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AEGIS European Conference on African Studies
11 - 14 July 2007
African Studies Centre, Leiden, The Netherlands
From Elaine to Mama Amenyo Nyowu Sika: Tourism, development, and the 'whiteman' in Ghana
| Panel |
1. Tourism in Africa
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| Paper ID | 139 |
| Author(s) |
Steegstra, Marijke
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| Paper |
No paper submitted
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| Abstract | The Ghanaian state tries to promote tourism from the West to Ghana as it is thought to benefit the economy. One of the main attractions travel agencies put on their program for Western tourists is Ghana’s ‘rich culture’, including the colourful traditions of chieftaincy. But Ghana is not a mass-tourism destination. Therefore, as Schramm (2004: 165) explains, in addition, the Ghanaian tourism sector puts great emphasis on establishing long-term connections with visitors. This happens mostly through the institutionalization of pilgrimage tourism to the slave sites (see Hasty 2003), which explains the relatively large number of African-American and other Diasporan visitors. But it also happens ‘from below’: Ghanaian communities establish ‘life-long’ connections with foreigners by installing them as so-called ‘development chiefs’ and ‘queenmothers’, people who are supposed to contribute to the development of the particular community, and giving them Ghanaian chieftaincy titles. The people involved range from ambassadors and businessmen, to aid workers, gap-year students, African-American roots pilgrims, and tourists. Especially since the mid 1990s, not coincidentally coinciding with a sharp increase in intercontinental tourism, both Ghanaian and foreign newspapers have been reporting about an increasing number of foreigners installed as (development) chiefs and queenmothers in Ghana. Why is the installation of foreign development chiefs and queens, despite criticism and inflated expectations, flourishing in Ghana?
In this paper it will be argued that this particular ‘tourist’-host interaction, the installation of foreigners as chiefs, can be defined as a process of exchange. Through the giving of a chieftaincy title, Ghanaians position themselves as people who are on equal footing with the oburoni (‘the whiteman’). By reciprocating the gift of development this way, they assert their agency in the process, and show their cultural self pride. However, there is increasing critique from within Ghanaian society on this ‘gift’. While in the beginning (from 1985) development chiefs only included people who had already contributed something substantial (material or otherwise) to the society, now the seemingly indiscriminate installation of people who may have ‘done nothing but donate a few hundred dollars’, as one Ghanaian chief phrased it, seems to imbalance the relationship. Here the concept of ‘whiteness’ appears to come in. ‘Whiteness’ implies power, and the person’s social identity in his/her own culture is irrelevant in this context (Bashkov 2006). This partially explains why ever more tourists, any ‘white’ person passing by, can now be installed as a development chief. The ‘whiteman’ personifies the ideal of development and the face of Western modernity.
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