Dissonant Heritage: a multi-site phenomenological ethnography of African diasporic 'return' to Ghana

The proposed research concerns 'roots tourism' in Ghana and the plan to spend approx. 12 months conducting fieldwork in different sites in Ghana is appropriate for the scale of project; - The candidate proposes to learn Akan Twi, which - alongside English - will be necessary/useful for the candidate to communicate with a wide range of informants. This proposed research is a phenomenologically-informed ethnographic investigation into the experiences, material culture and archaeologies of African diasporic people from Britain, France, the US, Canada and the Caribbean, who journey to Elmina Castle, Cape Coast Castle, Assin Manso Slave River Site and Salaga Slave Market in Ghana, as forms of individual and collective 'return'.

The research aims to investigate diasporic engagement with the "dissonant heritage" of European and Indigenous African involvement in the trade of enslaved Africans (Tunbridge and Ashworth, 1995; Perry, 2009), which appear as binary "perpetrators vs. victims" narratives (Sabaro, 2022, 12). A phenomenological approach will help investigate how such complex histories, narratives and experiences are embodied and are part of African diasporic people's 'habitus', influencing their interaction with the heritage landscape associated with slavery in Ghana (Bourdieu 1977; Merleau-Ponty, 1962; Tilley, 1994).

A recent exhibition at the National Museum of Ghana, titled 'Blind Spots', highlighted the "forgotten" histories of slavery in Ghana (AARHUS University, 2023). It can be noted, that interior sites, like Salaga Slave Market and Assin Manso Slave River, receive significantly less attention from researchers and tourists alike, in comparison to sites on the coast, like Elmina Castle and Cape Coast Castle.

There appears to be a tension between how diasporic visitors engage with sites on the coast and in the interior, which spatially reflects a racialised "perpetrators vs. victims" binary (Sabaro, 2022, 12). I hypothesise here that coastal sites in both the 'popular imagination' and embodied sense, represent white colonial enslavers (Nti, 2014, 116), and conversely, the interior sites are associated with the complex history of African agency and complicitness (Lovejoy, 1986); a "dissonant heritage" (Tunbridge and Ashworth, 1995) that many African diasporic people struggle to grapple with (Sabaro, 2022; Hartman, 2006).

The main research methodology will be phenomenologically-informed field ethnography, and will include surveys, semi-structured interviews, participant observation, and visual methods such as photography, film and art-making. This research fits into the anthropological field of study, and also overlaps with archaeology and heritage. The research will contribute a critical take on popular narratives of 'return' back to Africa, and generate new data for sites that are underresearched.

I plan to Akan Twi which is Ghana's most widely spoken language next to English, in order to communicate with locals during fieldwork without reliance on a translator. I would also like to continue my French studies, in order to be able to interact with tourists from France and the French Caribbean.