Talk:Dagbani language

Untitled 30 January 2006

As far as I know, Dagbani also has contrastive vowel length. I think this is worth mentioning in the article.

Untitled 18 March 2010

Dagbani is most definitely *not* mutually intelligible with Moore. The languages are, very roughly, about as similar as German and Danish. It's not hard for a speaker of one to learn the other, but they are unequivocally not mutually intelligible. I lived for years in Northern Ghana and can testify on this point first hand. Kusaal, which I know quite well, is considerably closer to Dagbani than Moore is, but even Kusaasi do not understand Dagbani without actually learning it!

The situation can easily be mistaken by foreigners who are confused by the fact that it's not uncommon for local people to speak several languages well; this does not imply that the languages themselves are mutually intelligible between monoglot speakers.

BTW Dagbani *does* have contrastive vowel length, as the commenter above says, but the contrast has been lost in open syllables, so you have e.g. Dagbani sana "stranger", plural saamba, as against Moore saana, plural saamba, Kusaal saan(a) plural saam(ma)

86.128.160.189 (talk) 20:32, 18 March 2010 (UTC)

Sexism and gender stereotyping.

@The Vintage Feminist: I have not read the entire paper because I do not have access to that pay wall. However I think the assertion that the language contains "more labels that denigrate and trivialize females than males" is far fetched. I could not find any other source that corroborates that view.—Masssly^✉ 11:53, 27 February 2015 (UTC)

Now reads: According to the linguist Salifu Nantogma Alhassan, there is evidence to suggest that there are gender-related double-standards in the Dagbani language with "more labels that denigrate and trivialise females than males."

"Language and gender: the construction of gender in Dagbanli" (pdf / free online)), was written by Dr. Alhassan's as his Ph.D. thesis paper two years earlier. --The Vintage Feminist (talk) 12:40, 27 February 2015 (UTC)

I would agree that there are words that trivialize not only females but both genders but this not a unique case to the Dagbani language as male and female differences in morphology and lexis, and linguistic items in general have been recorded in all languages" as can be seen in Keenan (1989), Gregersen (1988) and Romaine (1999) referenced here by the linguist in his dissertation mostly based on original research "These (data) were collected...and transcribed...during conversations". See Wikipedia:Original research.

However there are no concrete examples in his thesis whereby these differences suggest any form of denigration or linguistic subordination on a womans personal identity and I'm a native speaker of the language. Many of the observations tended to be based on the linguists' personal biases and this is not surprising. Lakoff (1975) in conducting a simmilar research for instance is believed to have relied heavily on her own impressions and subsequent research came up to challenged many of her assertions. Whiles his/your conclusion is not a generalness, I do not think the word "denigrate" or any of its synonyms deserve a place in the article in that particular context.
—Masssly^✉ 12:11, 28 February 2015 (UTC)

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Title change?

From looking at this page's history, "Dagbani language" was the longterm stable title from the page's creation in 2005, until December 2025 when Masssly moved the page unilaterally. Kwamikagami then moved it back on March 11 2026. I don't have any opinion on the correct title at this time, but the stable status quo ante is "Dagbani", so it falls to Masssly at this time to open discussion and make the case for "Dagbanli" if they so choose. Please do not WP:CUTPASTE the page, which doesn't help at all. _signed, Rosguill ^talk 14:30, 15 March 2026 (UTC)

My note to Kwamikagami is here. --Masssly (talk) 14:38, 15 March 2026 (UTC)

And you need to seek consensus here, on the talk page. Further, I'm not sure which part of the comment to Kwamikagami you think is persuasive; to me it reads like a personal attack, and lacks policy-based arguments. _signed, Rosguill ^talk 14:39, 15 March 2026 (UTC)

For example, this entire section "Contemporary scholars, including Dr. Fatimata Wunpini Mohammed, argue that Dagbanli is the culturally and linguistically appropriate name, and that the continued use of Dagbani reflects colonial-era naming practices. She describes the use of Dagbanli in academic and community contexts as part of ongoing efforts toward linguistic decolonization." was removed by User:Kwamikagami in the article unilaterally. --Masssly (talk) 14:56, 15 March 2026 (UTC)

I won't be reverting you myself but if keep changing our article so it's titled Dagbani but starts off "Dagbanli is a Gur language spoken in Ghana and northern Togo" and uses Dagbanli throughout you're likely to be reverted. If you want to introduce sections like the one you describe you need to stop making bad edits at the same time as editors often don't have time to pick the possibly good edits from the clearly bad ones. Nil Einne (talk) 16:00, 15 March 2026 (UTC)

Also you need to provide inline reliable sources for claims you make in the article. You cannot simply say some scholar said something without a reliable source demonstrating they did. Nil Einne (talk) 16:03, 15 March 2026 (UTC)

Sources almost universally use "Dagbani", and AFAICT there's nothing to indicate that it's anything other than a typical anglicization, not different in kind from "Spanish", "Arabic" or "Malay", with no reason to think it's pejorative. — kwami (talk) 19:30, 15 March 2026 (UTC)

I've spent about an hour digging through English usage, and while there's a minority of usage that goes with Dagbanli, especially in academic sources, Dagbani still appears to be the preferred word in English, generally speaking. As Kwami did, I also searched for any evidence of Dagbani being used as a pejorative, and I'm not finding anything. CoffeeCrumbs (talk) 00:55, 16 March 2026 (UTC)