Language choice in churches in indigenous Gã towns: a multilingual balancing act

Abstract

This paper examines the determinant factors motivating language choice in churches in coastal Accra, an area characterized by a high degree of urbanization and multilingualism. As this region is also ethnically Gã, we survey the attitudes of Gã congregants to the use of other languages in their churches, bearing in mind the pressure faced by Gã from the more dominant vehicular languages, Akan and English. Data was obtained via participant observation, questionnaires and interviews. Using domain analysis, we show that language choice in the church domain is guided by the diametric principles of inclusiveness and church expansion on the one hand, and the conservation of a homogeneous socio-cultural identity on the other. Multilingual churches espouse the former while monolingual churches prize the latter. Gã congregants in churches that make extensive use of Akan and English report feeling satisfied with the language choices in their churches as they see these lingua francas as necessary for reaching out to the wider community. Although in other spheres of life there is irritation among Gã natives about the diminishing role of their language, in the church domain, this is readily tolerated for the greater good of advancing the church’s work.

A critical review of church interpreting research

“…The importance of the internal politics of each church is also listed among the reasons for church interpreting by Biamah (2013b) and among the factors explaining language provision in the work of Krihtova (2016). Church politics and a desire to reach a wider community were also found to be explanatory factors as to how and when churches used different languages and interpreting by Campbell and Anderson (2023). All these studies therefore provide evidence to the performative nature of church interpreting as an act with specific meaning in the specific contexts in which it takes place.…”

Cultural conceptualisations and spatial cognition in Ghanaian English

“…Even though there is no official policy document backing it, English is the official language of Ghana. It is used in education (Agbedor, 1994;Ansah, 2014;Djorbua et al, 2021), politics (Ansah, 2017), health delivery (Ansah & Orfson-Offei, 2022;Chachu, 2022), religion (Campbell & Anderson, 2023) and even as a home language (Afrifa et al, 2019;Anderson et al, 2008). Given the level of linguistic diversity and vitality in Ghana, and from a Cultural Linguistics perspective, we could assume that speakers of Ghanaian English come to the learning experience with their cultural conceptualisations which they may have to unlearn and learn new ones in order to learn English effectively.…”