Building the Ancestral Public
Cemeteries and the Necropolitics of Property in Colonial Ghana
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 7096932 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Sarah Balakrishnan (0000-0001-8134-5737, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2022 |
| Volume | 56 |
| Issue | 1 |
| Pages | 89-113 |
| Publication date | 2022-02-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Journal of Social History (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0022-4529 • E-ISSN: 1527-1897 |
| Publisher | Oxford University Press (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1093/jsh/shac010 |
| OpenAlex | W4210474748 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 11 |
This essay studies changes to mortuary practices in colonial Gold Coast (southern Ghana) beginning with the British state’s creation of town cemeteries in the late nineteenth century. It argues that the colonial state enforced cemetery burial because they realized Gold Coast people would never sell their land if it contained the remains of their elders; cemeteries were therefore a crucial tool in the transformation of land into private property for state dispossession. However, the invention of cemeteries had a significant impact on how communities worshipped, and conceived of, ancestral spirits. By gathering ancestors from the various households into a single site, the graveyard created an “ancestral public,” a community of ancestors who protected the community collectively. Their invention changed Gold Coast communities’ relationship to spirits, the afterlife, and property. What ensued were political contestations over rightful burial places, mortuary authority, and what will be called “the necropolitics of property”—the decision of who could, or who could not, enter the afterlife, and what consequences this had for estates
Afterlife · Ancient history · Archaeology · Art · Colonialism · Gold coast · Gold rush · Political science · Politics · Private property · Property (philosophy · Sociology · State (computer science · African history and culture studies · Anthropological Studies and Insights · Colonialism, slavery, and trade · History · Law
No Place Like Home in a New City
Funerary Placement in the Past and Present
Where the outliers lie
Remains of an Unrealized Yesterday
Introduction
Land management and the Bayaa institution
Property disputes, neighbourhood development and everyday life in Epetedo, colonial Lagos, 1927–1947
In the neighbourhood’
The Probate Regime
Urban History in Kumase, Ghana
Building the City from Below
| Unique citing works | 11 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 2,75 |
| Citation span | 2022 - 2026 (5) |
| Citation velocity | current |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 11 |