Languages Of West Africa Research Articles

A transformer-based approach to Nigerian Pidgin text generation

AbstractThis paper describes the development of a transformer-based text generation model for Nigerian Pidgin also known as Naijá, a popular language in West Africa. Despite its wide use, Nigerian Pidgin remains under-resourced, particularly in areas related to text generation and natural language processing. These difficulties are primarily due to technological constraints rather than the language’s fundamental attributes. There is currently a demand for Nigerian Pidgin-specific solutions because it is used in everyday communication and has a unique linguistic blend. This paper aims to close this gap by exploring the application of state-of-the-art transformer technology to develop a text generation model for Nigerian Pidgin. This work uses the public Afriberta-corpus dataset to optimize the Generative Pre-trained Transformer (GPT-2) model across a sizeable dataset. The performance evaluators, BLEU and Perplexity metrics provide a detailed breakdown of the model’s text quality and predictive accuracy. Despite the difficulties caused by a limited amount of training data, preliminary evaluations show that the model can generate coherent Nigerian Pidgin text. The performance evaluation yielded perplexity scores of 43.56 for variable target reference length and 43.26 for fixed text length. BLEU scores of 0.15 for fixed max length and 0.56 for variable reference target length. This highlights the quality of generated text and the significant improvement when the generated text length is aligned with the reference target. Our work was benchmarked against African American Vernacular (AAVE) revealing that BLEU scores for AAVE are significantly lower than those for Standard American English, with BLEU given as 0.26. Our Nigerian Pidgin model, with a BLEU score of 0.56, shows a better performance. However, both results suggest that both dialects are challenging for language models. Leveraging the pre-trained transformer-based language model and evaluation metrics, we showcase the model’s capacity for coherent Nigerian Pidgin text generation. For future research, the research work can serve as a good foundation for advancement and progress in the Nigerian Pidgin language generation and other low-resource languages.

Metaphorical Personal Names in Mabia Languages of West Africa

Cultural philosophies, belief systems and experiences serve as superordinate cultural concepts that are reconceptualised and expressed using metaphorical personal names in Mabia languages. Metaphorical personal names are ‘vehicles’ that transport the worldviews of speakers of Mabia languages to the target audiences. Every metaphorical personal name shares properties of a superordinate umbrella concept such that even newly created metaphorical names fall within an already existing cultural philosophy. This study argues that there is a corresponding relationship between a metaphorical personal name, the source domain, and its superordinate umbrella philosophical concept, the target domain. The study uses data from four Mabia ‘sister’ languages of West Africa: Dagbani, Kusaal, Likpakpaln, and Sisaali. The findings show that the source domains of these names include the name-bearer and the personal name itself, and the name-giver, whilst the target domains include flora and fauna terms, belief systems, innuendos and proverbs, experiences of name-givers, ‘death prevention’ labels, among others. The article also establishes that both sociocultural and ethnolinguistic factors influence the use of metaphorical personal names in the cultures under study. The Conceptual Metaphor Theory (CMT) is employed for the analysis of data in this research. The work uses the qualitative method and data are sourced from semi-structured interviews, from school registers and other previous studies on personal names in the selected languages.

Causative construction in Likpakpaanl (Konkomba)

This article is a contribution to the cross-linguistic discussion on causation. It proceeds on the note that causation is a significant notion, both cognitively and grammatically. I make a case that the Mabia (Gur) languages of West Africa are severely under-represented in the literature on causation. I then focus on causation in Likpakpaanl, an under-researched Mabia language spoken in Ghana and Togo in West Africa. I further present data from thirteen other related West African languages for comparative purposes. Broadly speaking, Likpakpaanl deploys all the traditional causation strategies- lexical, morphological, serialising and analytic. However, the use of nasals, especially vowel nasality as a causativisers is novel and uniquely places Likpakpaanl among its linguistic relatives. The Likpakpaanl analytic causative marker chà has a functional scope for both factitive and permissive causatives. In a sense, the source of the specialised analytic causative marker in Likpakpaanl diverges from the oft-cited cross-linguistic source of analytic causative markers. The Likpakpaanl biclausal causative is the balanced structure and, therefore, aligns well with the biclausal causative structure described for the West African linguistic area, contra the deraked structure of Indo-European languages. A thorough investigation of the constellation of causatives in Mabia promises new insights into causative typology.

