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The reality of death is attested by everyday experiences in all human societies. Whilst death is a universal phenomenon, the rites associated with dying, death and funeral differ from society to society. The Akan community of Ghana performs many rites from the time that one’s death is imminent till the final funeral rites are performed, and even afterward. One such rite is the presentation of Adesiedeɛ (burial items). Whilst there are many publications about Akan funeral rites, Adesiedeɛ has not received any significant scholarly attention. This study was, therefore, conducted to examine adesiedeɛ rite from an Akan socio-religious perspective. It is an empirical research that collected data through participant observations, field surveys and interviews. The paper argued that Akan funeral rituals associated with laying-in-state and burying of the corpse are deeply rooted in the Akan belief in ancestors and the desire of the living Akan to maintain a good relationship with the supernatural. The paper found a close correlation between the Akan socio-economic and religious worldview and the rite of presenting Adesiedeɛ. The research contributes to studies on Akan cultural and primal religion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Gender differences have been recognized in most cultures, but the challenge arises when such differences are misinterpreted as gender inequality, especially to the gross disadvantage of women. One dimension of culture where gender inequality is generally manifested is through language and more specifically the use of proverbs, which are generally believed to host the wisdom of societies. Among some societies, people's actions or inactions are often reflected in the meanings and interpretations of proverbs. This paper examines how proverbs may perpetuate gender inequality and potentially lead males to pronounced risks among the Akan in Ghana. Using a Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA), the study revealed that while some proverbs portray masculine superiority, such construction of masculinity, ironically, tends to subject males to pronounced risks in trying to live up to the expectations of society. Implicitly, these proverbs restrict the socio-cultural space for men to express their socially constructed ordeals. We conclude that the traditional representation of men in proverbs needs to be critically re-examined to holistically deal with gender inequality in Ghana. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper addresses the phonology of an Akan-speaking child aged 5;3 with Protracted Phonological Development. His phonological system had many strengths, with most consonants accurate at least some of the time and with many long words, but with weaknesses that lead to a very low Whole Word Match. In addition to some difficulty with consonant and vowel sequences (leading to assimilation), there are issues relative to complex consonants that contain vowel features (consonants with secondary articulations, the labiopalatal glide, and /r/) and with syllabic consonants (nasals and /r/) that lead to deletion, epenthesis, and some extensive changes in output. One complex place of articulation (alveolopalatal) is well-established and frequently overgeneralized in the output. We present a non-linear analysis of his speech production and a plan for intervention targeting his difficulties. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although Akan is one of the most widely spoken indigenous languages in Ghana, very little is known about children's phonological development. This paper investigates the development of consonants in Akan among typically developing children aged 3–5 years. A list of 103 Akan words was compiled, sampling the full range of prosodic structures, sound positions, features and segments, and controlling for word familiarity. A native Akan speaker audio-recorded the 103 single-word productions from each of nine typically developing children aged 3–5 years. The child productions were transcribed and analysed following procedures used in a larger cross-linguistic study. The current study presents results on the acquisition of consonants across the various ages. Preliminary results indicate that most consonants in Akan are mastered by age 4 or 5, similar to reports for other languages, although /w/ and /l/ showed late mastery, contrary to cross-linguistic observations. The rhotic /ɹ/ and consonants with secondary articulation were still developing at age 4 and showing a variety of mismatch patterns across children. The findings provide preliminary information for developmentalists and speech-language pathologists on typical phonological development in Akan and contribute to a growing database on language acquisition in Niger-Congo languages. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Natural Semantic Metalanguage (NSM) approach to language studies has been applied to languages such as English, French, Russian, Malay, Spanish, Italian, Arabic, Japanese, Chinese, and Korean. The indigenous languages in Africa that have gained scholarly attention in NSM studies are Ewe, Fulfulde, Amharic, Likpe, Wolof, Giryama, and Igala. Akan, the most widely spoken language in Ghana, has not been explored. This paper explores the extent to which the translation equivalents of the set of semantic primes are expressible in Akan, with special reference to the Asante Twi dialect. Sentences or sentence fragments that exemplify the allowable grammatical contexts of the NSM primes were used as data. The claim in NSM research is that semantic primes are universal or near-universal meanings that can be expressed as lexical units or morphemes in every language. We found that in Akan, almost all the lexical equivalents correspond in a straightforward manner with the English primes and their syntactic frames. However, the semantic prime MOMENT seems problematic to posit and thus, needs further investigation. The set of NSM semantic primes in the Asante dialect of Akan can serve as a valuable tool for descriptive linguists, especially semanticists, to analyze Akan culture-specific meanings and test their semantic equivalence with the corresponding vocabulary in English and other languages. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, the focus is on non-name address forms, or rather, non-proper name address forms, and they are seen as English loan words, which are originally used in the native English culture not as address terms or names. With their use in the Akan culture, these expressions have not only been loaned, but they have also been referentially transformed. The paper looks at the use of such address forms of English origin as kinship terms, common formal titles, status-description names, names denoting age and physical characteristics and occupational names in the Akan culture. It discusses the meaning and use of these names vis-à-vis their usage in Standard English. The paper also discusses the processes of indigenisation as the terms are adopted into the Akan sociolinguistic culture. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study analyzes bargaining interactions recorded in Ghana's Kumasi Central Market to examine how traders employ kasadϵ ('sweet/persuasive talk') in transactional exchanges. Kasadϵ —a compound noun derived from kasa ('talk' or 'language') and dϵ ('sweet')—is a genre of market speech that simultaneously incorporates Akan norms of verbal politeness and the art of persuasion. In interviews on the metapragmatics of kasadϵ, market women highlighted their use of complimentary address forms and deference markers to pamper (krɔkrɔ) potential and recurring customers. My analysis of recorded bargaining interactions, however, revealed that traders also wield rougher, more argumentative language—a style that violates the Akan ideal of politeness and blurs the boundaries between conflict and mock conflict talk. That is, while traders reported that kasadϵ denotes good, polite speech, actual trading talk incorporates a mixture of indirect, direct, antagonistic, and deferential forms. Using two recorded bargaining interactions, this paper presents a detailed analysis of these juxtaposed forms of marketplace talk. I argue that while both styles are critical in economic exchanges—one for maintaining customer relationships, the other for protecting transactional gains—each presents interactional and transactional risks. The tension between these competing motivations creates interactional ambiguity and requires moment by moment navigation. • Ghanaian market traders use (kasadϵ) 'sweet talk' in bargaining transactions to nurture exchange relationships. • 'Sweet talk' in marketplace bargaining incorporates features of Akan verbal politeness. • Traders also use a verbal form that violates Akan politeness and hinges between conflict and mock conflict. • Both forms are critical in economic exchanges but present interactional and transactional risks. • Amid economic precarity a single transactional exchange is a high-stakes negotiation; traders rapidly pivot between forms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present paper examines interactions in psychiatric care consultation in selected hospital settings in three Akan-speaking communities in Ghana, based on 45 audio-recorded doctor/nurse--patient interactions. Using a discourse pragmatics approach, we note how language is used in the management of communication in psychiatric consultations, and how the dominance of healthcare practitioners is enacted. Specifically, we focus on some of the strategies used by the participants to manage the multilingual communicative settings, such as code-mixing. Our findings also suggest that the use of proverbs as a diagnostic tool in psychiatric consultations in Ghana needs to be reviewed. We propose that in order for patients to experience consultation sessions that are more interactive, with possible therapeutic benefits, health practitioners need to make considerable efforts to involve the patients in decisions regarding their health. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article will look at the varying plural noun forms found in Akan. The focus will be on Akan nouns referring to persons, and the paper will discuss how these forms appear in Ghanaian English. It argues that in an intense language contact situation, such as pertains in (urban) Ghana, the question as to what is a code-switched item and what is a lexical borrowing is not clear, as many transferred items exhibit either Akan or English plurals and at times a confounding of the two. Some lexical items of obvious ethno-cultural significance cannot easily be classified as of either transfer category, and so code-switching and lexical borrowing might not be as clearly distinguishable as suggested by, for instance, Poplack and Sankoff (1984). It will be argued that the varying plural forms might be best explained in terms of a style-shift using Bell's (1999; 2001) Audience Design framework. