CHAIR'S REMARKS

by Jean Allman

The Ghana Studies Council has had another exciting and productive year. Our active membership continues to grow and our account balance, though still relatively small, is beginning to allow us to fund activities and projects of importance to our membership. Beyond the numbers is an exciting range of GSC activities -- some old and many new.

At the African Studies Association meeting held in San Francisco in November, 1996, the Council was able to sponsor two interdisciplinary panels on Law and Custom in Ghana. The panels included papers and comments by the following GSC members: Richard Rathbone (SOAS, University of London), Gareth Austin (London School of Economics), Victoria Tashjian (St. Norbert College), Gloria Ofori-Boadu (Georgetown Law School); Jean Allman (University of Minnesota), Ivor Wilks (Northwestern University), Larry Yarak (Texas A&M University), Roger Gocking (Mercy College), Raymond Silverman (Michigan State University), and Amos Anyimadu (University of Ghana). Both sessions were well-attended and included, as always, some very lively debate.

The Council has proposed two panels for the upcoming ASA meeting in Columbus, OH. Larry Yarak has put forward a proposal for a roundtable entitled, "The Past Through the Present: Forty Years of Interpreting Ghana(ian) History." Raymond Dumett has put forward a panel proposal around the theme, "Labor and Work in Ghana: Past and Present Perspectives." As an associate organization of the ASA, the Council is allowed to sponsor only two panels at the yearly ASA meeting. At this stage, we know of at least one other Ghana-focused panel that has been put forward for the 1997 meeting. Brenda Chalfin has proposed a panel entitled, "Confronting and Comprehending Ghana's Double History: New and Old Research from the North." The Council will learn in late July whether or not these proposals have been accepted by the 1997 meeting organizers.

In addition to organizing annual events around the ASA meeting, the Ghana Studies Council has been involved in a number of other initiatives. Larry Yarak has continued to develop the GSC Homepage [see Internet Update, p. 11]. Larry not only posts our hardcopy mailings and newsletter at the site, but will post any "Announcements or Queries" you would like circulated. The URL is: http://acs.tamu.edu/~yarak/gsc-ann.htm. Larry is also heading up efforts to get our interdisciplinary journal, Ghana Studies, off the ground [see Journal Update, p. 10] Assisting Larry in these efforts are David Henige, Ray Silverman, Amos Anyimadu, Jean Allman, Gareth Austin, David Owusu-Ansah, Michel Doortmont and Victoria Tashjian. Anyone else interested in assisting in this effort should contact Larry directly.

The Council is also pleased to announce its involvement in the Colonial Secretary's Office [C.S.O.] Papers Project at the National Archives of Ghana. Following preliminary conversations with the project director, Mr. Joseph Anim-Asante, I received a formal proposal requesting GSC funding for the C.S.O. project in October, 1996. The project is an extremely important initiative being undertaken by the National Archives.

Shortly after independence in 1957, the National Archives accessioned all of the records of the Colonial Secretary's office. These records cover an incredible array of topics and issues -- from agriculture and forestry to medicine, sanitation, geology, "native affairs," and education. The records have been maintained in the Archives just as they were in the C.S. Office. Retrieval, as many of our members know, has been virtually impossible. Thus, an extremely important body of archival material on Ghana's colonial past has been largely inaccessible to students, scholars and other visitors to the National Archives.

By mid-1996, Mr. Anim-Asante and his staff had managed to classify and prepare handlists of all of the colonial department records used by the Secretariat in its coordination activities. Numbering 50,000 files, these records constitute one of the three main records systems used by the Secretariat. Unfortunately, due to limited funding, the handlists for these files were handwritten and the project coordinator obviously feared that the lists would be damaged or disappear over time.

Mr. Anim-Asante's proposal asked for the GSC to fund the development of a data base system so that the CSO handlists could be entered into a program, revised as needed, printed out and bound for placement in the Search Room, in Regional Offices and in selectd institutions abroad. At our November, 1996 meeting, the GSC unanimously voted to fund the proposal ($961). Mr. Anim-Asante intends for the initial database to be complete by September, 1997. In addition, the National Archives supported the idea of placing hardcopies of the processed lists at the Herskovits Library (Northwestern University) and the School of Oriental and African Studies Library (University of London). Membership dues, modest though they are, clearly can be put to good use!

And since we're on the subject of dues and membership, the 1998 GSC membership form/ questionnaire is at the back of this Newsletter. We're still months away from 1998, but why not get a jump on the year and take a moment to fill out the form and send it in, along with your 1998 dues (where applicable].

The information you provide will keep our files updated and will allow us to include a publications list in 1998. If you know of friends or colleagues who might bejoining the Council, please feel free to xerox as many copies of the form as necessary or have potential members contact me directly.

Finally, here's how 1997-1998 looks for the GSC. Please mark your calendars: