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| Semester | spring semester 2019 |
| Course frequency | Once only |
| Lecturers |
Veit Arlt (veit.arlt@unibas.ch, Assessor)
Paul Jenkins (paul.jenkins@unibas.ch) |
| Content | This course provides insight into the challenging and exciting task of editing primary sources for publication. It allows graduate students to engage hands-on with a unique corpus of more than thirty edited reports from the Gold Coast (1868–1908) written by the Ghanaian pastor Theophilus Opoku (184*–191*), which will be published in the series Fontes Historiae Africanae of the British Academy and UNESCO. So the course offers an introduction to the methodological problems in working with this kind of sources and an opportunity to judge how far the editors have succeeded in their objective to facilitate the reading of social history of change and continuity in an African community. Over a time-span of several decades Historian Paul Jenkins (former archivist of the Basel Mission and lecturer in African History at the University of Basel) and Social Anthropologist and Ghana specialist Michelle Gilbert (Trinity College Hartfort, CT) have engaged with the reports written by Revd Theophilus Opoku, assembled the complete corpus, transcribed the texts and, in an iterative process, edited them for publication. Clarifications and contextualisation are provided by their jointly-written introductions and footnotes. The publication consists of an introductory part and seven chapters containing the texts written during the various parish appointments Opoku had in the South-eastern Gold Coast. With a few months to go before the corpus goes to print, the editors invite graduate students to scrutinize the texts and put them to test. Participants will engage with the following scholars: • Michelle Gilbert (anthropologist, Trinity College, Hartford CT) • Andreas Heuser (theologian, University of Basel) • Paul Jenkins (historian, Centre for African Studies Basel) • Nana Opare Kwakye (theologian, University of Ghana, Legon) • David Maxwell (historian, University of Cambridge) • Adam Mohr (anthropologist, University of Pennsylvania) • Emma Wild-Wood (theologian, University of Edinburgh) |
| Bibliography | The complete book manuscript will be made available to registered participants by 15 February 2019. The following readings are helpful to any participant not familiar with the context of the Basel Mission on the then Gold Coast and will be accessible via the ADAM-workspace: Gilbert, Michelle and Jenkins, Paul: The King, His Soul and the Pastor: Three Views of a Conflict in Akropong 1906-7, in: Journal of Religion in Africa, Vol. 38, Fasc. 4 (2008), pp. 359-415. Gilbert Michelle:"No Condition is Permanent': Ethnic Construction and the Use of History in Akuapem' Africa Vol. 67, No. 4 (1997) pp. 501-533. Jenkins, Paul, Short History of the Basel Mission, 25 pp.,1989. |
| Admission requirements | This interdisciplinary workshop is open to graduate students from a wide array of disciplines, especially History, Social Anthropology, Literature, Religious Studies and Theology. Advanced MA students with a specific interest in the topic and, ideally, first experience in working with a corpus of edited primary sources are encouraged to contact veit.arlt@unibas.ch. |
| Course application | Please register by email to veit.arlt@unibas.ch before 20 February 2019. Provide information on your subject area and the current state of studies. |
| Language of instruction | English |
| Use of digital media | No specific media used |
| Interval | Weekday | Time | Room |
|---|
No dates available. Please contact the lecturer.
| Modules |
African Studies: Recommendations (PhD subject: African Studies) |
| Assessment format | continuous assessment |
| Assessment details | Active participation: Each participant will read the general introduction and will present one of the chapters to the workshop participants, opening the general discussion with graduate students, experts and editors. In addition, each participant will take minutes of one of the sessions for reporting to the closing session. The texts will be distributed on 15 February 2019 |
| Assessment registration/deregistration | Reg.: course registration; dereg.: not required |
| Repeat examination | no repeat examination |
| Scale | Pass / Fail |
| Repeated registration | no repetition |
| Responsible faculty | Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, studadmin-philhist@unibas.ch |
| Offered by | Zentrum für Afrikastudien |