Quick—what language do they speak in West Africa? If you answered French, that is partially true, but this is really a trick question, since hundreds of languages are spoken across the vast area that encompasses West Africa. French and English are used as lingua francas in different countries in the region, but most West Africans speak an indigenous African language as their first, only learning the European languages for interethnic communication. This is the case in Togo, where the population learns French as a second language—but many people speak the indigenous Ewe as their first.
That’s right—despite its name, Ewe is a human language, not a sheep language. This often overlooked African language boasts as many as 20 million native speakers in Togo, Ghana, and Benin—it has even been granted “national language” status in Togo and Ghana. But sadly, most translation agencies ignore important African languages like Ewe in favor of European or Asian languages, so finding translation services for Ewe can be tricky. Not with TranslationServices.com, though. We have a team of professional Ewe translators, and we’re proud to offer our Ewe translation services.
Would you like professional Ewe translation services? Get in touch today to request a free quote!
Here’s some more information about Ewe!
Ewe is widely spoken in the southern portion of the remarkably narrow West African country of Togo, as well as the southeastern part of Ghana and a small area in the southwest of Benin. The language is part of the huge Niger–Congo language family, making it distantly related to Swahili. However, it’s on a completely different branch from the well-known Bantu language, residing on the Gbe branch of the family. This makes it closely related to neighboring languages like Gen, with which it’s mutually intelligible.
Ewe is a tonal language, like many other languages in West Africa, which means the tone can carry important grammatical distinctions. The word order is subject-verb-object—just like in English—but adjectives come after the noun, and Ewe uses postpositions rather than prepositions like English. Ewe makes heavy use of serial verb constructions, wherein verbs are stacked together with no connecting words, which can sometimes make for ambiguous sentences. However, Ewe avoids ambiguity in pronouns by employing a fourth-person pronoun to distinguish between multiple third-person referents.
What do you want us to translate to or from Ewe?
Ewe is a unique and beautiful West African language, and as tricky as the language may be, our professional Ewe translators—native speakers hailing from around Togo, Ghana, and Benin—are proud to offer translation services for their language. We’re proud to offer translation services both to and from Ewe for just about any type of content you can think of.
Business documents? Whether you’re an international company eying a new West African market or a local business that wants to branch out to the wider world, our Ewe translators are here to help. Academic or educational content? Whether you’re a Togolese scholar who wants to share your findings with the international community or an educator looking to produce Ewe-language learning materials for native-speaking children, our team is here for you. Literary and creative content? Whether you wish to publish traditional Ewe stories in other countries or want to translate more websites, apps, and games into Ewe to usher the language into the digital era, our Ewe translators are eager to assist.
To start your Ewe translation project, simply contact us today.