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Item Akyem Abuakwa C.1874 - 1943: A Study of the Impact of Missionary Activities and Colonial Rule on a Traditional State(University of Ghana, 1980-04) Addo-Fening, R.This thesis is a study of the nature and extent of the pressures -social, economic and political - that the Basel Missionaries and British colonial Administrators brought to bear on Akyem Abuakwa society during the period 1874-1943. The study also examines the state's responses to these pressures and the extent to which they were conditioned by her pre-european historical experience, her ethos, the strengths and weaknesses of her institutional arrangements, the quality of her political leadership and her resources. The general conclusions that emerge from this study are that missionary activities and colonial policies brought a great deal of material progress to Akyem Abuakwa society: the quality of life was improved by the spread of western-style education, by the adoption of new skills, by improved medical care and by infrastructural developments; changes in the customary penal system made the administration of justice more humane; while the evolution of a modem-style bureaucracy at the courts of the chiefs and the adoption of certain administrative routines enabled the complicated and diverse functions of modem government to be effectively discharged. Those positive results were, however, off-set by negative and harmful results: the spiritual foundations of Akyem Abuakwa were seriously undermined by widespread and wilful violation of time-honoured customary taboos by missionary converts in the name of religious freedom as well as by the introduction of a dichotomy between 'church’ and ‘state’, between religion and politics; the cohesion and solidarity of Abuakwa society suffered great damage by the creation of salems whose Christian inhabitants held aloof from the life of the wider community; existing social conflicts were sharpened while new, more serious and harmful ones were introduced by the concept of territorial jurisdiction as embodied in the N.J.O., by the distortion of the character and role of chieftaincy, and by the destruction of the religious conformity of the state; the wakening of extended family ties, growing emphasis on individualism and the failure of Christianity to deal adequately with the trauma. of rapid social and. economic change created problems of security which expressed themselves in alcoholism and neurosis; above all the exploitation of Abuakwa’s immense resources -human and natural - for the greater benefit of her alien rulers resulted in the under-development of the state.Item Women’s Engagement with Radio Broadcasting in Post-Colonial Ghana, 1960-1975(University of Ghana, 2015-06) Akrofi-Quarcoo, S.; Perbi, A.; Gadzekpo, A.; Amoah-Boampong, C.; University of Ghana, College of Humanities, School of Arts, Department of HistoryWhat did Ghanaian Women do with Radio, for what purposes and to what ends? Combining scholarship from gender and colonialism with media theories, archival research (written and audio), and oral history, this study on Women’s Radio history explores Ghanaian Women’s relationships with Radio, “an important Imperialist asset” involved in the mission of “civilising” primitive Africans and empire-building. The overarching theoretical foundation for the study is modernisation, packaged as Victorian styled “domesticity” a framework for British cultural imperialism. The study argues that women across various levels of social and cultural power, appropriated Radio and transformed it into a resource to contest their subordination, to expand their communication space and to negotiate new and more equitable gendered relationship within a predominantly patriarchal domestic space. In support of the thesis, the study examines three areas of women’s relationship with radio. Firstly, it explores the employment trajectory of women in radio careers focusing on the pioneers and key personalities and their contribution to the development of radio in Ghana. Secondly, it unearths the neglected history of Women’s Radio Programmes and shows how post-colonial Ghanaian women used the programme space to subvert colonial and neo-colonial agenda of promoting Victorian-styled domesticity and separate women’s sphere. Thirdly, the study examines the history of women’s listening relationship with radio. Findings from the study indicate that by taking up careers in radio, Ghanaian women transcended historical prejudices against women in the exclusively male-defined economic space of Radio Broadcasting to contribute to the development of radio. In their roles as programme producers, journalists, and programme makers, Ghanaian women were agents in the early construction of national unity and the grander agenda of African Unity. The study also found that Ghanaian women had a strong voice on radio using the Women’s Radio Magazine spaces strategically to advocate women’s rights; to educate women on many issues peculiar to their sex and on national issues of health, hygiene, economics, science, sports and patriotism. As radio listeners, post-colonial Ghanaian women were not passive to radio programmes but selective of the programmes they listened to and engaged with content to facilitate their “personal modernity” and integration into “modern society.” This study presents new evidence that aside propaganda, radio was a primary tool of domesticity from the early 1930s. It also addresses critical historical issues regarding the use of radio to propagate Victorian domesticity in post-colonial Ghana particularly after independence. The study rejects the notion that domesticity was a negative feature of post-colonial Ghanaian women’s life and argues that post-colonial Ghanaian women appropriated radio, a domestic technology and a tool of domesticity and transformed it into a resource to foster their integration into “modern society.”Item Rewriting Women into Ghanaian History 1950-1966(University of Ghana, 2012-09) Opong, A.K.; Odotei, I.K.; Perbi, A.Ghana today enjoys the presence of a multiplicity of voluntary organisations majority of which claim to be dedicated to women’s welfare and empowerment. These groups or movements operate in a rather calm and tolerant political atmosphere and enjoy the benefits of access to and a relatively easy means of information dissemination. How different was the situation in the 1950s and early years after independence when the main focus and attention of Ghanaians particularly, male politicians was on the political fortunes of the new nation and women’s interests and empowerment largely remained a secondary issue? Taking the discussion beyond the political developments in the Gold Coast in the years leading up to independence, a topic which has been the subject of immense research, this study focuses on women’s organizations and how these were able to push their agenda for the enhancement of the status of Ghanaian women in the years leading up to independence and the immediate independent era.Item Nawuri-Gonja Conflict, 1932-1996(University of Ghana, 2012-12) Mbowura, C.K.; Addo-Fening, R.; Awedoba, A.K.; Baku, D.E.K.This study examines the causes of the Nawuri-Gonja conflict, which broke out in 1991 over allodial land rights. In Alfai, as is the case of other Ghanaian societies, the modes of measuring allodial land rights are embedded in the historical traditions of the people. By right of autochthony and autonomy, allodial land rights in Alfai in the pre- colonial period resided in the Nawuri. However, Alfai’s encounters with the colonial enterprise led to the evolution of new constructs of allodial rights in land, which challenged established traditions and provided the opportunity for the immigrant Gonja community to appropriate land. In 1913 the Germans issued a warrant to Kanankulaiwura Mahama Karatu, the Gonja head chief in Alfai then, making him the overlord of the area for the sake of political expediency. This began Gonja rule over the Nawuri, which was made irreversible when the British colonial authorities subsumed Alfai into the Gonja kingdom in 1932 following the introduction of indirect rule in the Northern Territories. This led to series of encounters between the autochthonous Nawuri and their Gonja overlords over allodial rights in land, which expressed itself in social, political and economic debate in Alfai in the colonial and post-colonial times. By the dawn of independence, Alfai continued to remain as an integral part of the Gonja Traditional Area, thus strengthening Gonja claim that the land belonged to them. As the Nawuri and the Gonja continued to jostle each other over allodial land rights in Alfai in the post-colonial times, and as the dispute remained unresolved, war between them became a possibility. This study argues that the conflicting claims over allodial land rights in Alfai between the Nawuri and the Gonja served as the nexus that connected the multiplicity of layers of issues that underlay the conflict.