School of Languages
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Item Diversifying language acquisition research can be (partly) achieved in urban societies and with simplified methodologies: Insights from multilingual Ghana(Journal of Child Language, 2023) Omane, P.O.; Duah, R.A.; Benders, T.; Boll-Avetisyan, N.Item The Ethnography of Surrogate Speech in a Foreign Language: The Case of the Timpani Drum Language among the Dagomba of Ghana(Journal of African Cultural Studies, 2023) Hudu, F.A.This article presents a study of the timpani drum beats and the akarima drummer among the Dagomba of Ghana, using analysis of audio and video recordings of drumming sessions and interviews with the drummers. Borrowed from the Asantes in the eighteenth century, the timpani transmits limited, oft-repeated messages in Akan, a language that neither the drummer nor his Dagomba patrons understand. In spite of this, the timpani is an integral part of Dagomba culture and rituals. In addition to transmitting messages, with the drum, the akarima guards tradition and culture heritage, and reinforces Dagomba values and cultural ethos. As a guardian of tradition, the akarima resists innovation of the practices associated with the use of the drum. As a constructor of realities, he creates knowledge and values from the praises of chiefs and imparts them to his patrons and actively moulds their lives to conform to these values. The article argues that, far from being a deficiency, the use of the drum to transmit messages in a language not comprehensible to the people contributes significantly to the success of the akarima, who functions as imparter of values to his listenersItem Language Contact in Santrokofi, a Ghana-Togo Mountain Language Community: Impact on Selee(Language Matters, 2024) Agbetsoamedo, Y.; Dankwa-Apawu, D.; Amuzu, E.The present study examines the language contact situation in Santrokofi, in Ghana, where Selee, a Ghana-Togo Mountain language, enjoys a good degree of maintenance although it is in triglossic contact with Ewe, Akan, and English. With insight from the triglossic structure model, we collected and analysed quantitative and qualitative data which revealed that Selee is the native’ ingroup language while Ewe (and to a limited extent, Akan) is their intergroup informal language with “others”; English is the dominant language of classroom interactions and other formal settings. There is evidence of lexical borrowing into Selee from the other languages, especially English and Ewe. The youth may be said to be holding on to Selee impressively, but this ongoing language maintenance may be put to the test by the looming encroachment of Santrokofi by Hohoe, the neighbouring major township where most public servants in Santrokofi currently reside.Item Subject-verb agreement marking by Ghanaian learners of French(Southern African Linguistics and Applied Language Studies, 2023) Kpoglu, P.D.In learning French as a foreign language, mastery of agreement marking is indicative of learner progression. In this article, I focus on how subject-verb agreement markers are acquired by Ghanaian learners of French. Based on written data collected from examination scripts, I attempt to present a coherent explanation for the trends noted. The results show that allomorphy characterises the verb stem and influences the production of agreement markers. While verbs with a single stems are strongly associated with first-person singular marking; verbs without an identifiable stem are more strongly associated with third-person singular marking. Interpreting this within the In the item-learning/rule-learning dichotomy, it is argued that both strategies are simultaneously deployed. Consequently, it is suggested that the dichotomy between rule-based versus item-based learning can be impacted by the modality of language.Item Digital cities and villages: African writers and a sense of place in short online fiction(Journal of African Media Studies, 2023) Opoku-Agyemang, K.This article analyses how young African writers challenge stereotypes about the continent through their imagination of places in online short stories. These stories appear on the literary websites Brittle Paper, Jalada, Saraba, Flash Fiction Ghana, Adda and African Writer Magazine, with a focus on cities and villages. Authored by ten writers from Ghana, Nigeria, Kenya, Malawi and Egypt, the stories contain elements of fiction that risk perpetuating negative stereotypes about Africa as they imagine their respective settings. However, textual analysis supported by an appreciation of context reveals how the writers use these stereotypes as basis to craft strong African narratives. By doing so, the writers emphasize the effect that places have on characters, theme, setting and the image of Africa. Ultimately, the roles that urban and rural spaces play in online fiction are multifaceted and enhance the African narrative in complex waysItem Bloody widows? Discourses of tradition and gender in Ghanaian politics(Discourse & Society, 2022) Diabah, G.According to the Inter-Parliamentary Union, although there have been steady increases in the number of women in politics, widespread gender inequalities persist. This is particularly pervasive in patriarchal societies where gender norms and practices are deeply entrenched, with socio-cultural barriers often cited as some of the key impediments to women’s search for political power. There have, therefore, been calls to remove such barriers for effective participation. Unfortunately, some events that occurred before Ghana’s 2020 election discouraged, rather than encourage women’s