Legon Journal of the Humanities, 25
(2014)
P a g e
| 49
from Friday late afternoon to the morning of the Saturday. In the evening of the Friday,
close relatives of the deceased gather in the family house to keep wake. The tradition is
that any sympathizer who comes around to greet the family is given an update or a briefing
on the
cause of death, which is usually done in Leteh first, and then summarized in Twi.
On the following day, the family head performs a rite to select a successor for the
dead person. The gathering is usually made up of close family members who are mostly
Larterians. It is a short ceremony during which Leteh is largely spoken. The following is
an extract of a funeral session for a deceased relative
who had lived and worked in
Kumasi, a town in the Ashanti Region of Ghana. On this occasion, Leteh (L) is spoken
and then interpreted into Twi (T).
Figure 4
Language choice at a funeral (i)
(Sympathizers enter the funeral grounds
to greet the bereaved family;
the family
spokesman introduces them)
.
Dostları ilə paylaş: 
