Funerals for the Living: Conversations with Elderly People in Kwahu, Ghana

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Periodical article

Title:	Funerals for the Living: Conversations with Elderly People in Kwahu, Ghana
Author:	Geest, Sjaak van der
Year:	2000
Periodical:	African Studies Review
Volume:	43
Issue:	3
Period:	December
Pages:	103-129
Language:	English
Geographic term:	Ghana
Subjects:	Akan death rites Peoples of Africa (Ethnic Groups)
External link:	https://www.jstor.org/stable/525071
Abstract:	This article explores the meaning of funerals in a rural Akan community of southern Ghana, taking the discrepancy between premortem and postmortem care as a starting point. The article is based on conversations of the author with elderly and younger people in Kwahu and on the author's personal observations and attendance at funerals during anthropological fieldwork in 1994, 1995 and 1996. Funerals are first and foremost occasions for the family to affirm its prestige and to celebrate its excellence. When thinking about their own funeral, the elderly are ambivalent. On the one hand, they criticize the overemphasis on funerals at the expense of proper care during their lives. On the other hand, they would certainly not want to turn the tables. For them, too, a poor funeral would be an unbearable disgrace. Bibliogr., notes, ref., sum. in English and French.