School of Languages
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Item What Is Africa to Me? or Maryse Condé’s Love-Hate Relationship with “Ancestral Lands” Struggling with Budding Independence(Cahiers d’études africaines, 2021) Asaah, A.H.The involvement of French-speaking Caribbean intellectuals in the socio political development of their ancestral continent, Africa, has taken diverse literary forms, key among which are René Maran’s novel Batouala (1921), Frantz Fanon’s political testimony Les damnés de la terre (2004 [1961]), Aimé Césaire’s play Une saison au Congo (1966), Myriam Warner-Vieyra’s novel Juletane (1982), and Raoul Peck’s film Sometimes in April (2005). While dialoguing with these authors/works, Maryse Condé’s autobiography, La vie sans fards (2012)/What Is Africa to Me? (2017), prolongs this affiliation with the account of her relocation to four West African postcolonies, namely the Ivory Coast, Guinea, Ghana, and Senegal between 1959 and 1970, with a year’s break in the uk.Item The Utility of Orthographic Design for Different Users: The Case of the Approved Dagbani Orthography(Language Documentation & Conservation, 2021) Hudu, F.A.This paper presents a critical assessment of the utility of the orthography of Dagbani. (a Gur language of Ghana) in the documentation, linguistic research, and literacy acquisition of Dagbani. While written literature on Dagbani dates to over a century, it was only in 1997 that the only known documented orthographic rules of the language, the Approved Dagbani Orthography (ADO), was put together. Its stated goal was to address inconsistencies that existed in the orthographic rules at the time. It has since largely served this goal and has remained a resource for linguists engaged in language documentation and linguistic research as well as adult and young learners acquiring literacy in Dagbani in formal and informal settings. The paper discusses the influence of orthography in the understanding of aspects of Dagbani linguistics and the challenges that remain with its use in modern-day multimodal communication. It shows that while the ADO has impacted literacy, documentation, and research on Dagbani linguistics, aspects of the design of the orthography have limited its potential impact and have given room for the emergence or maintenance of co-orthographic practices used for electronic communication and in the documentation of names in non-native official circles.Item Women, Metaphors and the Legitimisation of Gender Bias in Spanish Proverbs(Journal of International Women's Studies, 2019) Lomotey, B.A.This paper aims to analyze the role of proverbs in the sustenance of gender violence within the Spanish context. As demonstrated by feminist linguistic activities, one of the avenues through which the status quo of both men and women is enacted and sustained is through language. However, given the complex nature of the relationship between gender and language, speakers often overlook the role of discourse on gender relations. The author investigates this interconnection using a multidimensional approach which includes insights from Lakoff and Johnson’s (1980) theory of metaphor and Austin’s (1965) Speech Act theory. This study confirms that quite several Spanish proverbs contain violent metaphors that can unconsciously shape speakers’ perceptions and actions. Misogynous ideologies in Spanish proverbs should therefore continue to be exposed, criticized, and eliminated through conscientization to sustain the campaign for gender equality.Item Interactive programmes on private radio stations in Ghana: An avenue for impoliteness(Journal of African Media Studies, 2018) Thompson, R.A.; Anderson, J.A.This study aims to show the impoliteness strategies employed during some radio interactions. The data used here are mainly recordings of the morning shows of some private radio stations in Ghana. We establish that all the recorded utterances have some features that correspond with at least one of Culpeper’s (1996, 2005) impoliteness strategies, which are bald-on-record impoliteness, positive impoliteness, negative impoliteness, off-record impoliteness, and withhold politeness. However, many of the participants prefer the use of the on-record strategies to the off-record strategies of impoliteness. We, therefore, assert that many participants in interactive radio programs in Ghana prefer to convey messages to their addressees in a more direct and unrestrained manner, with little or no attention to their (addressees’) face needs. These participants attack the faces of more powerful people not only to demean their social status but also to demand quicker results and gain some psychological relief.Item Topics In Dagbanli Phonology: A Cross-Dialectal Study(University Of Ghana, 2021-07) Inusah, A.The thesis is a cross-dialectal investigation of various topics in Dagbanli Phonology. It is set up to contribute to the understanding of segmental phonology which concerns individual segments of speech and their patterns. It responds to basic empirical questions about suprasegmental phonology which realm is linked utterances. A cross-dialectal study of segmental phonology as well as suprasegmental properties of the dialects is discussed and assessed for the purpose of Dagbanli phonology. The prime objectives are to describe variations in Dagbanli dialects, to provide analysis of the topics in Dagbanli phonology across dialects and to advance sound correspondence and sound alternation across Dagbanli dialects. Ethnographic Approach is employed to solicit