SOCIOLINGUISTIC SURVEY REPORT FOR THE KUSAAL LANGUAGE WRITTEN BY: JOHN BERTHELETTE SIL International 2001 2 Contents 0 Introduction and Goals of the Survey 1 General Information 1.1 Language Classification 1.1.1 Language Location 1.1.2 Description of Location 1.2 Population 1.3 Accessibility and Transport 1.3.1 Roads: Quality and Availability 1.3.2 Public Transport Systems 1.3.3 Trails 1.4 Religious Adherence 1.4.1 Spiritual Life 1.4.2 Catholic Activity 1.4.3 Protestant Activity 1.4.4 Language Use Parameters Within Church Services 1.5 Schools/Education 1.5.1 Types, Sites, and Size 1.5.2 Attitude toward the Vernacular in Public Schools 1.6 Facilities and Economics 1.6.1 Supply Needs 1.6.2 Medical Needs 1.6.3 Occupations and Commercial Ventures 1.7 Traditional Culture 1.7.1 Social and Religious Practices 1.7.2 Attitude toward Culture 1.8 Linguistic Work in the Language Area 1.8.1 Materials Published in the Language 1.8.2 History of Literacy in the Agole and Tonde 1.8.3 Suitability of Existing Written Materials in the Tonde Dialect Area 2 Methodology 2.1 Sampling 2.2 Lexicostatistic Survey 2.3 Dialect Intelligibility Survey 2.4 Questionnaires 3 Comprehension and Lexicostatistical Data (between villages) 3.1 Reported Dialect Groupings: Results from Questionnaires and Interviews 3.2 Results of the Recorded Text Tests 3.3 Lexical Similarity Results: Percentages of Apparent Cognates 3.4 Summary 4 Multilingual Issues 4.1 Language Use Description 4.1.1 Children's Language Use 3 4.1.2 Adults’ Language Use 4.2 Language Attitudes as Reported 5 Recommendations with Regards to a Language/Literacy Project Appendix 1 Population Data 2 Questionnaire Responses 3 A Word List of Kusaal Dialects Bibliography 1 References 2 Other Materials about Kusaal 3 Materials Published in Kusaal 4 Contacts for Further Information 4 The Kusaal Survey Report 0 Introduction and Goals of the Survey This report deals with the findings of a survey carried out by Carol and John Berthelette and Sonja Anderhalden among the Kusaal language group in April 1996. The Burkina Faso administration of the Société Internationale de Linguistique has for a number of years considered Kusaal's western dialect (known as tonde)1 a definite candidate for language development, despite Kusaal's eastern dialect (known as agole) already having been developed in Ghana. The survey had as its goal to gather certain information on the Kusaal ethnic group, such as: ♦ finding out more about their geographic and demographic setting; ♦ determining the inherent intelligibility between the agole and tonde dialects as well as insights into the attitudes of tonde (western) speakers towards agole (eastern); ♦ discovering their attitudes toward their own language variety, the vitality of the language, and the presence of other dialects. 1 General Information 1.1 Language Classification Kusaal falls under the following classification: “Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, North, Gur, Central, Northern, Oti-Volta, Western, Southeast, Kusaal” (Grimes 1992:175). In the Ethnologue, a book published by the Summer Institute of Linguistics including information on all of the known languages of the world, its code is “KNU”. The language is most closely related to Dagbani and Mampruli (Naden 1989:145), but is also closely related to Frafra (also known by the names Ninkaré or Gurenne) and Mooré. According to Prost, the similarity to Mooré is great, much more similar to Mooré than is Dagaara (Prost 1979:2). 1.1.1 Language Location The Burkina Faso Kusaal region is located in the country's southeastern corner, in the province of Boulgou. However, the great majority of the Kusasi (the name given to the speakers of the language) are found in northeastern Ghana. In Burkina Faso, the neighboring language to the west is Ninkarsé (a related dialect of Frafra); and to the north and east the Bissa. In Ghana, the Kusaal ethnic group is located in the Upper East district, and north of the Gambaga Scarp (Spratt 1968:1). The Kusasi's neighboring languages to the west are the Frafra, Nabdem, and Talensi; to the south is the Mamprusi; and to the east are the Bimoba and Moba. The Kusaal language area in Burkina Faso is roughly 700 km2, while in Ghana it is approximately 3,300 km2. See the map in figure 1.1.2.1 for further details. 1Père Mélançon referred to the dialect as “twen”. In later research, A. Prost found that his informants had not heard of the term; he concluded that they felt that they were the true Kusasi, and thus did not have a dialect name (Prost 1979:1). 