Abstract:
The emergence and institutionalization of feminist geography
in Ghana was in tandem with the global feminist
movement in the 1970s and its subsequent international
women’s conferences. This paper discusses the pioneering
work and research at the Department of Geography
and Resource Development, University of Ghana, and its
effect on the institutionalization and diffusion of feminist
geography in Ghana. Through research and external collaborations,
the need for gender as an academic discipline
was strongly argued for and instituted as an undergraduate
course at the Department of Geography and Resource
Development, University of Ghana. These external collaborations
with other feminist geographers in international
geography associations and universities served as a boost
as they created opportunities for highlighting the spatial
variations in the role and situation of particularly women’s
lives in Ghana. Subsequently, there was a diffusion of
feminist geography research and its institutionalization as
an academic sub-discipline in Geography departments
in other Ghanaian universities. These notwithstanding, the
departments of Geography in Ghanaian universities are still
dominated by male faculty members. Moreover, research
work has been mainly in the field of human geography more
than the physical aspects calling for the mainstreaming of
gender issues in all the systematic branches of the discipline.
