Dangme Alphabet

Dangme is written in the Latin alphabet, in this order: A B D E Ɛ F G GB H I J K KP L M N NY Ŋ ŊM O Ɔ P S T TS U V W Y Z, each with a capital and a small form. The three single-character letters beyond English are Ɛ ɛ (open e), Ŋ ŋ (eng) and Ɔ ɔ (open o); in word lists, words with ɛ follow all words with e. C, Q, R and X are not part of the alphabet.

Five Dangme alphabet entries are written with two characters: gb, kp, ny, ŋm and ts. gb and kp are made at the lips and the back of the mouth at the same time, and ŋm is the nasal partner of that pair. ny is the sound of the ñ in Spanish año, while ts represents the “ch” sound in English. These multiletter alphabet entries are typed by entering their characters in sequence.

Dangme is a tonal language: the pitch of a syllable can change which word it is. Its everyday spelling, like that of Ga and Twi, does not mark tones with accents, so the alphabet needs no accented letters; readers know the word from its context.

What ɛ, ɔ and ŋ sound like

Dangme has seven vowels but Latin has only five vowel letters, and ɛ and ɔ fill the gap. Plain e is a close e, near the vowel of French été, while ɛ is the open e of English bed. Plain o is a close o, near the o of go, while ɔ is the open o of British law. Swapping one for the other can give a different word, so writing ɛ as e or ɔ as o is a real spelling mistake, not a style choice.

The Dangme letter ŋ represents the ng sound in English sing, and it appears in ŋm as well. Many Dangme school books, following the Bureau of Ghana Languages spelling, write the same sounds as ng and ngm (as in the festival name Ngmayem), while linguistic descriptions and this page use ŋ and ŋm. Ga and Ewe also use ɛ, ɔ and ŋ; standard Akan (Twi and Fante) uses ɛ and ɔ, but not the letter ŋ.

Watch the look-alikes when you copy: ɛ (Latin small letter open e, U+025B) is not the Greek ε epsilon, and ɔ (Latin small letter open o, U+0254) is not the reversed c ↄ or the Greek ω. Text typed with a look-alike looks almost right but breaks search, spell-checking and sorting.

How to type ɛ, ɔ and ŋ on a keyboard and phone

On a phone, the easiest way is a Ghanaian-language keyboard with the characters you need. For example, Nkyea includes ɛ, ɔ and ŋ for Twi (Akan), Ewe and Ga, or you can copy the letters straight from this page and paste them.

On Windows, in Microsoft Word or WordPad type the code and press Alt+X: 025B gives ɛ and 0190 Ɛ, 0254 gives ɔ and 0186 Ɔ, 014B gives ŋ and 014A Ŋ. On a Mac, press Control+Command+Space to open the Character Viewer and search for open e, open o or eng.

In HTML, write ɛ for ɛ, Ɛ for Ɛ, ɔ for ɔ, Ɔ for Ɔ, and ŋ or Ŋ for ŋ and Ŋ. The cedi sign ₵ is 20B5 then Alt+X in Word, or ₵ in HTML.

Where the Dangme language is spoken

Dangme is spoken in south-eastern Ghana, on the coastal plains east of Accra and in the hills behind them, in the Greater Accra and Eastern Regions; CLDR estimates about 1 million speakers. Its dialects carry the names of the peoples who speak them: Krobo, the largest, around Odumase, Somanya and Agomanya; Ada at the mouth of the Volta; and Shai, Osudoku, Ningo, Prampram and Kpone. Adangme and Adangbe are other spellings of the same name, common in older English writing.

Dangme's closest relative is Ga, the language of Accra; together they form the Ga–Dangme branch of the Kwa languages, which is why you will often see “Ga-Dangme” and “Ga-Adangbe”. Dangme is one of the Ghanaian languages taught in schools, and it is the language of local radio, church services, gospel songs and the Dangme Bible.

For money, Dangme speakers use the Ghana cedi: prices are written GH₵ 20 or, with the easier cent sign, GH¢ 20. For the letters of Ghana's other languages see the Ga, Akan and Ewe collections, and for the flag, the cedi and the country's emoji see Ghana.

Krobo beads, Ada salt and Dangme festivals in emoji

A few emoji belong to Dangme culture as naturally as its letters. 📿 stands for Krobo beads, the glass beads the Krobo make from crushed, often recycled glass fired in clay moulds, worn above all at Dipo, the rite that marks a Krobo girl's coming of age. 🧂 is for the salt the people of Ada have long gathered from the Songor Lagoon near the Volta estuary.

🌾 fits Ngmayem, the Krobo millet harvest festival, and the Ada people celebrate Asafotufiami, the festival of their warrior companies, with drums 🥁 and processions. Add 🇬🇭 and the message is complete.