Topic marking in Kusaal and selected Mabia (Gur) languages of West Africa

Abstract This article looks at topic marking strategies in Kusaal and related Mabia (Gur) languages: Dagaare, Buli, Moore, Dabgani, and Gurene, spoken in Ghana, Togo and Ivory Coast. It is generally observed that these languages use left dislocation as a topic coding strategy. They either use topic phrases or particles, which may be obligatory or optional. It is argued that the languages under discussion cannot be fully classified as subject prominent languages alongside other Niger-Congo languages. It is shown that these languages demonstrate features that put them in between subject prominent and topic prominent languages. To identify a topic constituent in these languages, three tests are suggested: the if+be test, the “aboutness test” and the use of left dislocation accompanied by a resumptive pronoun.

The metonymic and metaphoric conceptualisations of the heart in Akan and English

The paper examines the metaphorical and metonymic structure of the heart in Akan (a Kwa language in West Africa,) and English, within the framework of the Conceptual Metaphor Theory (CMT), formulated by Lakoff and Johnson (1980). My aim is to explore the ways in which akoma , ‘the heart’, is used in Akan to express human experiences and also to compare the conceptualisations of the heart in Akan to those in English in order to establish whether the two languages manifest any cross-conceptual, cross-linguistic or cross-cultural differences. The data reveal that there are no striking differences between English and Akan with respect to the metaphoric and metonymic conceptualisations of the heart. The differences in the language-specific conceptualisations are attributed to the cultural models embedded in the two languages. Keywords: heart, metaphor, metonymy, Conceptual Metaphor Theory, cultural models

Exorheism growth as an explanation of increasing flooding in the Sahel

For two decades, the Niamey area, in Niger, has undergone the creation of several new wadis (“koris” in hausa, the most spoken language in West Africa). The significant runoff increase in the Sahelian reach of Niger river makes us interested in the behavior of the basins of the tributary koris of Niger River in the Niamey area, in Niger. These koris generally formed during a single storm event, within depressions previously occupied by ponds; these ponds are overflown creating a new “kori”. This study examines in detail the causes of this new exorheism mechanism. The main explanation of this evolution has been determined as being the strong runoff increase, related to an extension of crusted soils due to agricultural practices, mostly the reduction of fallow duration. The degradation of their structural stability leads to crusting and a strong reduction of their hydraulic conductivity. This is linked to water and sediment balance at the catchment scale.

Special Session on Languages of West Africa

Special Session on Languages of West Africa

Relative clauses in Suriname creoles and Gbe languages

Two creoles of Suriname, Ndyuka and Saramaccan, are compared with each other and with Western Gbe, Eastern Gbe, and other languages of West Africa with respect to relative clause formation. Relativization strategies are described for the syntactic positions subject, direct object, and indirect object, and the semantic roles benefactive, locative, temporal, comitative, instrumental, comparative, and possessor. Omission of relative markers (rel), headless relatives, and other uses of rel are also compared.This comparison shows significant differences between the Suriname creoles, principally the presence of number marking on rels in Saramaccan vs. its absence in Ndyuka, and the wider distribution of relative markers derived from interrogative forms in Ndyuka than in Saramaccan. Some of these differences parallel differences between the Western and Eastern Gbe languages examined, strongly indicating a greater Western Gbe influence on relativization in Saramaccan vs. a greater influence of Eastern Gbe in Ndyuka. A brief examination of the non-Gbe Kwa language Akan and the non-Kwa language Kabiye, both of potential relevance to Suriname creoles in terms of extralinguistic history, shows that neither of these resemble the Suriname creoles with regard to relativization nearly as much as the Gbe languages do.

From Wordlist to Comparative Lexicography: The Lexinotes

This paper sketches the history of the study of the languages of West Africa, particularly of their lexical resources, offered as a typical example of similar developments elsewhere in the world. The collection of wordlists from the languages and their use to establish genetic relationships is considered, with some practical observations on the improvement of this methodology. The final section reports on an ongoing project for a comparative dictionary in northern Ghana, particularly the use of simple semantic network studies both within and across languages. An appendix presents one of the preliminary papers circulated in connection with this project.

Serial verbs in English

Serial verb constructions (SVCs) are found in Creole languages and in the languages of West Africa, Southeast Asia, Amazonia, Oceania, and New Guinea. In this article we examine catenative verb constructions (CVCs) in English from a Role and Reference Grammar perspective and compare them with SVCs. More specifically, based on the set of syntactic and semantic properties of SVCs proposed by Kroeger (2004: 229–230), it will be demonstrated that CVCs in English have all of the characteristic syntactic and semantic properties of SVCs.

Bongó Itá: leopard society music and language in West Africa, Western Cuba, and New York City

The Abakuá mutual-aid society of Cuba, recreated from the Ékpè leopard society of West Africa's Cross River basin, is a richly detailed example of African cultural transmission to the Americas. Its material culture, such as masquerades and drum construction, as well as rhythmic structures, are largely based on Ékpè models. Its ritual language is expressed through hundreds of chants that identify source regions and historical events; many can be interpreted by speakers of Èfìk, the pre-colonial lingua franca of the Cross River region (Miller 2005). With the help of both Ékpè and Abakuá leaders, I have examined relationships between the musical practices of West African Ékpè, Cuban Abakuá, as well as Cuban migrants to the United States whose commercial recordings have evoked West African places and events historically relevant to Abakuá, meanwhile contributing to the evolution of North American jazz.

