User:Sarah5261/sandbox/Akuapem dialect

Akuapem, also known as Akuapim, Akwapem Twi, and Akwapi, is one of the principal members of the Akan dialect continuum, along with Bono and Asante, with which it is collectively known as Twi, and Fante, with which it is mutually intelligible.^[1][2][3] There are 626,000 speakers of Akuapem, mainly concentrated in Ghana and southeastern Cote D'Ivoire.^[1] It is the historical literary and prestige dialect of Akan, having been chosen as the basis of the Akan translation of the Bible.^[3][4]

Akuapem was selected in the year 1838 as the official written literary standard of the Akan language. There are 8 different variants of Akan spoken in Ghana and Colte'Dlvoire. Akuapem currently has around 626,000 speakers. It was originally spoken by the Akuapem people who inhabited the Akuapem hills in the Northern Eastern Region. The reason why Akuapem is slowly going extinct is because of the policies that are put down by the Ghana government. Their government does not allow ethnolinguistic groups to use their languages in public domains such as schools and work but only in private domains. These policies make It more likely for languages such as Akuapem to become endangered languages.

The name Akuapem is thought to derive from either Akan nkoa apem ("thousand subjects") or akuw-apem ("thousand companies").^[5] Nana Ansa Sasraku I of Akwamu, a famous warrior king, gave these multi-ethnic people the name Akuapem. He gave them these names after his Akwamu army was defeated.^[6]

The origins of the Akan are unclear, but some scholars believe that the various Akan kingdoms were established by refugees fleeing Songhay's devastation of the twenty-seven confederated states of Kumbu around 1470. However, it is well recognized that the different ethnic groups that make up the Akan were once independent traditional states that fought each other for supremacy. Akuapem's orthography was first developed by missionaries at the Gold Coast Basel Mission in 1842,^[7] but its written history begins in 1853 with the publication of two grammars, the German Elemente des Akwapim Dialects der Odshi Sprache and the English Grammatical Outline and Vocabulary of the Oji Language with especial reference to the Akwapim Dialect, both written by Hans Nicolai Riis, nephew of the Gold Coast Basel Mission's founder Andreas Riis. These would not be followed in the bibliography of Akuapem writing until the translation of the New Testament.^[8]

Akuapem was chosen as a representative dialect for Akan because the missionaries at Basel felt it a suitable compromise. Christaller, who had himself learned Akyem but believed Akuapem was the better choice,^[4] described the issue, and its solution, in the introduction to his 1875 Grammar of the Asante and Fante language called Tshi:

It [Akuapem] is an Akan dialect influenced by Fante, steering in the middle course between other Akan dialects and Fante in sounds, forms and expressions; it admits peculiarities of both branches as far as they do no contradict each other, and is, therefore, best capable of being enriched from both sides.^[3]

Akuapem's history as a literary dialect originates with its selection to serve as the basis of the Akan translation of the New Testament, published in 1870 with a second edition in 1878, and the entire Bible, published in 1871. Both were written by the Gold Coast Basel Mission, principally by German missionary and linguist Johann Gottlieb Christaller and native Akan linguists and missionaries David Asante, Theophilus Opoku, Jonathan Palmer Bekoe, and Paul Keteku.^[9][10][11]

Johann Gottlieb Christaller, a German missionary and philologist with the Basel Mission, is credited with making Twi the most important African literary language in what is now Ghana. He translated the Bible into Twi with the aid of two African colleagues. In 1827, he was born in the small German town of Winnenden, near Stuttgart. His father was a poor tailor who was fascinated by books and purchased over 2,000 for his library. As a child, Christaller spent most of his after-school hours reading his father's books and honing the philological and linguistic skills that would later make him one of the century's foremost linguists.^[12] Christaller is best known for two monumental works, in addition to his translations. The first is Tshi (Twi, Chee): An Asante and Fante Grammar Based on the Akuapem Dialect with Reference to Other (Akan and Fante) Dialects (1875). Even though the orthography has changed over the years, this scholarly work remains the best Twi grammar. The author used his philology, phonetics, and linguistics skills to solve grammar problems and demonstrated a wide understanding of African languages. He had gathered the information on the Gold Coast, and upon his return to Basel, he sought the advice of David Asante and other African scholars on a regular basis.

Despite the publication of the Bible, Akan literacy would not be widespread among the Akan for some time, nor even among the European colonizers. For instance, when British officer Sir Garnet Wolseley, who was and still is known in Ghana as "Sargrenti" (a corruption of "Sir Garnet"),^[13] began his campaign into Ghana during the Third Anglo-Ashanti War in 1873, he intended to address his summons to war to Asante king Kofi Karikari in English and Asante, only to find that, to their knowledge, "no proper written representation of the Fante or Asante dialect existed", delaying the dispatch of the summons for almost two weeks; all this even though an Akuapem New Testament had existed for three years and the entire Bible for two.^[14]

Examples of action verbs in Twi include “soa (carry)”, “popa (clean)”, “pagya (lift)”, “dwene (think, actively)”, “pia (push)”, “noa (cook)”, “bɔ (kick)”.

Examples in sentence form:

1. Menoa aduane

     I cook food

2. Dwene wo ho.

    Think about yourself

3. Pagya adaka no.

    Lift the box.

4. Kofi soaa akonnwa no.

      Kofi carried the chair.

5. Kwadwo, bɔ bɔɔlo no.

      Kwadwo, kick the ball.

stative verbs do not express actions; they express states of being.

Examples in sentence form:

6. Ama dɔ no.

      Ama loves him/her.

7. Mehunuu Akosua.

      I saw Akosua.

8. Ɔte deɛ mereka no.

      He/she hears what I’m saying.

9. Mewɔ asomdwoeɛ.

      I have peace.

Researchers from a variety of fields, including history, anthropology, linguistics, literary studies, and folklore, will learn a lot from Ghana and the Akan people. Slave castles at Elmina and Cape Coast are two historical landmarks worth visiting. During inter-ethnic wars, the Asante sub-group of the Akan people is considered to have had strong leaders, warriors, and heroes. We recall King Osei Tutu, who is credited with uniting the Asante people, and Queenmother of Ejisu, Yaa Asantewaa, who led the Asante army against the British in 1900. In addition, anthropologists, linguists, folklorists, and scholars from other disciplines interested in verbal art should find the various traditional materials surrounding the Akan useful. Not only does studying Twi help students meet their foreign language requirements, but it also allows them to understand the language as well as the Akan people's different cultural traditions. There are also study-abroad programs between American and Ghanaian universities that enable American students to improve their Twi skills while interacting with native speakers on a daily basis.

1. Schachter, Paul (1968). A Phonology of Akan: Akuapem, Asante, Fante.
2. BELLO, MARIAMA (2013). ASSESSING LANGUAGE VITALITY AND LANGUAGE ENDANGERMENT OF LƐTƐ (LARTEH). ISBN 10362664. {{cite book}}: Check |isbn= value: length (help)
3. McCaskie, Tom (2011). LOCAL KNOWLEDGE: AN AKUAPEM TWI HISTORY OF ASANTE. Cambridge University Press.