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Ashanti Tribe Essay

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The Ashanti tribe is located in central Ghana in the rainforest of West Africa. They are the major ethnic group in this roughly 50 years-old young nation. The Ashanti people are known as fierce fighters whether they are women or man. The tribe have a slogan: “If I go forward I die, If I go backward I die, better go forward and die.” (Baden-Powell) When they are faced by a war, you can hear drums from the villages to signal each others. The Ashanti religion combines both spiritual and supernatural powers. They believe that every living thing have souls, including plants and animals. They believe that there are fairies, monsters and witches, and their religious belief surrounds an all-powerful, all-knowing god called “Onyame”. In this research …show more content…

However, for the Ashanti tribe, their god “Onyame” is sometimes portrayed as both female and male. The female is referred to the moon which created human beings with water, and male is referred to the sun which give human beings life to live. Females are seen as an important figure, because they are labeled as the mother of humankind, where all humans originated from. The Ashanti tribe believe that women was created by God, as an “instrument of human life” (Kenneth Kojo Anti) on earth. Since women in Ashanti helps the tribe to produce offspring, and also take care of the role of raising the children, it is fair to say that women are the back bone of tribe. There are myths in traditional African religion that blames women for causing human to live on earth, instead of heaven with god. Despite the myths, we can see that women have a special relationship with God, where they share similar process of creating life, experience the death and misfortune in life. This is also the reason why in west African culture, women generally practice as medium, since they are believed to have connection to God. Africans believe women can communicate to the other worlds, and sometimes even getting possessed by deity. They believe that possessions by deity can reveal past, preset or future events, and help the tribe to overcome obstacles. We can see that women that are born in the Ashanti tribe is part of their …show more content…

Comparing to men, female puberty ceremony is not done in secrete like men’s does, female puberty is seen as a more important process than man’s. The Ashanti tribe believes that women need to be properly trained to be a good mother, to raise children with good morals. All the participants are women, including queen mother and female leaders. Experienced women will then pass on womanhood secrets and technics to the young women. Education in sex, birth control, and how to maintain good marriage with man is taught in these couple weeks of time. Dancing and drumming rituals are also carried out by the name of Onyame, to bless the young women to have a successful fertility life. In Ashanti religion, women represent the purity, beauty, and dignity of the tribe, they are the instrument of god to create life. Ashanti women inherits this status when they were born, and they have to follow rules to achieve it. Older women learnt these rules for a long time, so they are here to make sure that young women will not break them. Older women will especially make sure that young women will not get pregnant before going through the puberty ceremony, because it is a traditional religion rule. Onyame and Obosom will get angry or even punish the tribe if that happens. There are also fines and punishment within the tribe to enforce it. The role of women is

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