Slavery and Its Legacy in Ghana and the Diaspora

Ghana-for all its notable strides toward more egalitarian political and social systems in the past 60 years-remains a nation plagued with inequalities stemming from its long history of slavery and slave trading. The work assembled in this collection explores the history of slavery in Ghana and its legacy for both Ghana and the descendants of people sold as slaves from the “Gold Coast” in the era of the transatlantic slave trade. The volume is structured to reflect four overlapping areas of investigation: the changing nature of slavery in Ghana, including the ways in which enslaved people have been integrated into or excluded from kinship systems, social institutions, politics, and the workforce over time; the long-standing connections forged between Ghana and the Americas and Europe through the transatlantic trading system and the forced migration of enslaved people; the development of indigenous and transnational anti-slavery ideologies; and the legacy of slavery and its ongoing reverberations in Ghanaian and diasporic society. Bringing together key scholars from Ghana, Europe and the USA who introduce new sources, frames and methodologies including heritage, gender, critical race, and culture studies, and drawing on archival documents and oral histories, __Slavery and Its Legacy in Ghana and the Diaspora__ will be of great interest to scholars and students of comparative slavery, abolition and West African history. Title Page 4 Copyright Page 5 Contents 6 List of Illustrations 8 Figures 8 Maps 8 Introduction 10 Slavery in Africa 13 Ghana and its Diaspora 18 Slavery and its Legacy 19 The Book and its Authors 22 Notes 24 Part One: The Transatlantic Slave Trade and Slavery before Colonial Rule 36 Chapter 1: Ghana and the Transatlantic Slave Trade 38 Chronology and Demographics 39 The Business on the Coast 41 State Formation 43 Social and Cultural Effects 45 End of the Atlantic Slave Trade in Ghana 47 Notes 47 Chapter 2: “Tied Up”: Slave Relics in Traditional Political Leadership in Burugu, Northern Ghana 55 Methodology 56 Relics: A Brief Discussion 57 The Context of Slavery in northern Ghana 58 In Search of Freedom: Burugu, its Relics, and Traditional Leadership 60 Death of Yayaha, Emerging Issues, and the Position of the Bu Naba 64 Conclusion 67 Acknowledgment 67 Notes 68 Chapter 3: “Earth from a Dead Negro’s Grave”: Ritual Technologies and Mortuary Realms in the Eighteenth-Century Gold Coast Diaspora 71 Obeah and Coromantee Oaths in the Americas 76 Coromantee Fortitude, Self-Destruction, and Transmigration 86 Notes 90 Chapter 4: Anti-Slavery in Nineteenth Century Fanteland 94 Atlantic Creoles in the Nineteenth Century 97 Beginnings of Anti-Slavery in Southern Ghana 98 Anti-Slavery in the 1830s–1850s: Economic Growth and Transatlantic Connections 101 Anti-Slavery in the 1860s–1870s: Aggery, Horton, and the Fante Confederacy 104 Conclusion 106 Notes 107 Part Two: Slavery and Abolition Under British Colonial Rule (1874–1957) 114 Chapter 5: The Claims Wives Made: Slavery and Marriage in the Late-Nineteenth-Century Gold Coast Colony and Protectorate1 116 “Repugnant to the Laws of England” 119 Being both Slave and Wife 121 Claiming “Wife” 125 A Woman Who Claimed “Slave” 127 Conclusions 128 Notes 129 Chapter 6: Signs of an African Emancipation? Slavery and its Resolution in the Reports (1868–1900) of a Ghanaian Pastor—Kofi Theophilus Opoku 135 Introduction 135 Pastor Opoku’s Distress in Distant Slave Markets, 1877 136 Slavery and Emancipation in Theophilus Opoku’s Annual Reports on His Work as Catechist and Pastor in the Southeastern Interior of the Gold Coast Colony, 1868–1900 138 Rebalancing Our History of Emancipation in the Gold Coast Colony 145 Slavery and Associated Relationships as Mirrored in the Basel Mission Archive 146 An African Emancipation? 153 Envoi 155 Notes 158 Chapter 7: An African Abolitionist on the Gold Coast: The Case of Francis P. Fearon 165 Introduction 165 The Emancipation Question and the Educated Community 166 The Fearon–MacMunn Affair 169 The Fearon–MacMunn Affair Reviewed 170 African Perspectives 172 Contextualizing Francis P. Fearon 174 The Aftermath of the Affair—Implications and Interpretations 176 Conclusion 179 Notes 180 Part Three: Memory, Heritage, and the Legacy of Slavery 188 Chapter 8: Slavery and the Slave Trade: A Shared History or Shared Heritage? 190 Introduction 190 History and Heritage: Toward a Definition 190 Slavery and the Slave Trade as History 193 A Divided History or Divisions and Connections? 195 Slavery and the Slave Trade as Heritage 196 Stakeholders in Shared History 199 Responsibilities of Stakeholders in a Shared Heritage 202 Developing and Managing a Shared Heritage for Development in Ghana 204 Conclusion 206 Notes 207 Chapter 9: The Legacy of Indigenous Slavery in Ghana 211 Introduction 211 Traditional Political Office 212 Land Tenure 218 Issues of Inheritance 221 Social Affairs 224 Conclusion 225 Notes 226 Chapter 10: Charged Memories: The Slave Trade in Contemporary Political Discourse 228 The Development of African Slave Sites 229 The Slave-Trade Speech as an American Political Tradition 231 The Slave-Trade Speech as an African Political Tradition 235 Ghana and the Politics of Memory 238 Obama in Ghana 240 Notes 243 Afterword 247 Notes 255 Select Bibliography 258 Index 270 "Ghana--for all its notable strides toward more egalitarian political and social systems in the past 60 years--remains a nation plagued with inequalities stemming from its long history of slavery and slave trading. The work assembled in this collection explores the history of slavery in Ghana and its legacy for both Ghana and the descendants of people sold as slaves from the "Gold Coast" in the era of the transatlantic slave trade. The volume is structured to reflect four overlapping areas of investigation: the changing nature of slavery in Ghana, including the ways in which enslaved people have been integrated into or excluded from kinship systems, social institutions, politics, and the workforce over time; the long-standing connections forged between Ghana and the Americas and Europe through the transatlantic trading system and the forced migration of enslaved people; the development of indigenous and transnational anti-slavery ideologies; and the legacy of slavery and its ongoing reverberations in Ghanaian and diasporic society Bringing together key scholars from Ghana, Europe and the USA who introduce new sources, frames and methodologies including heritage, gender, critical race, and culture studies, and drawing on archival documents and oral histories, Slavery and Its Legacy in Ghana and the Diaspora will be of great interest to scholars and students of comparative slavery, abolition and West African history."--Bloomsbury Publishing.