METAPHOR AND EVALUATION AS ECOLINGUISTIC DEVICES IN HELON HABILA’S OIL ON WATER

Abstract

This paper investigates metaphor and evaluation as ecolinguistic devices in Helon Habila’s Oil on Water, a Nigerian novel that dramatises the ecological devastation of the Niger Delta. Oil on Water presents an imaginative re-creation of how oil exploration has altered the natural environment and human livelihoods. Within the framework of ecolinguistics and drawing insights from cognitive metaphor theory and appraisal theory, this study examines how metaphors construct ecological meanings and how evaluative language conveys attitudes, judgments, and values about environmental degradation. The analysis reveals that metaphors in the text highlight tensions between purity and pollution, life and death, and nature and exploitation, thereby encoding the struggle of marginalised communities in ecologically compromised spaces. Evaluation, on the other hand, amplifies ideological positions by foregrounding negative judgments of oil corporations and political elites, while affirming sympathy for human and nonhuman victims of ecological violence. The study concludes that metaphor and evaluation function not merely as stylistic devices but as ecolinguistic strategies that deepen readers’ awareness of the politics of ecology and the ethics of environmental survival in Nigeria. The paper argues for the continued use of literary texts in ecolinguistic inquiry to illuminate the cultural and moral dimensions of ecological crises.