Publication Information The main body of the Publication Information page contains all the metadata that HRAF holds for that document.
Author: Author's name as listed in Library of Congress records
Arhin, Kwame
Title:
Political and military roles of Akan women
Published in: if part or section of a book or monograph
Female and male in West Africa, edited by Christine
Oppong
Published By: Original publisher
Female and male in West Africa, edited by Christine
Oppong
London: Allen & Unwin. 1983. 91-98 p.
By line: Author's name as appearing in the actual publication
Kwame Arhin
HRAF Publication Information: New Haven, Conn.:
Human Relations Area Files, 2000. Computer File
Culture: Culture name from the Outline of World Cultures (OWC) with the alphanumberic OWC identifier in parenthesis.
Akan (FE12)
Subjects: Document-level OCM identifiers given by the anthropology subject indexers at HRAF
Status, role, and prestige (554);
Clans (614);
Towns (632);
Chief executive (643);
Military organization (701);
Gender roles and issues (890);
Abstract: Brief abstract written by HRAF anthropologists who have done the subject indexing for the document
In this article, Arhin discusses the political and
associated military organization of the Akan and women's roles within them. Arhin writes
that ‘Female stools complemented the hierarchy of male stools.’ Women had a place in the
village and town councils and participated in legislative and judicial processes. The
chief's wife, OHEMMA, had her own oath, court, and spokesman. She was also the foremost
authority on genealogies and therefore played a major role in chiefly succession. Political
marriage was an important strategy in uniting the Asante empire. Women played a supportive
role in war, encouraging their men on by performing dances and songs behind the lines. One
Asante heroine precipitated the 1900 British siege of Kumasi by defying the British
governor's demand to take the Golden Stool.
Document Number: HRAF's in-house numbering system derived from the processing order of documents
43
Document ID: HRAF's unique document identifier. The first part is the OWC identifier and the second part is the document number in three digits.
fe12-043
Document Type: May include journal articles, essays, collections of essays, monographs or chapters/parts of monographs.
Essay
Language: Language that the document is written in
English
Note:
For bibliographical references see source 56:
Anonymous
Field Date: The date the researcher conducted the fieldwork or archival research that produced the document
Not Specified
Evaluation: In this alphanumeric code, the first part designates the type of person writing the document, e.g. Ethnographer, Missionary, Archaeologist, Folklorist, Linguist, Indigene, and so on. The second part is a ranking done by HRAF anthropologists based on the strength of the source material on a scale of 1 to 5, as follows: 1 - poor; 2 - fair; 3 - good, useful data, but not uniformly excellent; 4 - excellent secondary data; 5 - excellent primary data
Social Scientist-4,5
Analyst: The HRAF anthropologist who subject indexed the document and prepared other materials for the eHRAF culture/tradition collection.
Ian Skoggard ;1999
Coverage Date: The date or dates that the information in the document pertains to (often not the same as the field date).
1700-1900
Coverage Place: Location of the research culture or tradition (often a smaller unit such as a band, community, or archaeological site)
Ashanti; Ghana
LCSH: Library of Congress Subject Headings
Akan (African people)