Sunday, October 16, 2016

Ghana



Taiye Selasi doesn't like being asked where she is from. She prefers the question, 'Where are you local?'. Her father was raised in Ghana. She was raised in Nigeria, but lives at times in Ghana, England, the US, and elsewhere. 


The answer to where you are local lies in shared rituals, relationships and restrictions. Familiarity of your world can extend across random borders. 

Ghana, like Middle Ages Europe, saw waves of Kingdoms and movement of people. These became more powerful with the emergence of the Gold Trade. Europeans, including Portuguese, Swedes, and Danes joined this trade over 15-18th century building a number of castles for protection. Free Trade at that stage was Forced Trade. The Anglo-Ashanti wars against the United Kingdom lasted almost the whole of the 19th century. By 1901, the Gold Coast was a British Colony. In 1957, it became the first sub-Saharan African country to gain independence in the post World War II process of decolonisation

British Control in Africa in 1913
Gold Coast in Dark Red

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