• Flashcards: Ewe Phonics (105 cards)

    This is a special product for the development of reading skills in Ewe language. It can be applied for both synthetic and analytical phonics as well as other learning activities like spellings.

    It comes with all graphemes of the Ewe alphabet and letter blends along with their corresponding examples. Each letter has a number of corresponding words (based on the first letter), each representing an application of the sound of the particular grapheme. It also comes with numbers in Ewe.

    The pictures and words have been carefully selected to make the learning experience pleasurable and induce diversity in the words.

  • Gbesela Yeye or English-Ewe Dictionary

    The first Gbesela was published in 1910; the second, which was a reprint of the first without any alterations, in 1922. The present edition (1930) is a completely new book and is more than double the size of its predecessors.

    The Gbesela Yeye or New Interpreter is intended to serve both Europeans and Africans, and this purpose has governed its composition and arrangement. The Ewe reader will expect to learn from it the Ewe equivalent for an English word which he may come across in his English reading. or in conversation. In consequence the Dictionary should contain not only the English rendering of Ewe words, but should also try to explain at least the more important of such English words for which the Ewe language has not yet developed a precise expression, and for which circumlocution or approximation is necessary. The enormous difference in the development of the two languages makes it necessary very often to use in Ewe the same word or phrase for a considerable number of English expressions with their numerous fine shades in meaning, although, in justice to Ewe, it must be admitted that in certain respects the valent. Ewe language abounds in expressions for which English is hardly rich enough to offer an equivalent.

    For anyone who wants to acquire the language, the marking of tones is indispensable, as every one will be aware who has ever seriously tried to approach the language. In a Dictionary, where the words stand isolated, even the Ewe Reader will in many cases not be able to find out which word is intended, if the tones are unmarked.

    In books for native speakers of the language, however, that is to say in the national literature, very few tone marks are required, because the context explains what is intended to say. Both non-Ewe and Ewe speakers will find the arrangement helpful by which short phrases or sentences have been added to many words, showing how they are used. This is particularly desirable and almost indispensable in the mutual interpretation of two languages which differ so widely as Ewe and English. The Ewe word in isolation in very many cases conveys practically no meaning to the non-Ewe speaker, unless its construction and application are shown in examples.

  • The Ewe People: A Study of the Ewe People in German Togo

    The Ewe of Ghana, Togo and Benin have been one of the most documented ethnic groups in West Africa, given their encounters with the German, French and British colonial administrations. In 1906, Jakob Spieth, a German Bremen Missionary, published Die Ewe-Stamme. Die Ewe-Stamme is one of the most comprehensive treatises on the history, religion, economic life, traditional social structure, and, indeed, the entire spectrum of everyday life of the Ewe. Published over 100 years ago the book had limited circulation and became increasingly rare to the extent that it almost became a deified piece of work and source of classified knowledge. Additionally, Die Ewe-Stamme was published in German and old non-standard and colloquial Ewe languages. It is hoped this translation of Die Ewe-Stamme into English and contemporary Ewe might create a revival of interest amongst researchers, enhance the understanding for the traditional Ewe culture and become reading material in schools and universities.

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