Re: Twi and Fanti UDHR samples

"Don Osborn" <[email protected]>
Newsgroups gmane.ietf.languages
Message-ID <[email protected]>
Doug, The differences in the texts you see may be a function of the linguistic varieties, or of the choices (or even the skills, biases, etc.) of the translators. Also,  in languages where there may not be established terms for various concepts used in law and human rights, there could be alternative ways of expressing those concepts. 

The OHCHR site* indicates that the same organization was responsible for the two Twi versions, but has no info on the people who actually worked on the translations, and several organizations for the Fante translation. Even in the same language it is possible - and I've seen it with Bambara for example - to have good translators come up with different ways of translating the same source material.

Basically it is not possible to say much about differences and similarities of these three Akan languages or dialects from the UDHR translations without knowing more about how they were translated. Keep in mind that these varieties of Akan are said to be interintelligible.

Don Osborn

* http://www.ohchr.org/EN/UDHR/Pages/SearchByLang.aspx

-----Original Message-----
From: Ietf-languages [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Doug Ewell
Sent: Tuesday, May 30, 2017 3:41 PM
To: ietf-languages <[email protected]>
Subject: [Ietf-languages] Twi and Fanti UDHR samples

Sascha mentioned the UDHR examples; here is Article 1 in all three
languages/dialects:

Twi (Akuapem)

Ahyɛde 1
Wɔawo adesamma nyinaa sɛ nnipa a wɔwɔ ahofadi. Wɔn nyinaa wɔ nidi ne kyɛfa koro. Wɔwɔ adwene ne ahonim, na ɛsɛ sɛ wobu wɔn ho wɔn ho sɛ anuanom.

Twi (Asante)

Ahyɛdeɛ 1.
Nnipa nyinaa yɛ pɛ. Na wɔde adwene ne nyansa na abɔ obiara. Ɛno nti, ɛsɛ sɛ obiara dɔ ne yɔnko, bu ne yɔnko, di ne yɔnko ni.

Fanti

Asɛmpɔw 1
Wɔwo adasa nyina to fahodzi mu, na hɔn nyina yɛ pɛr wɔ enyimnyam na ndzinoa mu. Wɔmaa hɔn nyina adwen na tsibowa, na ɔwɔ dɛ hɔn nkitahodzi mu ndzeyɛɛ da no edzi dɛ wɔyɛ enuanom.

I think it's clear that all three of these differ in more than just orthography.

Michael said these examples didn't form the strongest use case, but to be fair, we've all agreed there aren't very many examples of Akan or other African languages on the Internet. Perhaps this is the best we can get for now. It's certainly not the weakest use case I've seen. 
 
--
Doug Ewell | Thornton, CO, US | ewellic.org

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