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AEGIS European Conference on African Studies
11 - 14 July 2007
African Studies Centre, Leiden, The Netherlands
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Winds of Change and the Ghanaian Family in the 21st Century
| Panel |
2. Representation of the African Family of the 21st Century
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| Paper ID | 698 |
| Author(s) |
Ardayfio-Schandorf, Elizabeth
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| Paper |
No paper submitted
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| Abstract | The pre-colonial period in Ghana, which started about the 1st Century AD, well before the indigenous people came into contact with Arabs and Europeans, was the period of indigenous culture. The family institution during this period was a strong one where communal living was the norm. The indigenous environment into which a person is born has a strong bearing on his\her future relations as the family occupied a unique place in the indigenous community. The concept of the family then involved kinship and filial relations well beyond the immediate father-mother-child relationships. The physical setting within which the functions of the nuclear and extended family were performed were varied and complex and were based on kinship ties. The way daily activities were executed were all functions of culture and religion. Families lived together in similar geographic space, worked together, owned property jointly and took responsibility for the upbringing and enculturation of the young together. There was a high premium on child bearing and polygyny was therefore accepted and encouraged under certain circumstances. Control of economic power and other power relations favoured males. This common family form was to change with major infiltration and infusion of foreign cultures. Clearly, the dominant space relations and interactions brought about by Arabs since 700 AD and Europeans in the 15th Century, were to transform this indigenous family institution. These have been further influenced by westernization and globalization. The paper consequently discusses the winds of change underlying the dynamism of the family in Ghana. It analyses the impact of foreign cultures and modernization processes on the indigenous family with respect to women and children in the family. Inspite of the challenges, core aspects of the indigenous family institution still survive alongside the external institutions as rays of hope in contemporary times.
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