From a memoir by a Ghanaian writer
In my primary school, there was a small wooden sign we called 'the board of shame'. If a teacher heard you speaking Twi in class, you had to wear it around your neck for the rest of the day. We learned quickly that English was the language of serious things, such as exams, offices and the radio news, and that our mother tongue was for the kitchen and the market.
It took me years to understand that this lesson was older than my teachers. It came from colonial times, when the language of the rulers was presented as the only path to knowledge. Today I write my books in English, but I let Twi walk freely through my pages. My characters pray, joke and argue in it. It is my way of taking that sign off my neck.
Na última frase, ao dizer que tira a placa do pescoço, o narrador indica que