Foreign Cinema And Popular Culture In Ghana, 1960 Circa 1980.
Date
2022-04
Authors
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Publisher
University Of Ghana
Abstract
A trend of popular culture evolved among Ghanaians from the 1960s to the 1980s. The
watershed of this was foreign cinemas or films awash in Ghana. It became popular with the
youth who served as agents of acculturated products, namely dressing, hairdo, slang, accents,
and gaits or imitated walking skills harvested from the foreign films. This M.A. thesis
examines the two decades of the efflorescence of unique popular culture in Ghana that
influenced Ghanaian intangible heritage.
Data for the thesis was based on primary and secondary sources. I made use of some research
methods, namely structured interviews to garner specific questions for the objectives of the
study. An open-ended interview questionnaire allowed respondents the latitude to add
complimentary insights. Additionally, focused group discussions among adults who were
between the ages of fifty-five and seventy years were employed. The relevance of the age-set
group is that they had the privilege to witness foreign films as a conduit of popular culture in
Ghana, and indeed, participated in the process and were impacted by the films whose end
products were a composite heritage.
Cinema and popular culture are centripetal to discussions of the tangible and intangible
heritage of people living within a specific era. The tangible refers to cinema houses that are
operating or those whose premises are being used for other purposes today. On the other
hand, the intangible ones are in the realm of acculturation. The demise of foreign cinemas in
the late 1980s appears to have brought to an end the ongoing acculturation emanating from
foreign films. This is not to say that the cultural influences from foreign films atrophied.
Rather they were perpetuated in streams of social change with some being retained while
others took on new hues and glow. Thus, the main goal of this thesis is to historicize heritage
from the watershed of foreign films, pointing to cultural trends such as fashion styles,
hairdos, gaits, slang, accents, and so on.
In sum, I show that from 1960 to 1980 foreign films were heavily patronized in Ghana
because it was a medium for watching movable human action or scenes on screens. As a
result, it eventually functioned as a venue of socialization and acculturation for the youths.
Thus, the thesis discusses how foreign lifestyles of popular culture were acculturated into
Ghanaian society through foreign films with Ghanaian youths as the agency.
Description
Keywords
Foreign Cinema, Popular Culture, Ghana, 1960 Circa 1980