Food and Identity in Nineteenth and Twentieth Century Ghana: Food, Fights, and Regionalism

by Brandi Simpson Miller

Overview

This book investigates how cooking, eating, and identity are connected to the local micro-climates in each of Ghana’s major eco-culinary zones. The work is based on several years of researching Ghanaian culinary history and cuisine, including field work, archival research, and interdisciplinary investigation. The political economy of Ghana is used as an analytical framework with which to investigate the following questions: How are traditional food production structures in Ghana coping with global capitalist production, distribution, and consumption? How do land, climate, and weather structure or provide the foundation for food consumption and how does that affect the separate traditional and capitalist production sectors? Despite the post WWII food fight that launched Ghana’s bid for independence from the British empire, Ghana’s story demonstrates the centrality of local foods and cooking to its national character. The cultural weight of regional traditional foods, their power to satisfy, and the overall collective social emphasis on the ‘proper’ meal, have persisted in Ghana, irrespective of centuries of trade with Europeans. This book will be of interest to scholars in food studies, comparative studies, and African studies, and is sure to capture the interest of students in new ways.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9783030884055
Publisher:	Springer International Publishing
Publication date:	01/13/2023
Series:	Food and Identity in a Globalising World
Edition description:	1st ed. 2021
Pages:	319
Product dimensions:	5.83(w) x 8.27(h) x (d)

About the Author

Brandi Simpson Miller is Visiting Assistant Professor of History and the Assistant Director for the Wesleyan College Center for Social and Racial Equity, Georgia, USA.

Table of Contents

1. In Search of Ghanaian Food.- 2. Ghana’s Eco-Culinary Zones.- 3. The Proper Meal.- 4. The Asante and Diplomatic Use of Food - A Symphony of Signals.- 5. Gold Coast Foodways in the Nineteenth Century.- 6. Savanna Foodways.- 7. Colonialism and Local Foodways.- 8. Globalisation and Local Foodways in Ghana.

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

“This book presents a fascinating account of the complex regional foodways, and the different eco-culinary zones of The Gold Coast/Ghana from the nineteenth to the twenty-first century. It uses an impressive range of primary and other sources and the approach taken by the author would provide an excellent model for exploring the history of culinary culture of other African nations. The book also provides a particularly insightful investigation into the history of the gendered division of labour, and the crucial role played by African women in growing, preparing, selling and cooking food” - Dr Igor Cusack, University of Leicestershire, UK

“This book on the social history of food and cooking in Ghana represents a major interdisciplinary accomplishment. She has, like an expert quilter, carefully and critically pieced together her own and others' research on material culture, history, geography, sociology, politics, food studies, technology, gendered relationships, theologies, and more, to create a timeless and fascinating work of beauty and great value” - Dr. Fran Osseo-Asare, PhD, Independent Scholar, USA.

Editorial Reviews

Brandi Simpson Miller's book was much needed to liberate the Western dominated-discourse of food (in) security in Ghana and other (West) African countries. She provides an excellent understanding of the historical developments of Ghana's food ways that should stand as the starting point for similar research.” (Chiara Scheven, anthrobookforum.americananthro.org, February 27, 2024)

From the Publisher