Make culture relevant to modern trends - Dr Steegstra

Accra, Sept. 15, GNA - Dr. Marijke Steegstra a cultural anthropologist at Radboud University of Nijmegen, Netherlands on Thursday called for a comprehensive study of Ghanaian cultures, traditions and norms to make it relevant in modern terms. "A historical study would avoid the pitfall of classifying culture as fixed, bounded, outmoded and backward...," Dr Steegstra stated at the launching of an anthropological and historical book, "Dipo and the Politics of Culture in Ghana."

The book analysis the contemporary annual performance of the Dipo initiation rites for girls among the Krobos of Ghana from a historical perspective.

It also deals with questions of culture and development in a context of social and religious change. Drawing on her extensive fieldwork and missionary and colonial archives, and shows how the contemporary performance of Dipo relates to and is shaped by Krobo encounters with missionary Christianity, colonial intervention and modern nationalism. The 347-page book with the effigy of young girls wrapped in traditional kente cloth with precious African beads around their neck embedded at the front is sub-divided into nine chapters. The author, Dr Steegstra said, "the effect of the publications was to make us realise we are just as exotic as anybody else in the world, where everybody thinks what it does is normal and what others do is weird."

She noted, "By applying the rhetoric of ritual to our own society we become aware of our tendency to label any activity of others, which we do not understand as ritual and sacred."

The Author paid tribute to LITVerlag in Germany (Muenster) and WOTRO (the Netherlands Foundation for the Advancement of Tropical Research) for their contributions towards the publications. According to Dr Steegstra proceeds from the sale of the first copies of the book would be donated to the Education Endowment Fund for needy students, initiated by the paramount chief of Manya Krobo, Konor Sackitey II, who chaired the launching.

Professor Dr Irene K. Odotei of the University of Ghana who launched the book encouraged Ghanaians to brace the challenges of research and write more books on cultural practices in the country.