the primary data from bucolic Dagbanli speech communities. Descriptive Method is engaged for the analysis of both primary and secondary data available while Theories of Data and Free- Standing Theories are applied where necessary. Gbanjonsili ‘Gbanjon dialect’, Zundusili ‘Zundua dialect’ and Jimansili ‘Jiman dialect’ are discovered as the sub-dialects of the major dialects of Dagbanli; the suffix [-sili] in this context refers to a dialect. The sub-dialects have the velar fricatives [x, ɣ] confined to specific segmental contexts with a particular inventory stricture. It reveals that the voiced coronal stop /d/ in the standard dialect manifests as voiceless coronal stop [t] in Zundusili, voiceless coronal affricate /ʧ/ in Gbanjonsili and voiceless dorsal stop [k] in Jimansili through fortition process of devoicing. The thesis confirms coalesce of non-coronal labial /m/ and coronal fricative /s/ to produce dorsal fricative [x] in intervocalic in Gbanjonsili (e.g., /m+s/→[x]; /wʊ́m-sí/→ [wʊ́xɨ́] ‘tame’). The thesis describes assimilation and non-assimilatory processes such as lenition and fortition as the phonological units that account for dialectal differentiation in Dagbanli. Both lenition and fortition operate on segmental level and are not caused by neighbouring segments; while Lenition concerns phonological weakening (e.g., /s/→[h], /máːsílí/ → [máːhílí] ‘cool weather’), fortition employs phonological strengthening (e.g., /d/→[t], /díní/ →[tíní] ‘knee’). Four different models are attested in the description of segmental differences and similarities across dialects; these models, Relisational, Selectional, Systemic and Distributional, highlight the segmental properties as well as phonological processes affecting the surface realisation of the segments. The alternation of [a~ɔ], [ɔ~a], [a~o] and [i~u] are described in Dagbanli as selectional (random) but not distributional (rule-governed). The thesis suggests that the chief source of segmental variations in Dagbanli is in vowel quality. The thesis describes the basic patterns of harmony systems across Dagbanli dialects with focus on triggers and targets. It argues that backness harmony in Dagbanli and its dialects is progressive where harmonic features spread from root-to-suffix. It shows that mora-counting play significant role in the description of Dagbanli phonology and falling tone is a feature in Dagbanli. The thesis concludes that Dagbanli counts CV.V and CVN as heavy while CV as light convincingly showing moraic consistency. Also, tone is observed as the diagnosis for mora-counting in Dagbanli Phonology.Item A Cognitive Semantic Analysis of Perception and Cognition Expressions in Akan(University of Ghana, 2020-07) Eshun, E.S.This study examines linguistic expressions in Mfantse (Akan) that relate to the basic senses of the body such as seeing, tasting, smelling, hearing and touching. For each sense modality, both the literal and metaphorical expressions were investigated. It adopts the cognitive linguistics approach. Data were gathered from forty native speakers of Mfantse (Central region) in a variety of interview formats and elicitation from stimuli. The data gathered confirmed the empirical validity arrived at in the conclusions of the study. A significant finding of the study is that the perceptive verbs (PVs) do not only display physiological roles but also demonstrate diverse extended meanings depending on the context in which they occur. The study illustrates that hwέ (look) involves a durative process. On the other hand, hú (see) is a visual activity that occurs ‘on the spot’ or instantaneously. Sometimes hú can be durative where the visual line is directed towards compassion. Hwέ is volitional while hú is both volitional and non-volitional. These two PVs are classified as: intra-psychological (self-philosophies) and social-psychological experiences (interdependency). The findings from the gustatory expressions show six primary taste sensations in Akan: sweet/pleasant, salty, sour, bitter, congealing, and a semantically derived form, táblábáá (lacking taste; bland), in contrast to the five taste forms in English. The study also revealed that from the ethno-cultural background, dɛ́ẃ ‘sweet/pleasant’ can be described as a pleasant taste that includes: +/- sugariness, and non-food related experiences. Also, Mfantse (Akan) expresses different forms of specific perceived sour taste as: kàẁ, fèm̀and yèrɛ̀yèrɛ̀ẁ. Further, all the taste expressions revealed metaphorical expressions: Pleasant– gentle/good speech, enough money, sexual enjoyment, flattery and pampering. Bland – improper dressing. Sour– regret, disappointment, bad body odour. Bitter – offensive talk, difficulties in life, excessive judgment, and stinginess. Salty – dishonest. Results also show that Mfantse (Akan) profiles different semantic ways of representing and interpreting basic and extended meanings of olfactory, auditory and tactile sensory information. The olfactory sense revealed that m̀fáŕ/ǹká ‘scent’ may be understood to conflate good, bad, fragrant, stench and disapproving concepts in portraying odours. Also, the semantics of ǹká ‘scent’ demonstrates that there are few occurrences where ǹká ‘scent’ does not have a negative connotation. Perhaps the non-negative connotation can be explained in the context where the concept of ǹká ‘scent’ needs to be modified with positive adjectives. For extreme odours, Mfantse (Akan) identified specific terms: sùòǹǹ, kòóò, káńkáń, hùǹtùǹǹ and sùkùsùkù to describe them. Also, bɔ̀ǹ ‘bad odour’ exhibits: bad human body