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Adinkra Symbols and Their Communicative Values in Akan

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Adinkra Symbols and Their Communicative Values in Akan Vol. 7(3), pp. 22-33, April, 2016 DOI:10.5897/PPR2015.0117 Article Number: A5A4C6E58407 ISSN:2141-663X Philosophical Papers and Review Copyright © 2016 Author(s) retain the copyright of this article http://www.academicjournals.org/PPR Full Length Research Paper The philosophy behind some Adinkra symbols and their communicative values in Akan J. E. T. Kuwornu-Adjaottor*, George Appiah and Melvin Nartey Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Kumasi, Ghana. Received 4 April, 2015; Accepted 24 November, 2015 This paper represents selected Adinkra symbols of the Akan and brings out the philosophical, educational, historical and moral values inherent in them. It seeks to encourage the understanding and usage of the Adinkra symbols in a more meaningful way by Ghanaians and foreigners, contemporary artists, designers, craftsmen, teachers, and all who appreciate the traditional symbols. It discusses 14 Adinkra symbols grouped into two of seven each. The first group consists of the symbols that are familiar to many Ghanaians but the philosophy, history and moral lessons behind them are not known to them and the other group also consists of symbols that are unfamiliar to many Ghanaians as well as the philosophical and historical lessons associated to them. Symbolic meanings, philosophical and historical background of these symbols have also been provided. The paper posits that the logical value of the Adinkra symbols used by Akans as a mode of communication is less important; it is their communication values that are important. The paper adds to knowledge in the disciplines of linguistics in general and semiotics in particular. Key words: Akan language, Adinkra symbols, semiotics, linguistics, Ghanaian indigenous symbolism, communication. INTRODUCTION Sapir (1949) posited that just as unlettered and primitive various types of social groupings. He was of the view that people have an economic basis of life, however simple in no human assemblage living a life in common has ever its operation, such a life is strictly comparable to the been discovered that does not possess some form of economic machinery that so largely that it orders the life social organization. of a modern civilized society. He also stated that, just as It is especially important to note that delineations of they have attained a definite system of religious beliefs communities in these respects are crucial to the and practices, to traditionally conserved modes of artistic understanding of the place of language in culture and to expression, to the adequate communication of thought understanding of the particular place of language in and feeling in terms of linguistic symbols, so also they culture signaled by what is commonly called the Sapir- appear everywhere as rather clearly articulated into Whorf hypothesis. According to Hymes (1972, 269-293) *Corresponding author. E-mail: [email protected]. Authors agree that this article remain permanently open access under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License 4.0 International License Kuwornu-Adjaottor et al. 23 to assume that differences in language shape or interact inhabit convey information about us to others even when with differences in worldview is to assume that the we are away from them. functional role of language in relation to the worldview is Gamble and Gamble characterized nonverbal the same everywhere. Indeed anthropological thought communication as follows: It is perpetual, frequent, and quite generally has tended to assume identity or involuntary. To support this point, they quoted Paul equivalence of function for language throughout the Watzalawick, author of Pragmatics of Human world. If a language is taken as a device for categorizing Communication, that, “no matter how hard one may try, experience, it is not such a device in the abstract. There one cannot but communicate” (1999, 132). No one can remains the question of what may be the set of events in stop sending nonverbal messages. As far as one person which categorization of language occurs. The set includes is observing the actions of another, it is impossible not to events in which a single person is using a language communicate. To Gamble and Gamble nonverbal excogitatively. communication, like verbal communication, can be Although anthropologists have sometimes talked of the ambiguous. Like words, nonverbal messages may not use of language „merely‟ as a tool of communication, and mean what we think they do. One has to be very careful of the categorizing of experience as if it were a superior when interpreting nonverbal cues. It is not possible to category, the role of language as a device for develop a list of nonverbal behaviors and attach a single categorizing experience and its role as an instrument of meaning to each. All nonverbal communication must be communication cannot be separated and indeed the latter evaluated or interpreted within the context in which it includes the former. This is the more true when a occurs. language, as it is often the case, affords alternative ways Again, verbal and nonverbal messages are sometimes of categorizing the same experience, so that the patterns contradictory. When we say one thing but do another, we of selection among such alternatives must be determined send incongruent or mixed messages. Whenever one in actual contexts of use- as must also, indeed - the detects an incongruity between nonverbal and verbal degree to which language is being used as a full-fledged (word-level) messages, the person would probably semantic instrument (as distinct from its use as an benefit by paying greater attention to the nonverbal expressive, directive, etc, instrument) at all in a given message. Researchers in communication believe that case. nonverbal cues are more difficult to fake than verbal When people categorize experience with language they cues. share the experience with other people in diverse ways Like any language, the Akan communicate through which include the use of semiotics - nonverbal communi- both verbal and non-verbal means. Verbal language is cation. Semiotics, the study of signs and symbols of a spoken; non-verbal language is expressed through particular language and society; and the interpretation of symbols. Domestic symbolism is a surrogate language symbols and their impact on people, may vary from where the message is presented in the form of a culture to culture. Language itself is a system of symbols traditional symbol in view of the spoken word (Yankah, as stated by Aristotle; „The Great Philosopher‟ working in 1995, 33). Some linguists ( e.g., Brooks and Health) refer language some 2500 years ago stated that „spoken to this aspect of language as “object language” and say words are the symbols of mental experience and written that it comprises the display of material things – art words are the symbols of spoken words‟. Symbols are object, clothes, the decoration of room, hairstyle, the replica of the meanings of words, things, actions, implements. Decoding of messages in any emotions, behavior, and ideas of a people within a communicative situation is pictured like the diagram particular culture. People‟s actions can be motivated and below: guided by symbols and their meanings (Agyekum, 2006, 122). Speaker Visual Icon Addressee Gamble and Gamble (1999,132) quoted the founder of (Agyekum, 2006, 122). psychoanalysis, Sigmund Freud, “He that has eyes to see and ears to hear may convince himself that no mortal Communication is placed in relation to communicative can keep a secret, if his lips are silent, he chatters with mediation where a message is passed from the speaker his fingertips; betrayal oozes out of him at every pore”. to the addressee through a third party. Agyekum (2006, What they mean is that our creative problem-solving 124) sees the various Akan semiotics which are abilities are often challenged as we seek to make sense embodied in artistic artifacts like wooden staffs, stools, out of communication situations. Thus they posited that, cloth, and gold weights as a clear manifestation of the term nonverbal communication designates all the general perceptions. Also, the Akans principles of kinds of human responses which are not expressed in behavior, co-operation, initiative, historical events and words; nonverbal communication is more extensive than allusions, social and religious norms, political and judicial just communicating with our bodies and appearance. We elements, which are stated quite clearly without words, can even communicate by sending messages through are also expressed in the Akan semiotics, visually the environment we create and live in. The spaces we represented in popular proverbs, idioms, maxims and 24 Philos. Papers Rev. phrases; and material forms of linguistic staff, stools, on some of their carvings or crafts. They also visited Kumasi jewelry, gold weights, traditional cloths, umbrella tops, cultural centre and interacted with Boakye Akyeampong, Adwoa modern wax prints. Boakyewaa and Akosua Asamoah (attendants) regarding the various arts and crafts of the Akans and their representations and significance. At the Manhyia palace in Kumasi, they were fortunate to have one of the chief‟s spokespersons, Okyeame Boateng, there The Akan Language as their informant. The researchers interviewed him on things and /or symbols in the palace and other aspects of the Akan nonverbal Akan has, since the 1950s, been used in Ghana to refer codes that were unfamiliar to them. They visited some kente weavers and some elderly members in some kente
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