The uniqueness of Ghanaian English pronunciation in West Africa

This paper shows drastic differences between the pronunciation of English in Ghana and in all the other West African countries with a similar colonial experience and similar sociological and sociolinguistic backgrounds. The distinctiveness of Ghanaian English involves the restructuring of (RP) ///, fe'J, post-tonic /a/ with orthographic <er, re, or, our, ur, ous, us, um>, fel before a final /n/, the pronunciation of able and -ative words, certain words with <a>, the Alternating Stress Rule, and some miscellaneous items. It is shown, for example, that /a/ and Id substitute for a wide range of (RP) segments, and that noticeable changes in the direction of these two vowels have occurred within the last two decades. Finally, the paper shows that Ghana, while diverging from the pronunciation of her more immediate neighbours and colonial companions, shows striking similarities in some restructuring patterns, not only with northern Nigeria, but also with geographically more distant east and southern Africa.