Legon Journal of the Humanities

The Role of Modal Auxiliaries in Commencement Speeches: A Case Study of Ghana and America

Elvis ResCue — 2024-08-13

The uses of modal auxiliaries in research papers and political speeches have been well established. The commencement speech, however, remains a green area as far as exploring modal auxiliary usage is concerned. This study explores a comparative semantic contribution of modal auxiliaries in commencement speeches in Ghana and America, and their link to the Speech Act Theory. A total corpus size of 51,447 words was obtained. The study employed AntConc 4.0 to generate the instances of modal auxiliary usage in the data. Leech’s (2004) theory of modal auxiliary meaning, and Searle’s (1969) Speech Act Theory were employed to identify modal meanings and speech acts performed in the speeches. The results indicate that the American commencement speeches employed more modal auxiliaries than the Ghanaian commencement speeches. The study highlights the vital role of modal auxiliaries and speech acts in encoding actions that speech acts inspire within the Ghanaian and American contexts.

Making light of the burden of economic hardship: A socio-pragmatic analysis of humour in Ghana’s post-COVID economic crises

Grace Diabah — 2024-06-28

pandemic, but this was expected since the country was already facing economic difficulties prior to the pandemic. To deal with the increasing crises, the government sought support from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in July 2022. This sparked ridicule since they had criticised the previous government for seeking an IMF bailout. This study, therefore, offers a socio-pragmatic analysis of the humour surrounding this political discourse on Ghana’s post-COVID economic crises. By analysing linguistic and paralinguistic features from an under-studied context, i.e. humour research in Ghana and on crisis, we examine how netizens used humour to lighten the burden of the economic hardship and, more importantly, as a tool to critique political actors for their alleged roles in the country’s socio-economic challenges. Data was gathered from Facebook and Twitter. With reference to the bifurcation of the play frame, which distinguishes between serious and non-serious framing, we argue that the political humour that characterised Ghana’s economic crisis goes beyond ‘this is play’ and highlights citizen’s frustrations and loss of faith, not only in the current government, but also in political leaders in general. Thus, behind the veil of humour, Ghanaians reiterate the endemic nature of the problems, something which goes beyond what an IMF bailout can solve.

Examining Sino-Ghana relations and the role of the Chinese community in Ghana through (Auto)biography as a historiographic approach

John Qiong Wang — 2024-06-28

evoke instant thoughts on illegal mining activities and not so positive reactions, the relationship between China and Ghana transcends this sphere. China and Ghana have a longstanding six-decade history of political, economic, trade, and cultural exchanges. This research employs (auto)biography as a historical method to explore the personal narratives of Chinese individuals living in Ghana and their influence on Sino-Ghanaian relations. By taking a transcultural approach, the study examines these interactions at a micropolitical level, emphasising the Chinese community’s strategic contributions and cultural insights in shaping bilateral ties. This approach offers a comprehensive understanding of Ghana’s political, historical, and sociocultural evolution through the lived experiences of Chinese residents. Utilising a mixed-methods strategy, the research integrates a systematic review of six decades of journalistic discourse with five in-depth case studies of Chinese people in Ghana. The results reveal the profound impact of Sino-Ghanaian relations on Ghana’s post-independence changes. Politically, China’s emphasis on unity and shared anti-colonial traditions has strengthened their friendship and influenced Ghana’s national development. Economically, the introduction of Chinese technology and products has propelled modernisation. However, the long-term suitability of the “Chinese model” in Africa appears relatively favorable as one of the options for development. This study underscores the necessity for Ghana and other African countries to carefully select development paths and partners, balancing opportunities from China’s rise with the need for national sovereignty. The enduring historical connection between China and Ghana, marked by a community of a shared future, provides a robust foundation for bilateral relations grounded in mutual respect and cooperative development. The study contributes to Sino-Ghanaian scholarship and offers valuable insights for enhancing public diplomacy efforts between the two nations.

A pragmatic analysis of the expression of appreciation – thanks in Nigerian English

Abolaji Samuel Mustapha — 2024-06-28

Many studies on the linguistic realizations and social functions of responses to thanks in different varieties of English have reported interesting findings on the speech act. However, it appears that thanking, the first pair part of the thanking formula, is under-researched. To fill this gap, this study investigated the linguistic realizations of thanks in Nigerian English in order to determine and compare their features and functions with previous findings in British English. 300 expressions of thanks that were recorded from speakers of Nigerian English from verbal exchange, WhatsApp and radio airings were analyzed. The analysis revealed massive similarities in linguistic patterns but divergent pragmatic features owing to cultural differences. These findings support the variational pragmatic theory which opines that intra-variation does not guarantee same pragmatic features.

