Syntactical Features Of The Gullah Language

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Ebonics is not the only language of the African diaspora that preserved its Africanity. In addition to several African influenced creoles, the Gullah language of the Sea Islands is reflective of African spirituality and philosophy. The Gullah language developed among enslaved Africans along the coasts of South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida, as well as the Sea Islands (Turner, 1). This region can be referred to as the Coast. In the early 18th century slaves from the West Indies, where resistance had grown common, as well as rebellious slaves from various colonies were being sent to the Coast. Taxes were placed upon these imported slaves because they were thought to have the ability of corrupting the slave system on the coast. Thus, slave …show more content…

In respect to the distinction of voice, Turner uses the example of a Gullah speaker saying, “they beat him” instead of the English syntactic phrase, “he was beaten” (Turner, 209). Thus, distinctive voice is eliminated by the use of the objective case as opposed to passive verbs in English. This syntactical framework can be found in the African languages of Ewe, Yoruba, Twi, Fante, and Ga (Turner, 209). Similarly to the languages of Ewe and Yoruba, the verb /de/ is the Gullah language is used as a prepositional verb. Also, in the Gullah language verbs are often used in pairs or phrases, which is reflective of the languages of the Ewe and Twi people (Turner, …show more content…

In the display of Gullah song lyrics, Turner notes that the words were accompanied by handclapping, drumming, and dancing (256). While in Ghana I visited Nana Abass’ shrine of African traditional worship, where I was able to engage in spiritual service. The key component of the service was the dancing, singing, handclapping, and drumming. These methods were used to call in the presence of the spirits. Thus, one can assume that the combination of such elements in Gullah song is a spiritual

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