‘I am the daughter of a man’
Transgressing gender boundaries, redefining chieftaincy in the life of Nana Kofi Abuna V
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1558/sols.24052Keywords:
Nana Kofi Abuna V, Essipun, feminism, Pentecostalism, GhanaAbstract
The purpose of this article is to discuss the cultural creativity that Nana Kofi Abuna V, the Chief of Essipun Traditional Area in the Western Region of Ghana, is investing in transgressing gender boundaries as a woman chief. Deploying an ethnographic research approach and biographical narrative, feminism as a methodological framework, I argue that Nana is breaking the boundaries of gender to chart new pathways as a woman chief. Nana is one of the few women chiefs in contemporary Ghana. Nana’s ascent to the stool as a chief diverges from the ‘conventional’ practice of male political rule in Akan traditional societies. Since Nana is a woman who bears a male name (Kofi), she acts as a male chief of her Traditional Area. But as a deaconess (church officer) of the Church of Pentecost (CoP), Ghana’s largest Protestant denomination, Nana did not submit to the performance of the rituals of chieftaincy during her installation. Similarly, Nana’s Pentecostal leaning does not permit her to perform ‘chiefship’ rituals. This goes contrary to the centrality of Akan chieftaincy as an ancestral cult and its attendant rituals. Nana, as a Pentecostal woman chief, therefore, breaks through culturally-induced gender boundaries to perform chiefship roles.
References
Adubofuor, B. S. (1994) Evangelical para-church movements in Ghanaian Christianity: c. 1950-early 1990s. PhD Dissertation, University of Edinburg.
Ahikire, J. (2014) African feminism in context: Reflecting on the legitimation battles, victories and reversals. Feminist Africa 19: 7–23.
Aidoo, A. A. (1985) Women in the history and culture of Ghana. Research Review 1(1): 14–51.
Akyeampong, E. and Obeng, P. (1995) Spirituality, gender, and power in Asante history. The International Journal of African Historical Studies 28(3): 481–508. Doi: https://doi.org/10.2307/221171.
Allman, J. (2004) Let your fashion be in line with our Ghanaian costume: Nation, gender, and the politics of cloth-ing in Nkrumah’s Ghana. In J. Allman (ed.) Fashioning Africa: Power and the politics of dress 144–165. Indianapolis: Indiana University Press.
Allman, J., Geiger, S. and Musisi, N. (2002) Women in African colonial histories: An introduction. In J. Allman, S. Geiger, and N. Musisi (eds) Women in African colonial histories 1–18. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.
Amadiume, I. (1998) Male daughters, female husbands: Gender and sex in an African society. London: Zed Books.
Beauvoir, S. de (1953) The second sex (Translated and edited by H. M. Parshley). London: Lowe and Brydone.
Bob-Milliar, M. G. (2009) Chieftaincy, diaspora and development: The institution of Nkosuohene in Ghana. African Affairs 108(433): 541–588. Doi: https://doi.org/10.1093/afraf/adp045.
Brempong, O. (2006) Chieftaincy and traditional taboos: An empirical approach. In I. I. Odotei and K. A. Awedoba (eds) Chieftaincy in Ghana: Culture, governance and development 213–230. Accra: Sub-Saharan Publishers.
Brobbey, S. A. (2008) The law of chieftaincy in Ghana: Incorporating customary arbitration, contempt of court, judicial review. Accra: Advanced Legal Publications (ALP).
Brydon, L. (1996) Women chiefs and power in the Volta Region of Ghana. Journal of Legal Pluralism and Unofficial Law 37: 227–247. Doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/07329113.1996.10756481.
Byfield, J. (2004) Dress and politics in post-World War II Abeokuta (Western Nigeria). In J. Allman (ed.) Fashioning Africa: Power and the politics of Dress 31–49. Indianapolis: Indiana University Press.
Comaroff, J. and Comaroff, J. (1992) Home-made hegemony: Modernity, domesticity, and colonialism in South Africa. In K. T. Hansen (ed.) African encounters with domesticity 37–74. New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press.
Daly, M. (1978) Gyn/ecology: The metaethics of radical feminism. Boston: Beacon Press.
Diabah, G. and Amfo, N. A. A. (2014) Caring supporters or daring usurpers? Representation of women in Akan proverbs. Discourse and Society 26(1): 3–28. https://doi.org/10.1177/0957926514541343.
Diop, C. A. (1989) The cultural unity of black Africa: The domains of patriarchy and of matriarchy in classical antiquity. London: Karnak House.
Dolphyne, F. A. (1991) The emancipation of women: An African perspective. Accra: Ghana Universities Press.
Dosekun, S. (2015) ‘For western girls only?’: Post-feminism as transnational culture. Feminist Media Studies 15(6): 960–975. Doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/14680777.2015.1062991.
