Chiefs, Priests, and Praise-Singers: History, Politics, and Land Ownership in Northern Ghana

Notes

Notes Introduction 1. Tamakloe, Brief History; the British referred to Dagbon, its people (the Dagbamba), and its language (Dagbani) as Dagomba. Tamakloe’s manuscript was prepared for publication by A. W. Cardinall. 2. Smith, “On Segmentary Lineage Systems.” 3. On the limited sense of the political in classical social anthropology, see Spencer, “Post-colonialism.” 4. Leach, Political Systems of Highland Burma; Leach, “Frontiers of ‘Burma’”; Firth, Elements of Social Organization. On the regional approach and Leach’s contributions, see Kuper, “Regional Comparison in African Anthropology”; and Scott, Art of Not Being Governed, 38, 214. 5. Fuglestad, “Trevor-Roper Trap,” 317. For a general critique of the problem, see White, “Politics of Historical Interpretation.” 6. McCaskie, “Empire State”; McCaskie, State and Society, ch. 1; Mbembe, Afriques indociles, 22–27. 7. Staniland, Lions of Dagbon, 13–14. 8. Janzen, Lemba; Feierman, “Colonizers, Scholars”; Schoffeleers, River of Blood, 11. 9. Olivier de Sardan, “Occultism and the Ethnographic ‘I’,” 14; Appiah, In My Father’s House, 121. See also Brenner, “’Religious’ Discourse”; Shaw, “Invention of African Traditional Religion”; Feierman, “Colonizers, Scholars,” 202; and Goody, Logic of Writing, 4–5. 10. Paul Landau takes a more radical position in “’Religion’ and Conversion in African History,” 29. 11. Vansina, How Societies Are Born, 76. 12. See also MacGaffey, “Changing Representations.” 13. Miller, Problem of Slavery as History, 8. 14. Bierlich, Problem of Money; Oppong, Growing Up in Dagbon. 15. For a good summary of the received history, see www.dagbon.net/history .php. 190 NOTES TO PAGES 6–18 16. Fage, “Reflections on the Early History”; Staniland, Lions of Dagbon, 1–7; Mahama, History and Traditions of Dagbon, 1–16. 17. Der, “Traditional Political Systems.” 18. Scott, Art of Not Being Governed, esp. 26–39. See also Wilks, “Mossi and Akan States,” 345. 19. Swanepoel, “Every Periphery Is Its Own Center.” 20. Skalník, “Early States in the Voltaic Basin,” 472. 1. Colonial Anthropology and Historical Reconstruction 1. Kirby, “Ethnic Conflicts and Democratization”; Brukum, Guinea Fowl. 2. Davis, “Continuity and Change in Mampurugu,” 160. 3. Wilks, “Medieval Trade Route.” 4. Kea, Settlements, Trade, and Polities, 198. 5. Mendonsa, Continuity and Change, 27. 6. Johnson, “Slaves of Salaga.” 7. Der, Slave Trade in Northern Ghana; Lovejoy, Caravans of Kola, 108. 8. Webb, “Horse and Slave Trade,” 221; Law, Horse in West African History. 9. Roberts, Warriors, Merchants, and Slaves; Klein, “Slavery in the Western Soudan.” 10. Meillassoux, L’esclavage en Afrique précoloniale, 24. 11. See Kopytoff, “Internal African Frontier”; on “symbiotic” relations, Scott, Art of Not Being Governed, 26; and on “autochthons and strangers,” Kuba and Lentz, Land and the Politics of Belonging. 12. Bening, “Definition of the International Boundaries”; Staniland, Lions of Dagbon, 39; Ladouceur, Chiefs and Politicians, ch. 1. 13. Bening, “Administrative Boundaries of Northern Ghana.” 14. Brukum, “Chieftaincy and Ethnic Conflicts”; Iliasu, “British Administration in Mamprugu”; Sharpe, “Ethnography and a Regional System.” 15. Lentz, “Stateless Societies or Chiefdoms?” 16. Maasole, Konkomba and their Neighbours, 65. 17. Der, “Traditional Political Systems”; Lentz, Ethnicity, 44; Kuklick, Savage Within, 269. 18. Lentz, Ethnicity, 14–32; Goody, Technology, Tradition and the State, 55; Goody, “Political Systems of the Tallensi,” 24; Mendonsa, Continuity and Change, 21–67. 19. Goody, “Circulating Succession among the Gonja,” 143. 20. Goody, “Over-kingdom of Gonja,” 186. 21. Wilks, Wa and the Wala, 29. 22. De Heusch, Drunken King. 23. Kopytoff, “Internal African Frontier,” 63. NOTES TO PAGES 18–26 191 24. Mahama, History and Traditions of Dagbon, 13; Fage, “Reflections on the Early History.” 25. Lentz, Ethnicity, 263. 26. Goody, “Political Systems of the Tallensi,” 24. 27. Wilks, Wa and the Wala, 112; Oppong, Growing Up in Dagbon, 24. The slaver/enslaved dichotomy has been challenged elsewhere in West Africa; see Hawthorne, Planting Rice and Harvesting Slaves, 8–11, and Hubbell, “View of the Slave Trade.” 28. Fortes, Dynamics of Clanship, 53. 29. McCaskie, “Empire State,” 468. 30. On the invasion model, see Leach, “Aryan Invasions over Four Millennia ”; Bernal, “Race, Class, and Gender”; Clark, “Invasion in British Archaeology ”; Cooper, “Conflict and Connection,” 1519; Braudel, “Situation of History in 1950”; and Miller, Kings and Kinsmen, 4–10. 31. Goody, “Restricted Literacy in Northern Ghana,” 199. 32. Mahama, Ethnic Conflict in Northern Ghana, 158. 33. Duncan-Johnstone and Blair, Enquiry into the Constitution, 4. 34. Tait, “History and Social Organization.” 35. Fortes, Dynamics of Clanship, 16; Lentz, Ethnicity, 2. For a southern Ghanaian example, see Gilbert, “No Condition Is Permanent.” 36...