MyGhana2027.com · Ghana@70 · Languages & Peoples
Around 80 languages are spoken in a country the size of Britain. English is the official one, eleven are taught in schools, and on the street most Ghanaians move between two, three or four without thinking about it. Each language carries the story of a people, and of how they came to the land that became Ghana.
Almost every language native to Ghana belongs to the great Niger-Congo family, which stretches from Senegal to South Africa. Within it, Ghana splits roughly into a southern group and a northern group, with a line running through the middle belt. Two important languages come from outside.
Akan (Asante Twi, Akuapem Twi, Fante, Bono and others), Ewe, Ga and Dangme, Nzema, and the Guan languages. These are tonal languages: the same syllable can mean different things depending on pitch. Kwa languages are spoken by well over half of all Ghanaians.
The Mole-Dagbani group (Dagbani, Mampruli, Dagaare, Gurene or Frafra, Kusaal, Wali), the Grusi languages (Kasem, Sisaala) and the Gurma languages (Likpakpaanl or Konkomba, Bimoba). These are related to Mossi in Burkina Faso, a reminder that the border is far younger than the languages.
Languages brought by Mande-speaking traders and horsemen from the old Mali empire. Their influence runs through the north-west and through Gonja history, and Wangara traders spread Islam and long-distance trade into the region from the 1400s.
Hausa, a Chadic language from northern Nigeria and Niger, arrived with traders and soldiers and became the common language of the zongos. English arrived with British rule and became the language of government, courts and schools.
Each page covers where the language comes from, who speaks it today, how it is written, and a few words to start with.
Ghana's 2021 census counted about 30.8 million people. By ethnic group, roughly: Akan around 46%, Mole-Dagbani around 18%, Ewe around 13%, Ga-Dangme around 7%, Gurma around 6%, Guan around 3%, Grusi around 3% and Mande around 2%. Language use goes further than ethnicity. Twi is spoken as a second language by millions who are not Akan, and Hausa by people of dozens of origins in the zongos.
How many languages? Counts range from about 70 to over 80, depending on where a dialect ends and a language begins. Asante Twi, Akuapem Twi and Fante are mutually understandable and usually counted as one language, Akan, yet each has its own written standard.
No people in Ghana claims to have simply always been there. Almost every tradition begins with a journey. Some are remembered in festivals, some in drum histories, some only in the names of places. Historians and oral traditions do not always agree on dates, and the dates below are approximate, but the movements are real.
Widely regarded as among the oldest inhabitants of the land, spread from the coast to the north before later peoples arrived and settled among and around them.
The Akan states grew in and around the forest, with Bonoman near Techiman among the earliest. Gold and kola drew traders, and later states such as Denkyira, Akwamu and Asante rose from this world.
Wangara (Dyula) merchants from the Mali empire reached Begho and the northern markets, bringing gold trading, Islam and long-distance networks that tied the region to the Sahara.
Horsemen in the line of Naa Gbewaa founded Dagbon, Mamprugu and Nanumba, ruling over earlier farming peoples. In the 1500s and 1600s, Mande cavalry under Ndewura Jakpa founded Gonja.
Ga and Dangme traditions describe migrations from the east, across the Volta, settling the Accra plains and the coast from Accra to Ada.
The Ewe tradition tells of escape from the walled city of Notsé in today's Togo, walking backwards to hide their tracks from King Agokoli. The southern Ewe celebrate it as Hogbetsotso.
Hausa traders followed the kola routes to Salaga and settled in zongos. Fulani herders moved south with their cattle, especially in the 20th century. Migrants from Nigeria, Burkina Faso, Niger and Mali came for cocoa, mining and trade.
Freed Afro-Brazilian families returned across the Atlantic and settled in Jamestown, Accra. Brazil House still stands there today.
English is the official language of Ghana, inherited from colonial rule. In schools, the state sponsors eleven Ghanaian languages, supported by the Bureau of Ghana Languages: Asante Twi, Akuapem Twi, Fante, Ewe, Ga, Dangme, Nzema, Dagbani, Dagaare, Gonja and Kasem. Hausa, despite being spoken in every zongo, is not among them.
In practice: young children are taught in a local language in the first years, then English takes over. Many Ghanaians read and write English more fluently than their mother tongue, and that is one of the quiet debates of Ghana at 70.