Re-contextualizing Traditional Dances in the Ghana Educational System

Ghanaian traditional dances have come under threat due to modernity and Christianity. I will relate modernity as a western system of schooling. For the most part, schools were organized by the European missionaries and had a strong Christian bias. The consequences of this education were the specific orientation to western moral codes and conduct. This has real implication for the society since the Ghanaian people were encouraged to turn from the articulation of their dances, customs and tradition. Ghanaian traditional dances are considered as backward by the missionary and spiritual churches in Ghana. Natives have marginalized traditional dance practices because of their Christian faith. These dances and their musical traditions faced extinction by these churches because their performances are said to have come from the worshipping of deities and spiritual beings. These traditional dances will vanish in the years to come as a result losing our identity as people. This project addresses how Ghanaian traditional dance forms are taught in the Universities in Ghana. Traditional dance forms face challenges in the educational sector because it is not a subject course in the primary or secondary schools. The Ghanaian government has not included traditional dance in the curriculum as a holistic subject where students can be tested on their knowledge. That is because there are many traditional dances embedded in Ghanaian cultural systems which make it difficult for the government to adopt one form of traditional dance to be taught at primary and secondary schools. These practices endanger traditional dances in Ghana. My study will assist in the understanding of traditional dances in the context of Ghana and the world as a whole. It will generate knowledge on Ghanaian dances, and develop new methodologies that can serve as a point of reference for researchers, and potentially shift public policies to support traditional dance practices