5 1.1.2 Description of Location In Burkina Faso, the Kusasi people are found to the south and east of the central (Mossi) plateau. The area is somewhat hilly, and the general impression is that farmlands in the region are only fair. Laclavère, in his atlas of Burkina Faso, places the Kusaal in the range of the tree- vs. bush-marked areas of the country (Laclavère 1993:18), although this area may have certain patches of rather dense “dry” wooded areas. Regarding rainfall, the Kusaal area averages between 900 and 1,000 mm annually (Laclavère 1993:16). The farmland in Ghana appears to be somewhat better, and to be sure, has a slightly higher annual rainfall. What is most striking about the Ghanaian region is that the White (Nakanbé) and Red (Nazinon) Volta Rivers pass through it, the White Volta being in general the boundary between the tonde and agole regions. Figure 1.1.2.1 Map of the Kusaal Region 6 1.2 Population To our knowledge, there are 15 Kusasi villages in Burkina Faso, all of which are located in Boulgou Province's Zabré and Zoaga Departments. Simply calculating the Burkina Kusasi population according to the 1985 Burkina census (INSD 1991), and assuming a 2.68% population growth rate (Laclavère 1993:24), one arrives at a rounded figure of 17,000. It is extremely doubtful, however, that all of the Kusasi villages are made up only of Kusaal speakers: at the villages visited, we learned of the presence of members of neighboring people groups. Therefore, the total Kusasi-speaking population probably does not exceed 16,000. See table 1.1 in the appendix for a list of known Kusaal-speaking villages in Burkina Faso and their populations, as listed in the 1985 Burkina Faso Census Report. The great majority of the Ghanaian Kusasi live in the Upper East Region. Nevertheless, we have two unresolved problems with the statistics available to us. We are forced to assume first that the White Volta River functions as the general boundary throughout the Ghanaian Kusaal territory; and are forced to use population statistics which date from 1988. What is more reliable in these statistics is the more precise breakdown of ethnic groups for each locality. Thus, we calculate there were approximately 245,000 Kusasi in the Bawku Administrative District (Ghana Evangelism Committee 1988:4/1–4/30). In the Upper East Region, there is an estimated 3.09% growth rate (Adams 1993:105), which would put the Kusasi current population at least 353,000. It would seem that around 72% of the total Kusasi population in Ghana are agole speakers. Table 1.2.1 contains a summary of the population statistics. See table 1.2 in the appendix for a list of Kusaal-speaking villages in Ghana and their populations. Table 1.2.1 Population Estimates for the Kusasi Population from Projected 1997 Percent of the mid 1980s Population2 Total Kusasi Population Eastern Kusasi (agole) in Ghana 184,671 253,646 71.6% Western Kusasi (tonde) in Ghana 60,686 83,353 23.5% Western Kusasi (tonde) in Burkina 12,463 17,118 4.8% Faso Total Western Kusasi (tonde) 73,149 100,471 28.4% Totals 330,969 454,588 2Projected 1997 population with a growth rate of 3.09% in Ghana and 2.68% in Burkina Faso. 7 1.3 Accessibility and Transport 1.3.1 Roads: Quality and Availability In Burkina Faso, travel into the general Kusaal-speaking area is possible via Route 12 (from Zabré). In Ghana, access is provided mainly through the east/west Bolgatenga/Bawku and north/south Nakpanduri/Bawku roads. All of these roads appear to be fairly well-maintained. However, direct travel between the majority of Kusaal villages—which are a distance from main roads—can be difficult for a car or truck, as the interior roads are not always regraded each year. Aside from the villages located close to the major roads, travel within the area by 4-wheel vehicles is limited, especially during the wet season. 1.3.2 Public Transport Systems Bush taxis are rare along Route 12 between Burkina Faso and Ghana. There is, however, fairly easy transportation along the Bolgatenga/Bawku road in Ghana, providing a good possibility for contact between the agole and tonde regions. 1.3.3 Trails Trails join many of those villages not near the major roads. A trail, for example, exists from Youngou (Burkina Faso) to Bawku (Ghana), 25 kilometers away. These trails are mainly used for those on foot and on bicycle. 4-wheel vehicles often have quite a difficult time on these trails. 1.4 Religious Adherence 1.4.1 Spiritual Life In both Burkina Faso and Ghana, the traditional religion continues to have a very strong influence among the Kusasi. In both Youga and Binaba, respondents to our questionnaires affirm that followers of the traditional religion are more numerous than both Christians and Muslims. We must also presume that among Christians and Muslims, there are those who continue to practice the traditional ancestral devotion and sacrifices.