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EDWARD M. BRUNER is
Professor Emeritus, Department of Anthropology, University of Illinois
at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL 61801
(Abridged; published with the
permission of the copyright holder, the American Anthropological
Association. I should like to acknowledge Prof. Bruner’s strong
support for my attempt to obtain permission to republish his paper here
unabridged. Prof. Bruner is not responsible for this abridgment, which
cannot do justice to the original.)
Figure 1: Elmina Castle. Photo by Edward M. Bruner
My essay (describes)
the meeting in the border zone between African American tourists who
return to mother Africa, specifically to Elmina Castle on the coast of
Ghana, and the local Akan speaking Fanti who receive them.
In 1993, there were 17,091 visitors to Elmina Castle; 67 percent were
residents of Ghana, 12.5 percent were Europeans, and 12.3 percent were
North Americans. An important and growing segment consists of blacks
from the diaspora, and includes many African Americans.
The Struggle over Meaning
As part of the tourism development project, much effort has gone toward
the rehabilitation of the historic castles and the construction of a
museum in Cape Coast Castle. The increased attention has precipitated
discussion over the interpretation of the castles, particularly over
which version of history shall be told.
What most Ghanaians want from tourism is economic development, including
employment, new sources of income, better sanitation and waste disposal,
improved roads, and a new harbor.
While Ghanaians see tourism primarily as a route to development, the
African American tourists have a different perspective.
African
Americans focus on the dungeons at the 500-year-old Elmina Castle
because, understandably, the slave trade is of primary interest to them.
Indeed, many African Americans come to Ghana in a quest for their roots,
to experience one of the very sites from which their ancestors may have
begun the torturous journey to the New World. It is for them a
transition point between the civility of their family in Africa and the
barbarism of slavery in the New World.
For many African Americans, the castles are sacred ground not to be
desecrated. They do not want the castles to be made beautiful or to be
whitewashed. They want the original stench to remain in the dungeons. .
. Some diaspora blacks feel that even though they are not Ghanaians, the castles
belong to them.
Balancing this sadness is the sense of strength and pride many African
Americans feel at the recognition that their ancestors must have been
strong people to have survived these inhuman conditions.
Most
Ghanaians, on the other hand, are not particularly concerned with
slavery.
Generally
Ghanaians focus on the long history of Elmina, while diaspora blacks
focus on the mid-Atlantic slave trade, which reached its height between
1700 and 1850. Ghanaians want the castles restored, with good lighting
and heating, so they will be attractive to tourists; African Americans
want the castles to be as they see them - a cemetery for the slaves who
died in the dungeons' inhuman conditions while waiting for the ships to
transport them to the Americas. Ghanaians see the castles as festive
places; African Americans as somber places.
Conflicting
Interpretations
Which
story shall be told? Vested interests and strong feelings are involved.
The Representation of Slavery
The attention of diaspora blacks to the dungeons and the slave experience has the
potential consequence of introducing into Ghanaian society increased
tension between African Americans and Ghanaians, and possibly a
heightened awareness of black-white opposition, a sensitive and possibly
controversial issue. . .
The situation is full of ironies. When diaspora blacks return to Africa,
the Ghanaians call them obruni, which
means "whiteman'' . . .
Many Ghanaians have told me that they consider some African Americans to
be racist.
. . . an African American
tourist who meets a Ghanaian may secretly wonder, Did his ancestors sell
my ancestors? Further, some Ghanaians, seeing that diaspora blacks are prosperous and
educated, feel they were in a sense fortunate in being taken as slaves,
because now they are economically well off and have a higher standard of
living than the Ghanaians. African Americans too may ask, What would my
life have been like had my ancestors not been taken as slaves but
remained in Africa?
Mahdi, Adamu The Hausa Factor in West African History ABUP OUP
Cheo Taylor Tyehimba on Shooting 'Back to Africa' Bullets
Shooting ‘Back
to Africa’ Bullets
By Cheo Taylor Tyehimba
TBWT Reporter
Article Dated 3/24/2001
OTHER REFERENCES
Brathwaite, Edward, Rights of Passage, OUP, 1967
Brathwaite, Edward, Masks, OUP, 1968
Harris, Joseph, ed, Global dimensions of the African Diaspora
Kreamer, Christine Mullen,
Contested Terrain: Cultural Negotiation and Ghana's Cape Coast Castle
Exhibition, "Crossroads of People, Crossroads of Trade" Forthcoming in
Ralph A. Austen and Kenneth Warren (eds.), The Atlantic Slave Trade in
African and Diaspora Memory. Duke University Press, ca. 2002.
Newbury, C. W., The
Western Slave Coast and its Rulers, Oxford, 1961.
Verger, Pierre. Bahia and the West African trade, 1549-1851 Published for the Institute of African Studies by lbadan university Press,.1970.
LINKS
Cheryl Finley: The Door of (No) Return
Identity politics and cultural heritage tourism in Ghana
http://www.common-place.org/vol-01/no-04/finley/
Common-Place: Special Edition on American Slavery (http://www.common-place.org/
)
.
. . I traveled to Ghana to conduct research in the historic castles and
dungeons of Cape Coast and Elmina. . . . I went there to study how the curators
of these sites reconstructed the history of the slave trade, and how visitors
interacted with the history exhibitions and the physical environment.
Specifically, I wanted to understand how visitors formulated ideas about
remembrance, cultural identity, and heritage in the space of the monuments. . .