36.2247, Diss: Kwa, Niger-Congo; Akan, Twi; Phonetics, Phonology, Sociolinguistics: "Investigating Sound Change in Twi Vowel Harmony: A Sociophonetic Study of Age, Gender, and Locality Effects" Kpogo (2024)

Wed Jul 23 16:05:02 UTC 2025

LINGUIST List: Vol-36-2247. Wed Jul 23 2025. ISSN: 1069 - 4875.

Subject: 36.2247, Diss: Kwa, Niger-Congo; Akan, Twi; Phonetics, Phonology, Sociolinguistics:  "Investigating Sound Change in Twi Vowel Harmony: A Sociophonetic Study of Age, Gender, and Locality Effects" Kpogo (2024)

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Date: 22-Jul-2025
From: Felix Kpogo [felix_kpogo at brown.edu]
Subject: Investigating Sound Change in Twi Vowel Harmony: A Sociophonetic Study of Age, Gender, and Locality Effects: Kpogo (2024)

Institution: Boston University Linguistics
Degree Date: 2024

Dissertation Title: Investigating Sound Change in Twi Vowel Harmony: A
Sociophonetic Study of Age, Gender, and Locality Effects

Dissertation URL:
https://open.bu.edu/items/d74de728-5cb5-4e55-849c-c05c2c90ed40

Linguistic Field(s): Phonetics
                     Phonology
                     Sociolinguistics

Subject Language(s): Akan (aka)
                     Twi (twi)

Language Family(ies): Kwa
                      Niger-Congo

Dissertation Director(s): Charles B. Chang, Daniel Erker, Kate Lindsey

Dissertation Abstract:

This dissertation employs a sociophonetic approach to document sound
change in Asante Twi, a language spoken in Ghana. Asante Twi is one
major variety of the Akan language. Traditional descriptions of Twi
phonology say that [æ] is allophonically derived when /a/ occurs
before advanced tongue root (i.e., [+ATR]) vowels /i, u, o/ and
palatal consonants.  For example, in the word /sika-ni/ ‘rich person’,
the syllable-final /a/ is pronounced as [sikæni] before the [+ATR]
vowel in the person suffix, {-ni}. However, a recent study observed an
[e] vowel (itself the phonemic [+ATR] counterpart of /ɛ/) in the
phonological context where [æ] is expected among urban dwelling Twi
speakers (Yankson, 2018). Thus, the traditional descriptions and the
recent evidence are at odds since the former does not reflect the way
native speakers are currently speaking in the urban area. The
dissertation aims to explore how Twi speakers produce and perceive the
[æ] vowel, particularly focusing on the language-internal and
–external factors constraining its production and perception.
The data comprised 105 Asante Twi speakers spanning various age
brackets (12 – 75 years) and genders residing in either traditional or
urban Twi-speaking communities. Production data were obtained via a
picture naming task featuring target items where /a/ preceded a [+ATR]
vowel or palatal consonant, alongside items with phonemic [+ATR] /e/
to diagnose the sound change. Acoustic measurements (F1 and F2) at the
midpoint of target vowels aided in diagnosing the potential sound
change. Perception data were gathered through a forced-choice
identification task to ascertain whether speakers maintained distinct
mental representations for [æ] and /e/.
The production results indicate a reorganization of /a/ vowel harmony
triggers, as well as the raising of the [æ] vowel, leading to its
encroachment upon phonemic /e/ in the vowel space. Specifically,
traditional speakers predominantly adhered to the traditional harmony
pattern, wherein /a/ is primarily articulated as [æ] before /i, u/,
and palatal segments (i.e., [+ATR, +high, -low] contexts), except a
few who produced an [e]. However, urban speakers produced /a/ as [e]
in the same environment. The [+ATR, -high, -low] /o/ context
inconsistently triggered ATR harmony in both speaker populations. An
analysis of a potential merger between the [+ATR] counterpart of /a/
(i.e., [æ]) and the phonemic /e/ showed that traditional speakers,
across various age groups, generally produced acoustically distinct
vowels. However, among the youngest traditional speakers, a few raised
their [æ] productions to align with /e/. In contrast, urban speakers
of all generations displayed [æ] raising and merger with /e/, with the
youngest age group showing nearly complete merger. Regarding speaker
gender, urban men were more advanced than women in the [æ]-/e/ merger.
Nonetheless, some younger women in the traditional community converge
on the merger observed in the urban community.
Furthermore, the analysis of perceptual data indicated that the
perceptual pattern of the merger tended to align with speakers’ own
production. Individuals who exhibited merger in production tended to
show a similar pattern in perception (i.e., “perception-and-production
conflaters”). Other participants showed either production merger but
not perception merger (i.e., “production-conflaters”) or a perception
merger but not production merger (i.e., “perception-conflaters”/
near-mergers). Interestingly, the study did not find a significant
relationship between production and perception over all participants,
suggesting a potential co-evolving connection between the two
modalities that can lead to perception-production alignment or
misalignment, in which either perception or production can be more
advanced in the sound change than the other modality. Overall, the
findings of the dissertation suggest an ongoing sound change in these
communities.
This dissertation provides the initial empirical evidence of sound
change within the Asante Twi vowel harmony system. It also contributes
significantly to the variationist sociolinguistic literature by
presenting data from a non-Western community, challenging some
longstanding assumptions on linguistic change from Western societies.
Moreover, it enhances language representation in the variationist
literature by introducing data from an understudied language with
unique linguistic features, such as ATR harmony, thereby advancing our
understanding of linguistic variation and change. Additionally, it
constitutes the most comprehensive collection of sociolinguistic and
sociophonetic studies of Asante Twi speakers to date. While it covers
a wide range of topics, several questions remain unanswered, and it is
anticipated that the findings will inspire future studies in other
understudied languages and communities in Africa and beyond.

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