Developing Yoruba Language Terminology for Information Technology: A Corpus Linguistic Approach

This study develops and evaluates a systematic approach to creating Yoruba-language terminology for information technology concepts, addressing the significant gap in indigenous language resources for digital and technology education in the South West geopolitical zone. The absence of standardised Yoruba IT terminology is a barrier to mother tongue-medium digital literacy instruction and undermines the goal of technology education inclusion in Yoruba-speaking communities. The study adopts a corpus linguistics methodology supplemented by terminological creation procedures drawn from ISO terminological standards and established African language corpus development frameworks. A reference corpus of Yoruba texts was compiled from available literature, radio scripts, and digital sources, and used as a baseline for evaluating lexical naturalness of proposed terms. Terminological proposals for 300 IT concepts were generated through strategies including semantic extension of existing Yoruba vocabulary, compounding, derivation, and phonological adaptation of English technical terms. The proposed terms were evaluated by 30 expert informants comprising Yoruba linguists, technology educators, and secondary school Yoruba teachers for semantic transparency, phonological acceptability, and pedagogical utility. Findings show high acceptance rates for semantically extended and compound terms relative to phonologically adapted borrowings. The study recommends the establishment of a national indigenous language technology terminology board under the supervision of the National Language Centre. Keywords: Yoruba terminology, information technology, corpus linguistics, terminological development, language planning.