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Pfisterer on Akpafu, 1904 (part I)
One of the goals of The Ideophone, besides functioning as a sounding board for ideas on expressivity and sound symbolism in African languages, is to make available sources on Siwu and other GTM languages which are otherwise hard to come by. This posting is the first in a series furthering that goal. Below you will…
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‘Remnants of some ancient tribal idiom’: deciphering the oldest Siwu to appear in print
Having been a small and quite isolated language for centuries, Siwu was relatively late to attract attention from outsiders. Europeans in search for gold to buy and people to enslave for the most part stayed near the coast. Halfway the nineteenth century, German firms (looking for cheap land) and missionary organizations (looking for converts) started…
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Gender-based folk etymologies for the name Akpafu
Akpafu is a term used by the Ewe of Ghana to refer to the Mawu people, their language (Siwu), and their land (Kawu). The Mawu also use it for themselves when talking to outsiders. So far, I have heard two Mawu folk etymologies explaining the origin of this name. The interesting thing is that one…