Multilingualism and language policies in the African context: lessons from Ghana

Abstract

Africa is a highly multilingual continent; the languages are diverse and numerous. Even though Maho ( 2004) suggests that there are 1441 languages in Africa, Simons and Fennig ( 2018) have a much higher fi gure of 2143 living languages. They suggest that 198 of the languages are institutional, 538 are developing, while 1018 are vigorous. 255 of the languages can be categorized as in trouble, and 134 are dying. It is clear, given the number of languages in active use, that multilingualism is rife on the continent. The multilingual situation in Africa has often been viewed as the premise for disunity and an impediment to development. This situation provided the premise for the ‘ Against All Odds ’ Asmara Declaration on African languages and the subsequent celebra- tion of the International Year of Languages with the Bamako International Forum on Mul- tilingualism by the Academy of African Languages in 2009. In spite of these e ff orts, Africa still struggles with the process of unearthing its head from the proverbial sand into which it is buried, in relation to acknowledging that multilingualism, if properly harnessed, is a blessing rather than a curse. De fi nitions of multilingualism are still very much strapped to the idea of languages as autonomous units because these enable us to concentrate on the broad politics of ethnolinguistic di ff erence and diversity within the nation-states. Trudell ’ s (2009) plenary in Bamako provided the impetus for a continued discussion on what multi- lingualism entailed and its prospects for the continent.