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Periodical article Periodical article Leiden University catalogue Leiden University catalogue WorldCat catalogue WorldCat
Title:Ethnicities of Enslaved Africans in the Diaspora: On the Meanings of 'Mina' (Again)
Author:Law, RobinISNI
Year:2005
Periodical:History in Africa
Volume:32
Pages:247-267
Language:English
Geographic terms:America
Ghana
Benin
Togo
Subjects:slaves
ethnological names
Mina
Akan
Ewe
history
1600-1699
1700-1799
1800-1899
History and Exploration
Labor and Employment
Peoples of Africa (Ethnic Groups)
Urbanization and Migration
External link:http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/history_in_africa/v032/32.1law.pdf
Abstract:The term 'Mina', when encountered as an ethnic designation of enslaved Africans in the Americas in the 17th to 19th centuries, has commonly been interpreted as referring to persons brought from the area of the Gold Coast (modern Ghana), who are further presumed to have been speakers of an Akan language. Gwendolyn Hall (2003), however, questions this conventional interpretation, and suggests instead that most of those called 'Mina' in the Americas were actually from the Slave Coast to the east (modern southeastern Ghana, Togo and Benin) and hence speakers of the languages nowadays generally termed 'Gbe' (formerly Ewe). The present paper argues that, in its original meaning in West Africa, the name 'Mina' did indeed relate specifically to the Gold Coast, or at least to persons who originated from the Gold Coast even if settled elsewhere, though these included speakers of the Ga-Adangme languages of the eastern Gold Coast, as well as Akan; and that in the Americas, although the term was sometimes used with an extended reference that included speakers of Gbe languages, it is questionable whether it ever denoted Gbe-speakers as distinct from speakers of Akan or Ga-Adangme. Notes, ref. [ASC Leiden abstract]
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