Shifting Trade Networks: Sub-Saharan to Atlantic Exchange in Central Ghana 1355-1725 CE.

Abstract

This project asks how regional, continental, and global processes converged upon a West African village. With a household-oriented focus, I will examine how the activities of daily life were constituted, negotiated, and mediated in part with integration in regional political, economic, and religious structures and interaction with global networks. The Bono Manso region of central Ghana was occupied from the late 12th to mid-18th centuries CE, spanning much of the zenith of sub-Saharan and Atlantic Trade eras. It lay on a primary trade route linking the Malian city of Jenne with the Akan goldfields. Using the satellite village of Kranka Dada, I analyze from the “bottom-up” how household practices linked the household of Kranka Dada to the nascent urban center within the region as well as global markets. This approach enables me to document how local villagers interacted with the larger center (Bono Manso) and how that interaction shaped economic, political, and religious organization from the sub-Saharan to the Atlantic Trade eras. By integrating oral, historical, archival, and archaeological data, I examine: (1) how households and their associated activities were affected by interaction with the political economy of Bono Manso, (2) how integration shaped household participation in regional and global exchange networks, and (3) the evidence for change and continuity over time.