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Asante, also known as Ashanti, Ashante, or Asante Twi, is one of the principal members of the Akan dialect continuum. It is one of the three mutually intelligible dialects of Akan which are collectively known as Twi, the others being Bono and Akuapem. There are 3.8 million speakers of Asante, mainly concentrated in Ghana and southeastern Cote D'Ivoire, and especially in and around the Ashanti Region of Ghana.
Akan is a group of several closely related languages within the wider Central Tano languages. These languages are the principal native languages of the Akan people of Ghana, spoken over much of the southern half of Ghana. About 80% of Ghana's population can speak an Akan language as a first or second language, and about 44% of Ghanaians are native speakers. There are populations of polyglots in Ghana who speak an Akan language as a third language. They are also spoken in parts of Côte d'Ivoire.
Fante, also known as Fanti, Fantse, or Mfantse, is one of the four principal members of the Akan dialect continuum, along with Asante, Bono and Akuapem, the latter three collectively known as Twi, with which it is mutually intelligible. It is principally spoken in the central and southern regions of Ghana as well as in settlements in other regions in western Ghana, Ivory Coast, as well as in Liberia, Gambia and Angola.
Adinkra are symbols from Ghana that represent concepts or aphorisms. Adinkra are used extensively in fabrics, logos and pottery. They are incorporated into walls and other architectural features. Adinkra symbols appear on some traditional Akan goldweights. The symbols are also carved on stools for domestic and ritual use. Tourism has led to new departures in the use of the symbols in items such as T-shirts and jewellery.
Ghana is a multilingual country in which about eighty languages are spoken. Of these, English, which was inherited from the colonial era, is the official language and lingua franca. Of the languages indigenous to Ghana, Akan is the most widely spoken in the south. Dagbani is most widely spoken in the north.
The Basel Mission was a Christian missionary society based in Switzerland. It was active from 1815 to 2001, when it transferred the operative work to Mission 21, the successor organization of Kooperation Evangelischer Kirchen und Missione (KEM), founded in 2001.
Bono, also known as Abron, Brong, and Bono Twi, is a Central Tano language common to the Bono people and a major dialect of the Akan dialect continuum, and thus mutually intelligible with the principal Akan dialects of Asante and Akuapem, collectively known as Twi. It is spoken by 1.2 million in Ghana, primarily in the Central Ghanaian region of Brong-Ahafo, and by over 300,000 in eastern Ivory Coast.
Twi is a variety of the Akan language spoken in southern and central Ghana by several million people, mainly of the Akan people, the largest of the seventeen major ethnic groups in Ghana. Twi has about 626,000 speakers in total, including second-language speakers; about 85% of the Ghanaian population speaks Twi as a first or second language.
Johannes Zimmermann was a missionary, clergyman, translator, philologist and ethnolinguist of the Basel Evangelical Missionary Society of Switzerland, who translated the entire Bible into the Ga language of the Ga-Dangme people of southeastern Ghana and wrote a Ga dictionary and grammar book. Mostly an oral language before the mid-nineteenth century, the Ga language assumed a written form as a result of his literary work. Zimmerman's work built upon the single introductory grammatical treatise written by the Euro-African Moravian missionary and educator, Christian Jacob Protten, in the Ga and Fante languages, and published a century earlier in Copenhagen, in 1764.
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Johann Gottlieb Christaller was a German missionary, clergyman, ethnolinguist, translator and philologist who served with the Basel Mission. He was devoted to the study of the Twi language in what was then the Gold Coast, now Ghana. He was instrumental, together with African colleagues, Akan linguists, David Asante, Theophilus Opoku, Jonathan Palmer Bekoe, and Paul Keteku in the translation of the Bible into the Akuapem dialect of Twi. Christaller was also the first editor of the Christian Messenger, the official news publication of the Basel Mission, serving from 1883 to 1895. He is recognised in some circles as the "founder of scientific linguistic research in West Africa".