Akan concepts and proverbs on abusua, ‘family’

Kofi Agyekum — 2024-06-28

The paper explores the Akan concept of family based on their cultural ideologies and proverbs. The paper adopts the framework of language ideology that looks at how a people rationalise their language and culture based on their worldview, religious beliefs and anthropological notions. The data for this paper is collected from library studies on books on Akan proverbs and other literary books. Part of the data is collected from Akan folksongs, folktales, interviews and discussions with some renowned Akan scholars. The proverbs collected are subjected to semantic, stylistic and pragmatics analysis. The paper will find out whether the proverbs that relate to family are still applicable in modern times where globalisation, westernisation, modernisation and foreign religion are taking over the Akan family system and some of the aspects of Akan culture and beliefs. This paper is a follow up of other papers I have done on the Akan concept of face, poverty, marriage and death.

Extending the rape narrative: A corpus-assisted discourse analysis of the construction of rape in selected Nigerian dailies

Richard Damilare Akano — 2024-06-28

This study examines the discursive construction of rape in news reports from the standpoint of critical linguistics. To do this, a corpus of news articles on rape cases was generated from five Nigerian newspapers (The Punch, Vanguard, Daily Trust, Nigerian Tribune and Sun) published between 2018-2022. For concordance analysis, AntConc4 was deployed to tease out lexemes and collocates that index the construal of rape and actors. With insights from Wodak’s (2001) model of critical discourse analysis, the study identifies (e)vilifying rape and its perpetrators through labelling, the empathy-evoking construal of rape victims’ experience, and sexual offenders as blame-shifters as ideological constructs accentuated by discursive strategies. Existing studies have argued that the Nigerian press has largely promoted an androcentric order in the reporting of rape cases, to the detriment of rape victims. However, this study extends this view and suggests that Nigerian newspapers attempt to combat the heinous act of rape by vilifying, demonising, denigrating, and negatively portraying rape and perpetrators through linguistic constructs. These constructs are meant to project sexual offenders and their heinous acts to the public in highly repugnant and distasteful ways that would convince the public to desist from such acts.

Exploring the semantic and pragmatic functions of modal auxiliaries: A case study of commencement speeches

Berengar Irene Duku — 2024-06-28

The use of modal auxiliaries in research articles and political speeches has been well investigated. The genre of commencement speeches, however, has yet to be investigated as far as the use of modal auxiliaries are concerned. In addressing the gap, the present study compares the usage of modal auxiliary verbs in commencement speeches of Ghanaian speakers with American speakers, and investigates the semantic contribution of the modal auxiliaries in the speeches. Additionally, the study also explores the speech act performed via the usage of the modal auxiliary verb and their pragmatic nuances in commencement speeches. The dataset for the study is a corpus of 51,447 words obtained from twelve (12) commencement speeches of the Ashesi University (in Ghana) and twelve (12) highly ranked American Universities. The study employed AntConc 4.0 to generate the instances of modal auxiliary usage in the data. Leech’s (2004) theory of modal auxiliary meaning and Searle’s (1969) Speech Act Theory were employed to identify modal meanings and speech acts performed in the speeches. The study highlights the vital role of modal auxiliaries and speech acts in encoding actions that speech acts inspire within the Ghanaian and American contexts. These include the can-do attitude of Ghanaians, on the one hand, and the need-to-cherish-family and keep close ties attitude of the Americans, on the other hand. The results show that relatively speaking, American commencement speeches employ more modal auxiliaries than Ghanaian commencement speeches.

On the development of psychology profession in Northern Ghana

Emmanuel Dziwornu — 2024-06-28

The history of psychology in Ghana has received research attention. However, documentation of regional or provincial history of psychology in Ghana has not received enough scholarly attention. In a resource-constrained setting, the least developed areas are often neglected, especially in terms of service provision and historical research. It is important that the progress of psychology in Northern Ghana, one of the least developed regions in Ghana, is examined to inform public policy decisions. In this paper, we discuss the history of psychology and its practice in Northern Ghana. We present the challenges faced by the profession in the region and some recommendations for improvement.