Introduction and Alphabet

Akwaaba!

I'm a day behind because I just got the (brilliant?) idea to create a blog that will follow me through this course as a way to review and practice the material AND share the lessons with others interested in learning (Asante-)Twi.

On the first day of class, we introduced ourselves, and I learned that I'm the only one who has no experience with Twi! Everyone has been to Ghana. One woman did her fieldwork in Ghana, two women have Ghanaian family members, and one man is Ghanaian and speaks Twi. There are only five students, which is great! We have plenty of opportunities for getting the pronunciation of each word and phrase correct. Twi is a tonal language, so the meaning of a word or phrase relies on knowing EXACTLY how to pronounce it. It's a lot of pressure.

We went over the alphabet, diagraphs (letter combinations), nasalized vowels, and tones.

First of all, this is how to say ‘Twi’: tchwi (not a hard ‘t’)

Some differences from the American alphabet: no 'c', additional ε and ⊃ (unfortunately I couldn’t find this last letter in Word so I had to use a math symbol. It should look like a backwards ‘c’), and all sorts of accents to show the different tones and nasalization of vowels.

The two additional letters are pronounced as: ε – the ‘e’ in ‘get’ and ⊃ - the ‘aw’ in ‘law’ or the ‘o’ in ‘orange’.

The hardest sounds to make: ‘w’ when it comes before ‘i’, ‘e’, ‘ε’. It sounds like ‘yw’ but not quite. I still haven’t gotten it straight. ‘hw’ is also hard. It is pronounced as a very breathy ‘wh’ as in ‘whew!’ so it’s really hard to say in combination with other letters. Try saying ‘hwε’.

As for nasalized vowels, it’s helpful to think of a ‘n’ after the vowel. You make the motion with your mouth, but don’t voice the ‘n’. I’m not good at nasalizing vowels, so this is hard, but the ‘n’ helps.

Favorite word of the day: k⊃k⊃⊃ [kawkaww] = red (I picture a red rooster saying this word.)



Note: Check out the slide show for the alphabet and other useful information from today's lesson.