odour, lack of intellectual competencies and general bad odours. The term húáḿ indicate good odours. Additionally, the olfactory experience of hùà ‘to sniff/smell’ coded the sense of relaxation, satisfaction, love of, and to detect preference of the odour of an entity. Metaphorical resource show that olfactory experiences in Mfantse indicate: húáḿ ‘good odour’; ‘good mouth talk’ – ‘good/eloquent speech’; bɔ̀ǹ ‘bad odour’; ‘bad mouth talk’ – loud-mouthed or offensive speech; ‘bad breath/bad smell in the nose’– hostility, unfriendliness; ‘self-matter smells’– bad character. The study identifies two auditory terms: tsè ‘hear’ and tsíè ‘listen’. Semantically, meanings from these two verbs are contextually different, but they have similar syntactic structures in terms of the arguments they select. Extended meanings of the auditory sense display the following: tsìètsíèè ‘to investigate’, tsíè ‘give a hearing’ (legal context), tsíè no ‘agree’/‘permit’; tsíè nó àsò pá mù: ‘listen without prejudice’, tsíè /tsè… àsέḿ ‘obedience’, tsíé…ànó ‘act on hearsay’; à-tsè â ńńtséè: ‘pretence’ and tsè àsó mú: ‘listen to the right information’. Further, the tactile sense employed serial verb construction; kà…hwέ; súóm…hwέ; and míá…hwέ (touch). These constructions engage the hand for examining physical experiences as well as expressing feelings regarding metaphorical expressions such as comforting, subduing, pleasing, loving, stimulating, intimacy and painful expressions. Importantly, the Mfantse data make a contribution towards the concept of perception and cognition predicates normally moving in pairs as state and non-state pairs in Akan. Thus, for the state, we have concrete/non-metaphorical uses and abstract/metaphorical uses for the non-state roles. These play a major role in the range of semantic/pragmatic interpretations that allow for these. It is expected that comparable research will spring up from closely related dialects and in other Ghanaian languages, the Kwa language family as well as African languages in general to bring out similarities and differences in the linguistic analysis of these sensory modalities.Item Regards Sur La Politique Linguistique Educative au Ghana : Perceptions Et Aspirations Des Acteurs Clefs Vis a Vis De L’enseignement Du Fle Dans Le Contexte Plurilingue Ghaneen(University of Ghana, 2020-10)Regards Sur La Politique Linguistique Educative Au Ghana: Perceptions Et This research work proposes a double-edged approach of sociolinguistics and social psychology to explore representations of families vis-à-vis language learning, and in particular of English, French, and Ghanaian languages, in a plurilingual Ghanaian educational context. It aims at understanding global issues on the educational management of plurilingualism in Ghana while drawing on two case studies, located in Aflao and Ejisu, in southern and central Ghana. These qualitative studies are "validated" by a quantitative survey in several schools in the capital city of Accra. The questioning retained concerns the links of coherence existing between the sociolinguistic situation in Ghana, the linguistic educational policies and the practices and representations of the families in relation to languages and individual multilingualism. These different levels of analysis are linked by means of a contextualization process that highlights certain specificities of social and family multilingualism in Ghana. More specifically, this research questions the place of French in the panorama of family language policy in Ghana, as well as the modalities of its teaching and the representations associated with it. The reflection led to some perspectives for a better recognition of multilingual practices in families, and a real consideration of the problems related to the contact of languages and varieties present in the social environment in which French tries to insert itself with so many problems. The results of the study show that the families in Aflao make a lot of effort to support their desire/need to add French as a third language in the linguistic basket that their children bring to the "sociolinguistic market", unlike the Akan of Ejisu who do not care about this language that is not very present in their daily framework or their vision of the future. The will of the Ewés, moreover, seems to lead inevitably to the decline of the practice of their local language, in Aflao, near the Togolese border. Indeed, the pressure of poverty, economic life and the sociolinguistic environment (need and presence of French at the border) seems to dominate and determine the attitudes and practices of these families in terms of education and family language choices.Item Regards Sur La Politique Linguistique Educative Au Ghana : Perceptions Et Aspirations Des Acteurs Clefs Vis a Vis De L’enseignement Du Fle Dans Le Contexte Plurilingue Ghaneen.