Professor of African Languages and Linguistics
Ph.D., Leiden University
- 342 Pugh Hall
- essegbey@ufl.edu
- 352.846.2431
- Homepage
- Curriculum Vitae
Office Hours — Fall 2023
- By appointment
Areas of Interest
My research interests include the description and documentation of endangered languages, syntax-semantics interface, the varieties of English spoken by people of African descent, and the influence of African languages on creoles. I work on the Kwa languages of West Africa, especially Gbe (i.e. Ewe, Gen, Aja and Fon), Akan, and Ghana-Togo Mountain (GTM) languages (Nyangbo and Animere). I also investigate the influence of the Gbe languages on Suriname creoles.
Selected Papers
- 2019 Cutting across the Gbe divide. In Essegbey, James & Kallulli Dalina & Bodomo, Adams (eds.), The grammar of verbs and their arguments: a cross-linguistic perspective, 85-114. Cologne: Rüdiger Köppe
- 2018 The influence of writing on oral traditions: the case of Nyangbo. In Leonard Muaka & Esther M. Lisanza (eds.), Language in contemporary African cultures and societies. Lanham: Lexington Books. 77-90
- 2017 Divergence and convergence among Ghana-Togo Mountain languages. In Language Typology and Linguistic Universals (STUF). With Felix Ameka
- 2017 Language endangerment, documentation and revitalization. In R. Vossen and G. Dimmendaal (eds.), The Oxford Handbook of African languages, 833-842.Oxford: Oxford University Press
- 2015 “Is this my language?”: Developing a writing system for an endangered-language community. In J. Essegbey, B. Henderson, and F. McLaughlin (eds). Language documentation and endangerment in Africa. John Benjamins, 153-177
- 2015 Language use at home and performance in English composition in multilingual Ghana. 2015. (urn:nbn:de:0009-10-42168) . With Sika Ahadzie and Felix Ameka. https://www.afrikanistik-aegyptologie-online.de/archiv/2015/4216/
- 2013 Serialising languages: Satellite-framed, verb-framed or neither. In Ghana Journal of Linguistics, Vol 2 (1), 19-38. With Felix Ameka (http://www.ajol.info/index.php/gjl/article view/90783)
- 2013 Cross-linguistic influence in language creation: assessing the role of the Gbe languages in the formation of the Creoles of Surinam. Lingua 129 (2013), 1-8. (with Bettina Migge & Donald Winford)
- 2010 Locative expression in Tutrugbu: losing typological characteristics due to contact. Journal of West African Languages 37, 93-118
Courses Taught
- AKA 1130 Beginning Akan 1
- AKA 1131 Beginning Akan 2
- AKA 2200 Intermediate Akan 1
- AKA 2201 Intermediate Akan 2
- SST 2501 African Elements in the Americas
- SSA 4903 Africanisms in the Americas
- SSA 4930 Black Englishes
- SSA 4930 Methods of Language Documentation