participation in governance. With data from articles, headlines and comments from various online media outlets, this paper examines three events that reinforce what may be called ‘a bloody widow discourse’ in Ghana’s politics. Using Feminist Critical Discourse Analysis, the paper shows how traditional norms and expectations associated with widowhood can be perceived as barriers to women’s (and not men’s) quest for political power, thereby sustaining the unequal gender and power relations in politics. The use of allusions and rhetorical questions and presuppositions further perpetuate a ‘blame-the-widow’ discourse which makes the women appear unworthy of the power they seek.Item Metaphorical euphemisms in death-discourse among the Nzema(Studies in African Languages and Cultures, 2022) Yakub, M.; Agyekum, K.This article seeks to deepen our understanding of the cognitive processes involved in death euphemisms in Nzema, a Kwa language of Ghana. The article highlights the metaphorical “mappings” across conceptual domains, where the concept of death (target domain) is well understood in terms of more physical events such as journey, departure, return, invitation, continuous sleep, losing a fight, etc. (source domain). It is demonstrated that the Nzema conceptualise death also as retirement, subtraction, and bereavement, as living in darkness, being missing at the crossroads, burial as hiding/preserving, burying as sowing a seed, coffin as house for an individual, cemetery/grave as better place, place of rest, and corpse as a thing among others.Item Towards reconstructing Africa: Recuperation and responsibility in Ayi Kwei Armah’s The Healers(Tydskrif vir Letterkunde, 2022) Asaah, A.H.; Zou, T.A product of Africa’s pre-colonial and colonial history, Ayi Kwei Armah’s fifth novel, The Healers (1978), is steeped in an African communalistic worldview and the functional conception of art. In this article, we examine the multiple dimensions to recuperation within the context of the reconstruction of Africa, the continental search for utopia, and the responsibility that this places on Africans. Using Armah’s communitarian perspectives on health as As a guide, we identify six interlocking subsets of recuperation: healing, re-creation, renascence, repossession, recall, and Sankofa (return). Informed by Molefi Kete Asante’s construct of agency and Armah’s communalistic injunctions to readers, we establish that permeating each of these building blocks is the responsibility of Africans to operationalize the reconstruction of Africa, the leitmotif of the novel. As helpers, visionaries, and custodians of vital traditional knowledge and skills, the healers facilitate the sharing of information on Africa’s past and future against the background of British colonial domination. We also show that Armah deliberately gives the novel this polysemic title to transcend the spatial, cultural, and epistemic limitations imposed on the continent by the colonial order. We conclude that the social orientation and creative configuration of health in the work are consistent with the diverse and intermingling meanings of recuperationItem Defining the prosodic word with segmental processes in Dagbani(Acta Linguistica Academica, 2022) Hudu, F.Few studies have explored the relevance of metrical structures in segmental processes. This paper shows that Dagbani (Gur, Ghana) has a prosodic word dominating a trochaic foot, which licenses segmental processes and phonotactics. The foot is the domain for marked vowels and unmarked consonants. The prosodic word regulates the sequencing of syllables of different degrees of sonority and weight within a word. The Optimality Theoretic analyses make use of classical metrical theory and prosodic principles. in defining the prosodic word in stress languages to highlight the typological relevance of these principles and the prosodic universality of these metrical structuresItem Negotiating Linguistic Disruptions and Connections in Migratory Contexts: Language Practices among Child Migrants in an Urban Market in Ghana(Journal of Linguistic Anthropology, 2021) Ansah, G.N.This article employs ethnographic methods to investigate communicative practices that shape the linguistic repertoires of child migrants in Agbogbloshie, an urban market in Ghana. Similar studies discuss the relationship between language and migration by focusing on language shift and loss among migrants; this article argues that migrants in complex linguistically diverse spaces—motivated by both social and economic dynamics of their space —make linguistic choices while negotiating their daily lives that lead to the development of complex, heterogeneous linguistic repertoires and practices. Data were gathered from interactions at childcare centers, where child migrants spend the day with peers and caregivers, and migrant homes, where child migrants spend the evenings and weekends with their families. The data reveals that while migrant parents negotiate their own multilingual practices with their migrant children, child migrants expand their linguistic repertoires through relationships and interactions with caregivers and peers in childcare centers and neighborhoods, leading to the development of heterogeneous language practices that neither their parents or caregivers necessarily possess. The article concludes that migration may lead to complex linguistic diversity. The study contributes to Indigenous perspectives on linguistic diversity and our understanding of the structure and nature of superdiversification . [migration, child migrants, multilingualism, Agbogbloshie Kayayei, language contact]