Academic competence refers to a learner’s underlying knowledge and ability to think critically, organize ideas, and understand academic content, while linguistic performance is the actual use of language in speaking or writing, which external factors may influence. Students may possess academic competence but struggle with linguistic performance, particularly in second language contexts.

This is a relevant article that draws on a Nigerian context:

Fakeye, D.O. and Ogunsiji, Y., 2009. English language proficiency as a predictor of academic achievement among EFL students in Nigeria. European Journal of Scientific Research, 37(3), pp.490-495.

https://shorturl.at/6Gslw

Academic Competence versus Linguistic Performance: A Scholarly Review on the Pronunciation of English Words of Foreign Origin by Final-Year English Students at the University of Ibadan

The distinction between academic competence and linguistic performance, rooted in Chomsky’s (1965) seminal dichotomy of competence and performance, provides a foundational framework for analyzing the linguistic behaviors of university-level learners, particularly within multilingual educational contexts such as Nigeria. Academic competence refers to a student’s underlying knowledge of language rules, academic conventions, and cognitive mastery required to engage effectively in scholarly discourse—especially in a second or foreign language. In contrast, linguistic performance denotes the observable manifestation of that competence in actual speech or writing, which may be influenced by psychological, sociolinguistic, and phonetic variables.

In the context of final-year English students at the University of Ibadan—a prestigious institution where English is both the medium of instruction and a subject of study—the interplay between academic competence and linguistic performance becomes especially salient when examining pronunciation, particularly of English words of foreign origin (e.g., French ballet, Italian piano, German kindergarten, Latin et cetera). These lexical items often retain orthographic and phonological features from their source languages, posing challenges for Nigerian speakers whose first languages (such as Yoruba, Hausa, or Igbo) lack equivalent phonemes or stress patterns.

Theoretical Underpinnings: Competence vs. Performance

Chomsky's (1965) concept of linguistic competence emphasizes an idealized, internalized grammar system, while performance reflects real-time language use, susceptible to memory limitations, distractions, and sociolinguistic identity. Canale and Swain’s (1980) model of communicative competence expands this notion by including grammatical, sociolinguistic, discourse, and strategic components—each relevant to academic settings. For university English students, academic competence thus encompasses not only grammatical accuracy but also the ability to comprehend, analyze, and produce discipline-specific discourse, including correct pronunciation norms in formal presentations, seminars, or oral examinations.

However, as observed in studies by Bamgbose (1995) and Udofot (2002), Nigerian English speakers often exhibit a gap between academic knowledge and spoken performance due to interference from L1 phonology, limited exposure to native-like models, and inadequate phonetic training in curricula. This discrepancy is particularly evident in the articulation of non-English phonemes such as the French /ø/ in beau, the German /x/ in Bach, or the Italian affricates in ciao.

Empirical Evidence from Nigerian Contexts

Research by Osisanwo (2004) on Nigerian tertiary students’ pronunciation habits reveals that even advanced learners tend to nativize foreign-origin words, applying Yoruba or Standard Nigerian English (SNE) phonotactic rules. For instance, the word rendezvous [ˈrɒ̃deɪvuː] (French origin) is frequently pronounced as /rendezvus/ or /rendezvu/, with epenthetic vowels and consonant additions reflecting L1 syllable structure constraints.

Similarly, a study by Salawu (2010) at the University of Ibadan found that final-year English majors demonstrated high academic competence in written analyses of etymology and phonemic transcription, yet performed inconsistently in oral production tasks involving loanwords. This supports the argument that academic literacy does not automatically translate into accurate phonetic performance—highlighting a dissociation between knowing the rules and applying them spontaneously in speech.

Further, Jowitt (2009) notes that Nigerian English speakers often adopt prestige variants influenced by British or American models, but without sufficient auditory discrimination or articulatory training, leading to fossilized mispronunciations. For example, the word genre is commonly pronounced as /jenre/ instead of /ˈʒɑːnrə/, indicating substitution of the voiced palato-alveolar fricative /ʒ/ with /j/—a phoneme more familiar in Yoruba and SNE.

Pedagogical Implications

These findings underscore the need for enhanced phonetics and phonology instruction within English degree programs. While students at the University of Ibadan are academically competent—capable of parsing complex literary texts and demonstrating metalinguistic awareness—their linguistic performance in pronunciation remains vulnerable to systemic gaps in phonetic training. Incorporating contrastive analysis, auditory discrimination exercises, and IPA-based pronunciation drills could bridge this competence-performance divide.

Moreover, recent scholarship by Adedoja and Olateju (2018) advocates for integrating Computer-Assisted Language Learning (CALL) tools and speech recognition software to provide immediate feedback on pronunciation accuracy, thereby reinforcing the transfer of academic knowledge into spoken performance.

Conclusion

In sum, academic competence among final-year English students at the University of Ibadan is generally robust, grounded in years of literary and linguistic study. However, linguistic performance—particularly in the pronunciation of English words of foreign origin—often falls short due to persistent L1 interference, insufficient phonetic instruction, and limited exposure to authentic pronunciation models. Future curriculum reforms should prioritize phonological accuracy as a core component of academic competence, ensuring that students’ spoken English aligns more closely with their impressive scholarly capabilities.

I’d frame it as a competence–performance tension: “academic competence” is the underlying disciplinary understanding, inquiry skills, and epistemic judgment a learner possesses, while “linguistic performance” is the observable language used to express that knowledge in tasks (papers, presentations, reviews). Scholarly reviews often judge competence through performance, so weak language—especially for EFL students—can mask strong ideas and methods. As a professor, I separate content and language criteria in rubrics, allow multimodal evidence and revision, and use targeted feedback to ensure we evaluate what students know, not just how fluently they say it.