Oborɔnyi is the Akan (or more specifically, the Fante) word for foreigner, literally meaning "those who come from over the horizon."[1] It is often colloquially translated into "white person."[2]
West Africa does not have an equivalent of the ubiquitous "mzungu", used throughout Eastern and Southern Africa, and even within Ghana,『oborɔnyi』predominates because it is common to the predominant local languages, those of Akan family, primarily Fante, Akuapem Twi and Asante twi. Other Akan languages employ variants on "oborɔnyi": For example, the Ashantes use the term "Broni" or "Aborɔfo", and Northern Ghana uses a more complex pastiche of terms: "gbampielli", "pielli", "siliminga" (Dagbani and other Gur languages), "bature", "baturiya" (Hausa language), "nasaara" (Arabic loanword used by some Muslims literally meaning "Christian"), "toubab" (Mande languages), among other terms.[3]
"Oborɔnyi" is not a direct translation of "white." For most Ghanaians, an oborɔnyi refers to any person with lighter skin or straighter hair than a dark-skinned Ghanaian. Asians, Middle-Easterners, Whites, Latinos and sometimes, by extension, even dark-skinned people who are regarded as having been heavily influenced by foreign cultures, like African American or Africans who have lived outside Africa for a long time may all be called "Oborɔnyi".[2] Americans of Ghanaian descent are still considered oborɔnyi because they come from abroad. Oborɔnyi are considered amusing, especially in rural areas, where children might follow around a foreigner, chanting the word.[4] The term is not derogatory, but a way to identify someone who is not a native-born Ghanaian, or an "obibinyi."
Oborɔnyi has a few uncommon modifiers in colloquial Akan. "Oborɔnyi pɛtɛ", meaning "vulture foreigner" refers to poor foreigners or more accurately, poor light-skinned foreigner.『Oborɔnyi fitaa,』meaning "white foreigner" refers to White people, "fitaa" is the Akan word for the color "white".『Obibini-borɔnyi,』meaning "black -foreigner" is an amusing (and acceptable) term for a very light-skinned African or an African who has been heavily influenced by foreign cultures. Though these modifiers are infrequently used, they point to how views of different races are written into the Akan language. In short,『Oborɔnyi』refers to a light-skinned foreigner, but by extension, could also refer to a dark-skinned person (native or foreigner) who looks, acts or talks like a light-skinned foreigner."[4]
The word oborɔnyi derives from the word bor (Fante), which means "from beyond the horizon," and nyi, which is a suffix that means "person". The plural form of oborɔnyiisaborɔfo (fo is the plural form of nyi).[citation needed]
There is another theory that oborɔnyi (and its plural form "aborɔfo") and derived from the similarly sounding phrase abrɔ nipa ("abrɔ" meaning "wicked" and "nipa" meaning person) for singular and abrɔfoɔ (meaning wicked people). In place of "wicked", it could also mean "trickster", "one who frustrates" or "one who cannot be trusted". Many believe this to be the case considering the deeds of White people in Ghana in the 17th-19th centuries, but present-day Ghanaians don't have this in mind when they call someone『oborɔnyi』(even though they might know that this is how the term came about).[citation needed]
InCentral and West Africa among either Mandé, Wolof speakers, and Francophone Africans, the name for a person of European descent is Toubab or tubabu, this is also true of the pockets of Mande speakers in northern and northwestern Ghana.
Initially among the Yoruba, and subsequently in casual speech in a number of other languages in Nigeria, the word used for a "white" person is Oyinbo.
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