GPH-International Journal of Social Science and Humanities Research

Personal Names as Repositories of Communal History and Circumstance among the Igala People of Kogi State

Ejuchegahi A. Angwaomaodoko — 2026-07-31

Personal names among African communities function as durable instruments of memory, holding within a single word the conflict, migration, reconciliation and communal occurrence that shaped the moment of a child's birth; this premise underlies the paper, Personal Names as Repositories of Communal History and Circumstance among the Igala people of Kogi State. The paper attempted to identify the categories of communal history and circumstance encoded in Igala personal names, examined the processes by which such names are assigned in relation to family and communal conditions surrounding birth, and assess the extent to which this historical content is presently preserved or eroded among Igala bearers in Kogi State. Halbwachs's Social Memory Theory was adopted as the guiding framework, treating personal names as social instruments through which a community relocates and sustains its past. A systematic review methodology, structured according to the PRISMA 2020 guideline, was employed, drawing on twelve verified scholarly sources retained after a staged process of identification, screening and eligibility assessment. Findings showed that Igala names encode identifiable categories of communal experience, including conflict, migration and reconciliation; that naming is assigned through an interpretive, communally witnessed process rather than private parental choice; and that indigenous naming content is undergoing measurable erosion among urban and elite bearers, though comparative evidence suggests deliberate maintenance can sustain such content even beyond the ancestral territory. The paper concluded that Igala personal names remain a viable, though weakening, repository of communal history, and recommended deliberate documentation, community-based naming education and further empirical fieldwork within Kogi State.

Correcting Misrepresentation: Igala Names as Evidence Against External Narratives of Negative Meaning

Ejuchegahi A. Angwaomaodoko — 2026-08-02

Names are never neutral; they carry the weight of a people's culture, history, and self-understanding, yet unfamiliar names are routinely misread, diminished, or dismissed by those standing outside the culture that produced them. It is this problem that motivates this paper on "Correcting Misrepresentation: Igala Names as Evidence Against External Narratives of Negative Meaning." The paper examined the structural and semantic composition of Igala personal names, to identify and evaluate the external and internalised narratives that attribute negative or evil meanings to them, and to present verified documentary evidence as a corrective against these narratives. It adopted Afrocentricity theory as its theoretical framework, privileging indigenous self-testimony over externally imposed judgement in determining what Igala names actually mean. Methodologically, the paper adopted a systematic review, synthesising sociological, linguistic, and field-documentary sources on Igala naming alongside comparative literature on name-based discrimination and colonial misrepresentation. The paper showed that Igala names are deliberately constructed grammatical and ritual units encoding theological, historical, and moral instruction; that claims of negative meaning persist through both colonial-era mischaracterisation and internalised self-doubt within the Igala community; and that independently corroborated evidence overwhelmingly attributes courage, gratitude, faith, and honour to these names rather than the alleged negativity. The paper concluded that the prevailing negative narrative is factually unsustainable, and recommended formal documentation of name meanings, targeted community sensitisation, and further peer-reviewed compilation of verified Igala naming data.

Intergenerational Transmission of Igala Naming Practices amid Religious and Educational Change

Ejuchegahi A. Angwaomaodoko — 2026-08-02

Personal naming among the Igala people of Kogi State has long functioned as a repository of ancestral memory, theological conviction and linguistic artistry, yet this inheritance now confronts the twin pressures of religious conversion and Western-style schooling, a tension this paper examined under the title Intergenerational Transmission of Igala Naming Practices amid Religious and Educational Change. The paper pursued three objectives, namely to establish the extent to which elders transmit the meanings, structure and ceremonial procedures of indigenous names within the family, to assess the influence of religious affiliation on the choice between indigenous and foreign names, and to determine the effect of formal education on younger Igala persons' competence in the Igala language and their consequent capacity to reproduce indigenous naming forms. Socio-onomastic theory provided the guiding framework, treating naming as a form of social action shaped by its surrounding conditions. A systematic review methodology, structured according to the PRISMA reporting guideline, was adopted to identify, screen and synthesise relevant scholarly sources. The review found that ceremonial transmission persists procedurally while interpretive competence increasingly concentrates among elders, that religious affiliation produces substitution, hybrid and demotion patterns in naming choice rather than a single uniform effect, and that English-medium education measurably erodes the linguistic competence underlying indigenous naming. The paper concluded that the survival of Igala naming as a living rather than ceremonial practice depends on reconciling religious and educational institutions with indigenous linguistic continuity, and recommended explanatory naming ceremonies, hybrid naming dialogue with religious leaders, and curriculum-based Igala language instruction.