Ghana is known for its diverse wildlife, thriving forests, and miles of beaches along a beauteous coast. The West African country spans disparate ecologies, from tropical rainforests to expansive savannas. Adjacent to the Gulf of Guinea with the Atlantic Ocean to the South, Ghana shares a border with Burkina Faso, Togo, and the Ivory Coast.
With nearly 35 million inhabitants, Ghana is also a multilingual country in which some 80 languages are spoken. While the official language is English, the most widely spoken language is Guyanese Creole — an English-based creole with influences from Indian, African, and Amerindian languages. As such, there are a number of accents spoken in Ghana.
What is an Accent?
Let’s start there. An accent is how someone pronounces a language. It can reveal the speaker’s geographical, socioeconomic, and ethnic background.
And by the way, we all have an accent, even if you don’t think so. But if you’re from the American South, imagine how you must sound to someone who dwells in the East.
What is Ghana’s Linguistic History?
The history of language in Ghana is marked by a number of indigenous languages, largely belonging to the Gur languages in the north and the Akan group in the south.
The country’s linguistic diversity is shaped by the rise and fall of kingdoms, the migration of varying ethnic groups, and the effect of British colonialism.
Before European powers came into play, Ghana was home to a number of kingdoms, each with its own culture and language. The Ashanti empire, for example, used the Akan language in communications and governance. The language remains a dominant force in Ghanaian society.
By the 19th century, Ghana had become a British colony. It was the British who introduced English as the language of education, administration, and law. Following Ghana’s 1957 independence, different languages came to be used in varying social settings and with different people. For example, people often use their native language at home but switch to English or other dominant language at work, school, or other formal settings.
Note that while English is Ghana’s official language, it’s not the most widely spoken. The country’s major language families include Mande, Niger-Congo, and Volta-Niger. Other prominent languages include Ewe, Akan, Busa, Ga-Adangbe, Dagbani, Dagaare, Kasem, and Gonja. French is also spoken, owing to Ghana’s proximity to Francophone countries.
Ghanian Accents
Here are the top accents and dialects used in Ghana:
Ghanaian English
Owing to Ghana’s colonial history, Ghanaian English (GhE) resembles British English and is widely spoken by the educated class. In fact, 67% of the country’s population can read and write in English, and one-fifth is exclusively literate in English. Many English phrases and words have been adopted into Ghanaian languages.
Note, though, that depending upon location and context, Ghanaian English is varied and deviates from the standard. For example, some words possess only one meaning, so that “depot” only means a police training school. Also, English words are often pronounced how they’re spelled, and most Ghanaians who speak English do not use the velar nasal sound. The “ed” of the past tense is also not pronounced.
Pidgin English
Ghanaian Pidgin English (GhP) is another regional variety of English spoken in Ghana, and is mainly an oral language spoken in urban areas. While stigmatized in traditional and formal settings, GhP is a type of creole that incorporates local words. It’s prominent in Ghanaian films and local music, and is used to bridge Ghanaian and Western cultures.
With GhP, consonants such as d, n, t, and l are commonly left off the end of words. Syllables are simplified by omitting or weakening consonants. Pidgin has a rhythm and flow: “ehen ehen,” for example, means “really?” and “that one dierr” means “that one in particular.”
Twi
Twi is spoken by the Ashanti people and is the most widely spoken dialect of Akan. It’s a tone accent, which means that each syllable’s pitch is key to the meaning of the word spoken. It also means that word distinction is determined not only by consonants and vowels. For example, “good,” “father,” and “fan” are separate words that, when pronounced, differ only in tone.
Further, Twi also distinguishes some grammatical categories such as the stative and habitual verb forms. Also, it’s common in Twi to have a consecutive sequence of verbs in a single sentence. Such verbs are called serial verbs. If the sentence with the serial verbs is negative, the sentence’s verbs get a negative prefix.
Fante
Fante is another widely used Akan accent. It’s spoken by the Fante people in the southern regions of Ghana as well as in parts of the Ivory Coast, Gambia, Liberia, and Angola. A characteristic of Fante is the level of English influence, including English loanwords as well as anglicized forms of native names. This is due to British colonial influence and to fill semantic and lexical gaps.
Fante, also known as Fantse, Fanti, or Mfantse, exhibits vowel harmony, meaning that all vowels in a word are members of one two distinct sets. It also has two contrastive tones: low tone (L) and high tone (L).
Dagbani
Part of the Gur dialect in African linguistic history, Dagbani is spoken primarily by the Dagombas in Ghana’s northern region. The dialect chiefly consists of varying root vowels in some lexemes, and is marked by different pronunciations or forms of some nouns, especially those referring to local flora.
A tonal dialect, Dagbani is characterized by two tone levels and what is called a “downstep” — a lowering effect that occurs between sequences of the identical phonemic tone. Also, in Dagbani, every set of personal pronouns is distinguished by number, person, and animacy. Dagbani also distinguishes between certain pronouns and there is no distinction between grammatical cases.
Call Centers, Biases, and Our Accent-Neutralization Solution
However subconscious, people are naturally biased regarding how others speak. We tend to favor our own accent to variations of our native language and attach to it more favorable traits.
Consider the plight of offshore call center agents, who rely on verbal communication for their livelihood. For many of them, English is their second, third, or even fourth language. Too often, callers react to agents’ accents with frustration and impatience, sometimes questioning the representatives’ competence.
The result is heightened agent burnout, in an industry already burdened by high turnover rates, and unhappy customers. Both of which affect call centers’ bottom line.
We have the answer.
Our accent-neutralization tool is upending an industry already undergoing transformational change — and quickly — most of it owing to artificial intelligence. We offer an AI-powered accent-softening filter that transforms words in real time into those that sound to the caller like a language’s native speaker. Ultimately, agents and customers are more satisfied, and call centers perform better.