the types of rela7ve clauses used and the frequency of occurrence as well as the func7ons of the rela7ve clauses in the play. The study also exposed the clarity the reader derives from the author’s use of rela7ve clauses in crea7ng a visible mental picture of issues presented in the story. The study adopted the descrip7ve grammar framework to account for the way rela7ve clauses have been used in the play by the author. The study found that the author of the text used finite rela7ve clauses and only one complex rela7ve clause. Also, it discovered that the usage of rela7ve clauses made the story quite state-of-the-art in style.