Documentation of the Socio-Cultural Significance of Artefacts in Sefwi Bekwai Palace in Ghana
Emmanuel Kofi Attah, Dickson Adom
, Joe Adu-Agyem , Babaaradio Kombui & Isaac Gyasi
Issue: Vol.5 No.5 Issue Article 4 pp.611-628
DOI: https://doi.org/10.38159/ehass.2024554 | Published online 3rd May, 2024
© 2024 The Author(s). This is an open access article under the CCBY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
Documentation of artefacts is a great avenue for recording the relevance of the works in the lives of the people. This would also help in improving the care and maintenance of artefacts. This study thus aimed at unfolding the philosophical foundations of the traditions and culture of the people of Sefwi Bekwai located at the Sefwi Bekwai palace in the Western North Region of Ghana. The artefacts made in different kinds of materials project the religious, political, social, economic and medicinal roles that these works play in the Sefwi Bekwai culture. The study was ethnographic research under the qualitative research approach. A total of 30 study participants were purposively sampled and interviewed with the help of a semi-structured interview guide. The study participants included chiefs, linguists, and elders of Sefwi Bekwai, art experts and visual art teachers. The study revealed that the artefacts are used as mediums of worship to satisfy religious needs; to bridge the gap between people and their ancestors; to act as dwelling places of the deities, ancestors, and other spiritual powers; to seek protection and good luck; to serve as a bond of unity, kinship, and belongingness; to express beliefs in bad force, death, and the afterlife. The study contends that documentation of artefacts in palaces is crucial for safeguarding and propagating the rich cultural heritage of a people to generations.
Keywords: Art Forms, Palace Artefacts, Sefwi Bekwai, Ghanaian Chieftaincy.
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Emmanuel Kofi Attah is an MPhil. graduate student in African Art and Culture who researches on the Arts and Culture of rural communities. He is interested in the in documenting the artefacts in museums and other cultural spaces in rural and urban communities. He is currently an instructor in General Knowledge in Art in a High School in Ghana.
Dr. Dickson Adom is a researcher in the pluridisciplinarity fields of Place Identity History, African Art, Art Installations, and Cultural Anthropology for Biodiversity Conservation, Environmental Sustainability, and Heritage Sites Conservation. He is a lecturer in the Department of Educational Innovations in Science and Technology, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Kumasi, Ghana. He also holds an extraordinary researcher position in the School of Economic Sciences, Northwest University, South Africa. For his scholarly and academically rigorous peer review activities for top-ranked publishers and journals such as SAGE Open, Taylor and Francis (African Identities), Springer, Elsevier and many others, he received 1% Global Top Reviewer Award from Publons, New Zealand in 2018. He is a certified Publons Academy mentor and a Diamond Level Author at Ezines (U.S.A), with over sixty journal publications, more than ten book chapters, and over 200 e-articles.
Joe Adu-Agyem is an Associate Professor in the Department of Educational Innovations in Science and Technology in the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Ghana. He is an expert in Art Education, Aesthetics and Criticism as well as Educational Research Methods. His landmark research has been on the exploration of various approaches in documenting the artefacts in museums and other cultural spaces in rural and urban communities. He has authored over fifty journal publications with remarkable University teaching and research skills.
Babaaradio Kombui is a PhD candidate studying African Art and Culture in the Department of Painting and Sculpture at the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Ghana. His research areas are in African Art History, Aesthetics and Criticism of Indigenous Arts and Culture. He is currently researching into ethnomedicinal and religio-cultural practices of rural communities in Northern Ghana.
Isaac Gyasi is a Kente weaving expert and works with various indigenous communities. He is currently a PhD candidate in the Department of Painting and Sculpture in the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Ghana researching the evolution of traditional Kente weaving practices and technologies across Ghana.
Attah, Emmanuel Kofi, Dickson Adom, Joe Adu-Agyem, Babaaradio Kombui & Isaac Gyasi. “Documentation of the Socio-Cultural Significance of Artefacts in Sefwi Bekwai Palace in Ghana,” E-Journal of Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences 5, no.5 (2024): 611-628. https://doi.org/10.38159/ehass.2024554
© 2024 The Author(s). Published and Maintained by Noyam Journals. This is an open access article under the CCBY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
