language prestige

Some time ago I talked to a man from the South West of Ghana who speaks the Anyii language. Even though it is a larger language group churches do not hold services in the Anyii language. Instead, they use English and more dominant Ghanaian languages. These practices have led to unintended and regrettable effects on many Anyii Christians.

The man told me that he was in a group of four Anyii men having a conversation in Anyii. They decided to pray. But none of them prayed in Anyii. They all switched to another language. It was clear that they thought other languages are more suited to prayer. It was as though, of all the languages of the world, the only language God doesn’t understand is Anyii. The man said:

We enter church with our tongue clipped.

If this were just an oddity, I wouldn’t be concerned. But history shows that where Christian faith bypasses the language of the people, it doesn’t go deep, and it often becomes superstitious and corrupt, as it did when it stuck to Latin in Europe.

Dedication of representative translation committees for three Ghana languages, 2014

Launching translations in three small languages in Ghana’s Volta Region that no on ever learns, although the people who speak these languages almost always learn the regional language.

In Africa, people who speak small languages learn larger languages, but the reverse does not usually happen.

When a missionary whose language is English learns a small language, that speaks volumes. Not only has the missionary learned the language, he or she has done something counter their own interests. Learning the smaller language is a step down the social ladder. When Africans learn smaller languages to minister to people, that also speaks volumes about humility and service. I have written about a specific example.

An African translator told me how a church leader mocked him for volunteering to help in literacy in his “little language”. The person told him that such activities have no value because his language is so small.

But the things that are growing the church in rural areas in northern Ghana and northern Côte d’Ivoire are translations and literacy in those “worthless” languages that no one will bother to learn. It’s another delicious example of God’s subversion from below:

Instead, God chose things the world considers foolish in order to shame those who think they are wise. And he chose things that are powerless to shame those who are powerful. (I Corinthians 1:27)

It turns out that the things people readily dismiss as useless provide the real leverage for transforming communities and bringing Gospel life.