Engelke, M. (2010) Past pentecostalism: Notes on rupture, realignment, and everyday life in Pentecostal and African Independent Churches. Africa: Journal of the International African Institute 80(2): 177–99. Doi: https://doi.org/10.3366/afr.2010.0201.
Engels, F. ([1883] 1972) Origin of the family, property and the state. New York: International Publishers.
Hansen, K. T. (1992) Introduction: Domesticity in Africa. In K. T. Hansen (ed.) African encounters with domesticity 1–36. New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press.
Kyomuhendo, B. G. and McIntosh, M. (2006) Women, work and domestic virtue in Uganda, 1900–2003. Oxford: James Currey.
Makana, S. (2018) Contested encounters: Toward a twenty-first century African feminist ethnography. Meridians: Feminism, Race, Transnationalism 17(2): 361–75. Doi: https://doi.org/10.1215/15366936-7176516.
Mama, A. (2001) Challenging subjects: Gender and power in African contexts. African Sociological Review 5(2): 63–73. Doi: https://doi.org/10.4314/asr.v5i2.23191.
Mamdani, M. (1996) Citizen and subject: Contemporary Africa and the legacy of late colonialism. New Jersey: Princeton University Press.
Manuh, T. (1988) The Asantehemaa’s court and its jurisdiction over women: A study in legal pluralism. Research Review NS(2): 50–66.
Mavhungu, K. (2012) Witchcraft in post-colonial Africa: Beliefs, techniques and containment strategies. Makon, Bamenda: Langaa Research and Publishing CIG.
McClintock, A. (1995) The limits of colonial feminism. In A. McClintock (ed.) Imperial leather, race, gender and sexuality in the colonial conquest 258–294. London: Routledge.
McFadden, P. (2005) Becoming postcolonial Africa: African women changing the meaning of citizenship. Meridians: Feminism 6(1): 1–18. Doi: https://doi.org/10.1353/mer.2005.0030.
McFadden, P. (2007) African feminist perspectives of post-coloniality. The Black Scholar 37(1): 36–42. Doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/00064246.2007.11413380.
Meyer, B. (1998) ‘Make a complete break with the past’. Memory and post-colonial modernity in Ghanaian Pentecostalist discourse. Journal of Religion in Africa 28(3): 316–349. Doi: https://doi.org/10.2307/1581573.
Miescher, S. (2007) Becoming an opanyin: Elders, gender and masculinities in Ghana since the twentieth century. In M. Cole, T. Manuh and S. Miescher (eds) Africa after Gender 253–269. Indianapolis: Indiana University Press.
Morgan, L. H. ([1877] 1963) Ancient society. New York: The World Publishing Company.
Obeng, G. S. (1998) Akan death-preventing names: A pragmatic and structural analysis. Names 43(3): 163–87. Doi: https://doi.org/10.1179/nam.1998.46.3.163.
Odotei, I. K. (2006) Women in male corridors of power. In I. K. Odotei and A. K. Awedoba (eds) Chieftaincy in Ghana: Culture, governance and development 81–100. Accra: Sub-Saharan Publishers.
Okech, A. (2020) African feminist epistemic communities and decoloniality. Critical African Studies 12(3): 313–29. Doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/21681392.2020.1810086.
Opoku, A. K. (1978) West African traditional religion. Accra: FEP International Private.
Oyewumi, O. (ed.) (2005) Africa gender studies: A reader. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
Prempeh, C. (2020) Religious Reforms and the Notions of Gender in Pentecostal Christianity: A Case of the Church of Pentecost. In N. Wariboko and A. Afolayan (eds) African Pentecostalism and world Christianity: Essays in honour of J. Kwabena Asamoah-Gyadu 75–87. Eugene: Pickwick Publications.
Prempeh, C. (2021) Dreadlocks in the church of Pentecost: Rasta or rastafarians? PentecoStudies 20(1): 36–55. Doi: https://doi.org/10.1558/pent.40540.
Ray, D. I., Quinlan, T., Sharma, K. and Clarke, T. (eds) (2011) Reinventing African chieftaincy in the age of AIDS, gender, governance, and development. Calgary, AB: University of Calgary Press.
Sartre, J.-P. (2007) Existentialism is a humanism. New Haven and London: Yale University Press.
Stoeltje, J. B. (2003) Asante queen mothers: Precolonial authority in a postcolonial society. Research Review NS 19(2): 1–19. Doi: https://doi.org/10.4314/rrias.v19i2.22871.
Tamale, S. (2016) Nudity, protest and the law in Uganda, Inaugural professorial lecture. Kampala: Makerere University.
Wollstonecraft, M. (1792) Vindication of the rights of women: With strictures on political and moral subjects. London: J. Johnson.
Zeleza, P. T. (2005) Gender biases in African historiography. In O. Oyewumi (ed.) Africa gender studies: A reader 207–232. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