A note on the cross-dialectal diffusion of grammaticalization: The case of ma in akan

Studies in grammaticalization have brought to light the fact that languages develop function words from lexical sources. Akan, a Kwa language, like many languages of West Africa, is known to have a complementizer that developed from the verb ‘to say.’ In addition to this, another complementizer has resulted from the grammaticalization of a causative verb ma ‘make, cause, give.’ Cross-dialectal evidence available reveals that this complementizer has only started and it is yet to diffuse throughout all the dialects of the language. The data from this language also goes to support the view that grammaticalization is not only the development of grammatical morphemes but also the creation of new constructions.

Local meaning in the English of West Africa

THIS ARTICLE addresses differences in meaning that are current in English as it is used along the West African coast. It is not uncommon for an ESL teacher to be confronted with such questions as, ‘Is that what “stranger” means?’ or such responses as, ‘Sir, I do not have a “belly”!’ However, in this context, a sound knowledge (or simply an awareness) of new meanings attached to old words may save some embarrassment. This paper proposes that, for the sound and successful teaching of English as a second language in West Africa, teachers should acquaint themselves with such usages.

Health research: what happened to the charcoal?

In ba k'ira, me ya ci gawai? This is a well-known question in the Hausa language in West Africa with allusion to blacksmithing: “If nothing has been forged, then what happened to the charcoal?”1 This month, at the Mexico Summit of Ministers of Health, WHO will launch the World report on knowledge for better health, subtitled Strengthening health systems.2 The report conveys the following eight key messages in 160 pages:

A Case Study of the Sociopolitical Dilemmas of Gullah-speaking Students: Educational Policies and Practices

Most of the languages spoken along the West African coastline are different from European languages but similar to Black English. Gullah, a West African and English Creole language, still spoken today on the sea islands of South Carolina and Georgia, is the predecessor of American Black English which is most similar to the languages of West Africa. Early research in reading comprehension and science language development has supported the belief that divergent language usage, such as Gullah, has a negative impact on the visible demonstration of academic reading achievement (Goodman, 1965; Hunt, 1975). Unfortunately, the educational system has been insensitive and ineffective in addressing the issue of the language differences between Black English and White English. Qualitative case study (Bogdan & Biklen, 1998) was chosen because we needed students with extreme examples of non-traditional English to illustrate easily the patterns that emerged. For all the students, description through language was a very complex issue. Often they omitted words or did not know the specific content words to complete a description. While their indigenous language patterns created holistic pictures, they did not use the exact or precise word to communicate the appropriate meaning to those unfamiliar with their language.

A Linguist's Credo (review)

