From Pentecostalism to politics

Mass literacy and community development in late colonial Northern Ghana

Bibliographic Data

ID9388376
AuthorsKate Skinner (0000-0002-3559-4916, University of Birmingham, corresponding author)
Year2010
Volume46
Issue3
Pages307-323
Publication date2010-01-08
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenuePaedagogica Historica (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0030-9230 • E-ISSN: 1477-674X
PublisherTaylor & Francis (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/00309230903194703
OpenAlexW1989562627
LanguageEN
Citations received4

This article takes as its starting point a strike among African trainee literacy workers in the Northern Territories of the Gold Coast (now Ghana) in 1952. While the existing literature tends to concentrate on the tensions and contradictions in British colonial education policy, this article uses the strike to investigate how these agendas were experienced by, and engendered opposition from, literacy workers on the ground. It argues that, in their efforts to link mass literacy to community development, and to secure legitimacy for their campaigns, colonial officials depended heavily upon the authority of chiefs. This strategy backfired because it ignored both shorterterm instances of chiefly venality, and the longer history of colonial taxation and labour demands which had been enforced on Northern peoples through chiefs. The African trainees went on strike because they were astute in recognising how different forms of educational provision fitted into the re‐ordering of local, regional and national power relations as the Gold Coast approached Independence

Colonialism · Legitimacy · Literacy · Opposition (politics · Political economy · Political science · Politics · Sociology · African history and culture studies · African studies and sociopolitical issues · Gender Studies · Law · South African History and Culture

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