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Purpose: As cancers increase in Ghana and in many low-and middle-income countries, healthcare utilization has become critical for disease management and patients' wellbeing. There is evidence that medical pluralism is common among cancer patients in Ghana and many other African countries, which results in lack of adherence to and absconding from hospital treatments. The objective of this study was to examine ways in which beliefs in disease causation influence medical pluralism among Akan cancer patients in Ghana. Methods: A qualitative research approach was employed in this study. In-depth interviews were conducted for thirty (30) cancer patients who were purposively recruited from Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital in Ghana. Thematic content analysis was used in analysing data. Results: Our findings revealed that cancer patients ascribed both physical and spiritual causality to their illness. As such, they combined orthodox treatment with spiritual healing and herbal medicine. Regarding the order of therapeutic search, patients reported to herbal and spiritual centres before going to the hospital, a phenomenon which contributes to the late reporting and diagnosis as well as bad prognosis of cancers in Ghana. Conclusion: The findings of this research elucidate the relationship between culture and health care choices of cancer patients in Ghana. Increased awareness creation is crucial in eradicating myths surrounding cancers in Ghana. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Akan community of Ghana has a large Christian following. Nonetheless, many Akan believers still consult traditional priests for protection, wealth, and power. This happens not because these Christians doubt the theological fact that Christ offered an atonement, but because they do not consider the atonement as providing them with adequate protection against evil forces. This situation makes the quest to closely investigate their concept of Christ fairly urgent and useful. To address the issue, there is the need to project Christ's power over evil forces. One of the models of atonement that is helpful in this regard is the Christus Victor which emphasises the victory that Christ won over Satan and his host through his death on the cross. This research, therefore, aims to give contextually express the Christus Victor motif of Christ's atonement from an Akan Christian perspective. This research is based on literature involving theological and ethical analyses of, and reflections on the Christus Victor model of atonement and how it can address the Akan Christian need for spiritual protection and economic liberation. The resulting theology is a contextual theology that incorporates the biblical world view, the Akan world view, and the Christus Victor model of atonement. Thus, the article seeks to bring about positive reforms in Akan religio-ethical beliefs and practices, and hence empower Akan Christians not only to discontinue their reliance on traditional powers, but also to have complete trust in Christ's atonement alone as means of providing them with all their physical and spiritual needs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Chieftaincy institution is the most enduring establishment in the Republic of Ghana's political history. Its capacity to transcend the three phases of the country: pre-colonial, colonial and post-colonial eras as well as the three regime types: one-party, multi-party and military, demonstrates its resilience. Further, it remains the medium of expression of social, political, religious, traditional and economic authority in most communities in Ghana. In spite of the persistent spirit of the institution, in the Akan areas of Ghana it is bedevilled with protracted succession conflicts which has become one of the major sources of conflict in the country, and a key party to these conflicts is the unseen role of the Queen Mothers. Hence, the central aim of this paper is to assess the contribution of Queen Mothers in these conflicts. Documentary sources and elite interviews were the methods of data collection; the study used the Conflict Development Analysis as framework to identify the various dimensions of these succession conflicts in four Akan regions. The study resolved among others that if all lines of succession of chiefs were documented and preserved, it would be a useful guide to Queen Mothers and king makers in the mitigation of chieftaincy conflicts in the country. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The distribution of pronouns varies cross-linguistically. This distribution has led to conflicting results in studies that investigated pronoun resolution in agrammatic indviduals. In the investigation of pronominal resolution, the linguistic phenomenon of "resumption" is understudied in agrammatism. The construction of pronominal resolution in Akan presents the opportunity to thoroughly examine resumption. Aims: To start, the present study examines the production of (pronominal) resumption in Akan focus constructions (who-questions and focused declaratives). Second, we explore the effect of grammatical tone on the processing of pronominal (resumption) since Akan is a tonal language. Methods & Procedures: First, we tested the ability to distinguish linguistic and non-linguistic tone in Akan agrammatic speakers. Then, we administered an elicitation task to five Akan agrammatic individuals, controlling for the structural variations in the realization of resumption: focused who-questions and declaratives with (i) only a resumptive pronoun, (ii) only a clause determiner, (iii) a resumptive pronoun and a clause determiner co-occurring, and (iv) neither a resumptive pronoun nor a clause determiner. Outcomes & Results: Tone discrimination.both for pitch and for lexical tone was unimpaired. The production task demonstrated that the production of resumptive pronouns and clause determiners was intact. However, the production of declarative sentences in derived word order was impaired; wh-object questions were relatively well-preserved. Conclusions: We argue that the problems with sentence production are highly selective: linguistic tones and resumption are intact but word order is impaired in non-canonical declarative sentences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Social workers are increasingly embracing international perspectives and roles to address persistent human rights issues. This study examines solutions to property rights disputes involving Ghanaian women who are widowed from the perspectives of Akan men and women in four communities. Property ownership is fundamental to the economic survival of women and their children, but millions of women around the world lose their rights to property following the deaths of their husbands. We conducted focus groups with 102 participants in four Akan communities to generate local, culturally viable solutions for preventing property rights violations and resolving them when they do occur. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Mental illness is a culturally laden phenomenon, and different cultures have unique ways of constructing mental illness. In this study, conceptions of mental illness were explored among 30 participants of Akan descent in Ghana through individual and group interviews. Participants demonstrated a wide range of knowledge on mental illness indicating that poor self-care, deficits in social functioning, and disordered behaviors are the cardinal features of mental illness. The data revealed that Akan cultural beliefs influenced notions of etiology of mental illness and care of the mentally ill. While participants recognized the role of multiple factors such as genetics, substance abuse, daily hassles (for example, concerns about basic needs such as food, clothing, and shelter), and trauma in the cause of mental illness, the predominant belief was that mental illness is a retributive and/or a spiritual illness. This belief encourages pluralistic health-seeking behaviors: use of hospitals, prayer camps, herbalists, and traditional healers. The implications of these findings for public health education on mental illness, and clinical training and practice are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Studies on indigenous knowledge of fauna particular birds and its potential use in biodiversity conservation and management are rare globally. Characteristics used in creating indigenous bird names in many Ghanaian languages are undocumented. The main aim of this study is to answer the question "whether indigenous bird naming systems by the Akan tribes in Ghana follow scientific nomenclature and whether indigenous Akan bird knowledge can potentially help improve bird conservation efforts in Ghana. Methods: Purposive sampling technique was employed in selecting 10 respondents from 25 communities in the five administrative districts in the Central Region. The study was conducted between November 2014 and March 2015. A mixed method approach was adopted in the data collection including key person interviews, focus group discussion, and structured interview supported by a participatory field observation. Results: Indigenous people in the study area have reported 143 species of birds belonging to 44 families representing 57 % of total number of species with known local names in Ghana. The study revealed that just as Latin and common English naming systems, indigenous Akan bird names originated from features of the bird, including plumage, vocalizations or behavioural characteristics and belief systems of the indigenous people. The study also discovered that indigenous people in the study area have distinct names for different species within a particular family for most of the birds they could identify. However, they occasionally assign a single general name for either the entire family or all species therein. Conclusions: The study found evidence to support the prediction that indigenous bird naming systems in the Akan language follow scientific nomenclature. Indigenous knowledge and understanding of birds in the study area can be tapped and used in conservation planning and monitoring of birds. This research thus provides sufficient evidence to prove that indigenous knowledge by the Akan tribes in the study area can be useful in bird conservation and monitoring programs in Ghana. Further research in other Ghanaian languages is recommended. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]