Reviewed by: A linguist’s credo by Paul Christophersen Alan S. Kaye A linguist’s credo. By Paul Christophersen. (RASK supplement volume 9.) Odense: Odense University Press, 1999. Pp. 176. This volume reprints thirteen of Christophersen’s essays penned over a long and distinguished career. He is well-known for his accomplishments not only as an Anglicist but also as a general linguist. Thus, in many ways he has, probably intentionally, followed in the footsteps of his countryman, the great Dane—Otto Jespersen, who retired five years before C enrolled as a student at the University of Copenhagen in 1930. C, in fact, served as a research assistant under a grant from the Carlsberg Foundation [End Page 616] in the preparation of Vol. VI of Jespersen’s famous Modern English grammar. One can read about his relationship with Jespersen in Ch. 4, “On English grammar and related topics: A conversation with Prof. Paul Christophersen’ (71–79), a 1981 interview by Pablo Dominguez, the editor of Revista canaria de estudios Ingleses. Herein, C speaks candidly about Jespersen’s linguistic views. Concerning language teaching, he has this to say: ‘he [Jespersen] would have been disappointed in the relatively insignificant role that phonetics seems to play nowadays’ (74); and on linguistic terminology, many linguists today would also agree with Jespersen’s dislike for ‘modern linguistic jargon, his own motto being: “what’s worth saying is worth saying simply” ’ (74). An entire chapter (Ch. 5, 81–92), in fact, is devoted to the exploration of ‘Jespersen and second-language learning’. This was originally presented as an address at the University of Copenhagen in 1993 at a symposium commemorating the 50th anniversary of Jespersen’s death. C asserts that Jespersen agreed with writers such as Henry Sweet on the importance of phonetic transcription (82) but was opposed to the use of translation as a foreign language learning strategy, following the lead of Wilhelm Viëtor (88). In the area of diachronic linguistics, C makes it clear that Jespersen in 1886 came out against the Junggrammatiker. Not generally known, however, is C’s relating that Jespersen considered his own English to be nonnative, despite his six-month residence in the United Kingdom and two stays in the United States as a Visiting Professor (81, 89). Let us now take up a few of the papers. Ch. 1, ‘Settling Hoti’s business: or: The linguist at work’ (13–30) was C’s inaugural address as Professor of English at the New University of Ulster, first published in 1977 in Northern Ireland Speech and Language Forum. He opines unconvincingly that linguists do not have any right to condemn prescriptive grammar (25) while simultaneously persuasively arguing that he does not ‘wish to defend pedantic insistence on worthless shibboleths’ (24). Further commenting on the realm of linguistics as a science, Ch. 2, ‘Linguistics: Science or mysticism’ (31–45) once again condemns linguists such as Jean Aitchison for chastising Robert Lowth, Bishop of London in 1777–87, for his prescriptive rules (43–44). C tries to make the case that a linguist is like a doctor. What good is a doctor, he asks, who merely describes diseases without prescribing treatment (44)? But, I believe, the analogy is fallacious in using the erroneous premise that native speakers who say ‘ain’t’, e.g., are suffering from a disease and thus that their language needs a cure. Among the most interesting papers are the last two, on English in West Africa. Ch. 12 (149–57), a review article of John Spencer, ed., The English language in West Africa (London: Longmans, 1971), originally published in English studies (1973), makes important observations on key issues such as diglottia (not to be confused with the well-known diglossia which involves a standard language), in which West African Pidgin English alternates with the more standard West African (acrolectic) English (150). Ch. 13, ‘West African English words’ (159–72), takes up, among other topics, the etymologies of two common West African words: dash ‘gift’ and ju-ju ‘idol, fetish’. The former derives from a Romance etymon meaning #x02018;tribute’; however, the specific donor language is not given. C rejects the OED’s etymology for the latter < French jou...

Coevolution of phonology and the lexicon in twelve languages of West Africa*

Synergetic models of language structure predict that the length of a word will depend upon various parameters such as its frequency and the number of phonemes in the language. This prediction has been used to explain word length differences within languages, but less often to explain the differences between languages. Here I show that average word length across 12 West African languages is related to the size of the phonological inventory. This is an apparent example of the adaptation of language structure to the efficient communication of information. The hypothesised mechanism by which the relationship evolves are outlined.

Historical Change in Serial Verb Constructions

This work examines both historical and comparative evidence in documenting the sweep of diachronic change in the context of serial verb constructions. Using a wide range of data from languages of West Africa, Asia and the Caribbean, it demonstrates how shifts in meaning and usage result in syntactic, morphological and lexical change.The process by which verbs lose lexical semantic content and develop case-marking functions is described; it is argued that the change is directional, from verb to preposition (or postposition) to affix, along a grammaticalization continuum. This same grammaticalization process is shown to result in the development of complementizers, adverbial subordinators, conjunctions, adverbs and auxiliaries from verbs. Strong parallels across languages are found in the meanings of the verbs that become “defective” and in the functions they come to mark. The changes are documented in detail, with examples from a number of languages illustrating the effect of the changes on typology and word order, implications for the encoding of definiteness and aspect, and the relevance of notions such as discourse topic, foreground and transitivity.With respect to theoretical assumptions and terminology, the author has taken a relatively nonpartisan approach, and the discussion is accessible to students of language as well as of interest to theoreticians.

Binding domains in Haitian

Like many Kwa languages of West Africa (Awoyale 1986), Haitian lacks unique, morphologically reflexive expressions equivalent to Englishherself, himself, themselves. Instead, local binding has three compositional sources.Morphological economy (Burzio 1989) construes an object pronoun reflexively just if no morphologically reflexive expression has the same agreement features. This elsewhere-type principle, generally satisfied in Haitian, applies only exceptionally in French and English, creating surface anaphor/pronoun complementarity as the predominant pattern in those languages (Bouchard 1984).Referential economy (Pica 1987) “anaphorizes” a possessive DP headed by an inalienably possessed noun such astet ‘head’ orko ‘body’.Inherent reflexivity licenses a null internal argument with an inalienably possessed lexical constant BODY. The necessity of all three mechanisms in Haitian argues for the reduction of the LGB binding conditions (Chomsky 1981) to the “On Binding” framework (Chomsky 1980).

Reduplication and Object Movement in Ewe and Fon

This article examines two alternations which are found in the Gbe languages of West Africa.