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Rose Ann Miller was a Jamaican-born educator pioneer who worked extensively on the Gold Coast in both Basel Mission and government-run schools. As a child in 1843, Miller relocated to the Gold Coast with her parents and siblings, as part of a group of 24 West Indian settlers recruited by the Danish minister, Andreas Riis and the Basel Mission to augment evangelism efforts in Ghana.
Christiane Emilie Christaller, née Ziegler, was a German educator and missionary in Akropong in colonial Ghana. She was the first wife of Johann Gottlieb Christaller (1827–1895), a German missionary, linguist and philologist of the Basel Mission, notable for his leading role in the translation of the entire Holy Bible into the Twi language.
Nana Amoako Atta I,, was the paramount chief of Akyem Abuakwa in nineteenth century southern Ghana. Locally, his position is known as the Okyehene or Omanhene. He ruled the traditional kingdom from July 1866 to 1880 and from 1885 to 1887. After the Sagrenti War of 1874, the British declared Akyem Abuakwa a colonial possession, legally called a ‘protectorate’, as part of the Gold Coast. This development led to a clash between the old traditional Akan culture and the imposition of the new Western Christian political order.
Wasa, also known as Wassa and Wasaw, is the common language of the Wasa people and a dialect of the Akan dialect continuum. It is spoken by 273,000 in southwestern Ghana, mainly in the Wasa Amenfi West and Wasa Amenfi East districts. There are also some Wasa speakers in Ivory Coast. Wasa is mutually intelligible with Fante, Akuapem, Asante, and Abron, the latter three which are collectively known as Twi. Its dialects include Amenfi and Fianse.
Oheneba is a regal rank given to both female or male child of a king or chief. It is the equivalent of prince or princess.
References
- ↑ Akan at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)
- 1 2 "Akan". Ethnologue. Retrieved 2019-12-25.
- ↑ Schacter, Paul; Fromkin, Victoria (1968). A Phonology of Akan: Akuapem, Asante, Fante. Los Angeles: UC Press. p. 3.
- 1 2 3 Christaller, Johann Gottlieb (1875). A Grammar of the Asante and Fante Language Called Tshi Chwee, Twi Based on the Akuapem Dialect with Reference to the Other (Akan and Fante) Dialects. Basel evang. missionary society.
- 1 2 Ofosu-Appiah, L. H. (1998). "Christaller, Johannes Gottlieb". Dictionary of African Christian Biography.
- ↑ Gilbert, Michelle (1997). "'No Condition Is Permanent': Ethnic Construction and the Use of History in Akuapem". Africa: Journal of the International African Institute. 67 (4): 501–533. doi:10.2307/1161106. ISSN 0001-9720. JSTOR 1161106. S2CID 144245685.
- ↑ Committee, Akan Language; Languages, Ghana Bureau of Ghana (1995). Language guide (Akuapem-Twi version). Bureau of Ghana Languages. ISBN 9789964200145.
- ↑ Christaller, Johann G. (1881). A Dictionary of the Asante and Fante language called Tshi. Basel. pp. XV.
- ↑ Reindorf, Carl Christian (1895). History of the Gold Coast and Asante 2nd edition. Accra.
{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link) - ↑ Debrunner, H. W. (1967). A History of Christianity in Ghana. Accra.
{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link) - ↑ L. H. Ofosu-Appiah (1997). The Encyclopaedia Africana Dictionary of African Biography (in 20 Volumes). Volume One Ethiopia-Ghana. New York, NY: Reference Publications Inc.
- ↑ Gocking, Roger (2005). The History of Ghana. Greenwood. p. 34. ISBN 9780313318948.
- ↑ Johann Gottlieb Christaller (1875). A Grammar of the Asante and Fante Language Called Tshi Chwee, Twi Based on the Akuapem Dialect ... Harvard University. Printed for the Basel evang. missionary society.