Creole Society and the Revival of Traditional Culture in Cape Coast during the Colonial Period

Abstract

During the nineteenth century a number of small Westernized societies developed along the coast of West Africa that were to provide the nucleus around which many of the colonial possessions of this area took form.1 Such societies shared many of the creole characteristics of their better-known Sierra Leonian and Senegalese counterparts, but as the example of Cape Coast indicates, they experienced their own particular historical development.2 The first phase of this town's colonial history was that of partial creolization which reached its apogee in the late nineteenth century.3 The second phase was a revival of traditional culture and particularly its political institutions which became increasingly important from the 1920s onwards. This second phase of colonial history can also be divided into three interwoven yet distinct stages. The first was primarily intellectual in scope and dominated by the most Westernized segment of the creole community. The second had wider PanAfricanist aspects but was similarly dominated by this elite, while the last consisted of a return to a preoccupation with traditional culture. This generation of cultural nationalists, however, in contrast to their forebearers, participated directly in traditional society, or the native order as it was also called, by seeking chiefly positions themselves.4 In addition, a much wider section