Shadows of Empire in West Africa

1. Front Matter

   Pages i-xxii

   PDF

2. Introduction: Interpreting West Africa’s Forts and Castles

   • John Kwadwo Osei-Tutu, Victoria Ellen Smith

   Pages 1-31

3. Grossfriedrichsburg, the First German Colony in Africa? Brandenburg-Prussia, Atlantic Entanglements and National Memory

   • Roberto Zaugg

   Pages 33-73

4. ‘Far from My Native Land, and Far from You’: Reimagining the British at Cape Coast Castle in the Nineteenth Century

   • Victoria Ellen Smith

   Pages 75-106

5. Viewed from a Distance: Eighteenth-Century Images of Fortifications on the Coast of West Africa

   • Emily Mann

   Pages 107-136

6. Illusions of Grandeur and Protection: Perceptions and (Mis)Representations of the Defensive Efficacy of European-Built Fortifications on the Gold Coast, Seventeenth–Early Nineteenth Centuries

   • John Kwadwo Osei-Tutu, Hermann W. von Hesse

   Pages 137-167

7. Female Agency in a Cultural Confluence: Women, Trade and Politics in Seventeenth- and Eighteenth-Century Gold Coast

   • Kwabena Adu-Boahen

   Pages 169-199

8. Fort Metal Cross: Commercial Epicentre of the British on the Gold Coast

   • Fritz Biveridge

   Pages 201-237

9. European Fortifications in West Africa as Architectural Containers and Oppressive Contraptions

   • Henry Nii Adziri Wellington, Rexford Assasie Oppong

   Pages 239-272

10. A Theatre of Memory for the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade: Cape Coast Castle and Its Museum

    • Neelima Jeychandran

    Pages 273-295

11. Diplomacy, Identity and Appropriation of the “Door of no Return”. President Barack Obama and Family in Ghana and the Cape Coast Castle, 2009

    • John Kwadwo Osei-Tutu, Ebenezer Ayesu

    Pages 297-326

12. Recreating Pre-colonial Forts and Castles: Heritage Policies and Restoration Practices in the Gold Coast/Ghana, 1945 to 1970s

    • Jon Olav Hove

    Pages 327-350

13. Back Matter

    Pages 351-368

    PDF

These essays reexamine European forts in West Africa as hubs where different peoples interacted, negotiated and transformed each other socially, politically, culturally, and economically. This collection brings together scholars of history, archaeology, cultural studies, and others to present  a nuanced image of fortifications, showing that over time the functions and impacts of the buildings changed as the motives, missions, allegiances, and power dynamics in the region also changed. Focusing on the fortifications of Ghana, the authors discuss how these structures may be interpreted as connecting Ghanaian and West African histories to a multitude of global histories. They also enable greater understanding of the fortifications’ contemporary use as heritage sites, where the Afro-European experience is narrated through guided tours and museums.

• West African History
• Forts and Castles in West Africa
• Colonial Society in Africa
• Cape Coast Castle
• William Smith, Thirty different drafts of Guinea
• Jean Barbot, Description of the Coasts of North and South Guinea
• history of women Gold Coast
• history of Gold Coast trade
• European architecture in Africa
• Obama visit to Cape Coast Castle
• colonial fortresses on Ghana coast
• heritage policies in twentieth-century Ghana
• heritage tourism in Africa
• African diaspora roots tourism
• African museum studies

• Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Trondheim, Norway

  John Kwadwo Osei-Tutu

• University of Ghana, Legon, Ghana

  Victoria Ellen Smith

John Kwadwo Osei-Tutu is Associate Professor in the Department of Historical Studies at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Norway. He is a member of the Editorial Committee of the Transactions of the Historical Society of Ghana.


Victoria Ellen Smith is a Lecturer in the Department of History at the University of Ghana. She is Founding Curator of the Adu Boahen Memorial Library and Archive.

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