Imagining tradition: heritage, culture and religion in contemporary Ghanaian cinema culture

Abstract

This article is a response to Birgit Meyer’s chapter ‘Mediating Traditional Culture’ from her book Sensational Movies: Video, Vision, and Christianity in Ghana. It reflects on her argument about heritage as a dominant discourse in debates about religion and culture in the Ghanaian video film industry, raises questions about the dynamics of this politics of representation, and outlines the significance of her approach for theorising heritage. It draws on a series of observations about sites of culture and heritage in contemporary Ghana to frame a discussion about dominant themes that emerge in Meyer’s chapter, namely, chiefs and chiefly authority, the genre of the 'epic,' and audience perceptions of mediations of tradition and culture. It concludes by pointing out the usefulness and value that a focus on imaginaries, media, and mediation brings to the study of heritage.