(University of Ghana, 2020-10) Nutakor, E.M.Regards Sur La Politique Linguistique Educative Au Ghana: Perceptions Et This research work proposes a double-edged approach of sociolinguistics and social psychology to explore representations of families vis-à-vis language learning, and in particular of English, French, and Ghanaian languages, in a plurilingual Ghanaian educational context. It aims at understanding global issues on the educational management of plurilingualism in Ghana while drawing on two case studies, located in Aflao and Ejisu, in southern and central Ghana. These qualitative studies are "validated" by a quantitative survey in several schools in the capital city of Accra. The questioning retained concerns the links of coherence existing between the sociolinguistic situation in Ghana, the linguistic educational policies and the practices and representations of the families in relation to languages and individual multilingualism. These different levels of analysis are linked by means of a contextualization process that highlights certain specificities of social and family multilingualism in Ghana. More specifically, this research questions the place of French in the panorama of family language policy in Ghana, as well as the modalities of its teaching and the representations associated with it. The reflection led to some perspectives for a better recognition of multilingual practices in families, and a real consideration of the problems related to the contact of languages and varieties present in the social environment in which French tries to insert itself with so many problems. The results of the study show that the families in Aflao make a lot of effort to support their desire/need to add French as a third language in the linguistic basket that their children bring to the "sociolinguistic market", unlike the Akan of Ejisu who do not care about this language that is not very present in their daily framework or their vision of the future. The will of the Ewés, moreover, seems to lead inevitably to the decline of the practice of their local language, in Aflao, near the Togolese border. Indeed, the pressure of poverty, economic life and the sociolinguistic environment (need and presence of French at the border) seems to dominate and determine the attitudes and practices of these families in terms of education and family language choices.Item Acquisition of English Syllable Structure through Explicit Teaching among Hausa Speakers(University of Ghana, 2019-03) Sadat, M.The debate between the effectiveness of explicit and implicit teaching has taken a center stage in the second language acquisition literature over a long period of time. Most of such debates center on grammar teaching and very few discuss suprasegmental features especially, syllable structure. All languages have some sort of syllabicity; however, the phonetic characteristics of syllables differ across languages. The difference can be seen in the types of sounds that can cluster together around a single syllabic nucleus. The current work examines the effects of explicit instruction on the acquisition of English syllable structure among native Hausa speakers. The work investigates the efficiency of interventions through explicit teaching on the English syllable structure in a classroom setting. English syllables have some structures that are absent in Hausa and these structures pose some difficulties for Hausa speakers who learn English. This work explores the structures and adopts explicit instruction as an intervention to remedy the difficulties through explicit teaching. The investigation was done on participants who are Ghanaian Hausa speakers learning English. Generally, the work adds to the literature on the efficacy of explicit teaching, and specifically on the teaching of English syllable structure among Hausa speakers. Finally, the work investigates some of the constraints that learners and teachers are faced with in Teaching English as a Second Language (TESL) and offers suggestions for improving the teaching of English pronunciation to Hausa learners. The study discovers that in disyllabic word, there is preference of trochaic syllable over iambic syllable, acquisition of onsets is easier than acquisition of codas and finally, explicit teaching is very effective in classroom.Item Acquisition of English Syllable Structure through Explicit Teaching among Hausa Speakers(University of Ghana, 2019-03) Sadat, M.The debate between the effectiveness of explicit and implicit teaching has taken a center stage in the second language acquisition literature over a long period of time. Most of such debates center on grammar teaching and very few discuss suprasegmental features especially, syllable structure. All languages have some sort of syllabicity; however, the phonetic characteristics of syllables differ across languages. The difference can be seen in the types of sounds that can cluster together around a single syllabic nucleus. The current work examines the effects of explicit instruction on the acquisition of English syllable structure among native Hausa speakers. The work investigates the efficiency of interventions through explicit teaching on the English syllable structure in a classroom setting. English syllables have some structures that are absent in Hausa and these structures pose some difficulties for Hausa speakers who learn English. This work explores the structures and adopts explicit instruction as an intervention to remedy the difficulties through explicit teaching. The investigation was done on participants who are Ghanaian Hausa speakers learning English. Generally, the work adds to the literature on the efficacy of explicit teaching, and specifically on the teaching of English syllable structure among Hausa speakers. Finally, the work investigates some of the constraints that learners and teachers are faced with in Teaching English as a Second Language (TESL) and offers suggestions for improving the teaching of English pronunciation to Hausa learners. The study discovers that in disyllabic word, there is preference of trochaic syllable over iambic syllable, acquisition of onsets is easier than acquisition of codas and finally, explicit teaching is very effective in classroom.