The Ga-Adangbe are an ethnic group in the West African nation of Ghana. It is part of the Dangme ethnic group. The Ga people are grouped as part of the Ga–Dangme ethnolinguistic group. They speak Kwa languages.^[1][2]

The Ga-Adangbe people inhabit mostly the Greater Accra Plains. Some are found in the Eastern Region at Akuse, Somaya, Dodowa, Akwamu and surrounding areas in Ghana. The modern day Adangbe include the people of Osu, Shai, La, Ningo, Kpone, Osudoku, Krobo, Gbugbla (Prampram), Ada and Agotime who speak similar dialects.

The Ga also include the Ga-Mashie groups occupying neighborhoods in the central part of Accra, and other Ga speakers who migrated from Akwamu, and surrounding areas.

Most Ga live in the southeastern coastal region of Ghana, around the capital of Accra, which the Ga founded in the 16th century as a trading port. The traditional Ga kingdom of Nkran gives Accra its name. Nkran state has been ruled by a succession of kings known as Ga Mantse since its founding in 1510. In more recent times, Teteh-Quarshie is given credit for bringing the Cocoa to Ghana in the 19th century. Today Cocoa is one of Ghana's main exports and Ghana is the second leading exporter of the crop in the world.

Culture[link]

The Ga people celebrate the Homowo festival, which literally means "hooting at hunger." This festival originated several centuries ago after a great famine in Ga land. The passing of this terrible period was marked by celebrating this festival. It takes place every year and is celebrated by all the Ga clans, but in stages by the various groups and "quarters," beginning with the Ga Mashie and ending with the La.

The Ada people celebrate Asafotu which is also called 'Asafotufotufiam',an annual warrior's festival celebrated by the people of Ada in the Greater Accra Region from the last Thursday of July to the first weekend of August. It commemorates the victories of the warriors in battle and those who fell on the battlefield. To re-enact these historic events, the warrior dresses in traditional battle dress and stage a mock battle. This is also a time when the young men are introduced to warfare. The festival also ushers in the harvest cycle for this special customs and ceremonies are performed. These include purification ceremonies. The celebration reaches its climax in a durbar of chiefs, a colourful procession of the Chiefs in palanquins with their retinue. They are accompanied by traditional military groups called 'Asafo Companies' amidst drumming, singing and dancing through the streets and on the durbar grounds. At the durbar, greetings are exchanged between the chiefs, libations are poured and declarations of allegiance made. Though, that being said, the Asafo or in fact the 'Asafo Companies' are originally a culture of the Mfantsefo(Fantes) who are a neighbouring tribe of the Ga people along the coast.

The Ga-Adangbe are no different from the other ethnic groups in Ghana in their love for music, drumming and dancing. One of their best known traditional music and dance styles (albeit a fairly modern one) is kpanlogo, a modernized traditional dance and music form developed around 1960. Yacub Addy, Obo Addy, and Mustapha Tettey Addy are Ga drummers who have achieved international fame.

Funerals and paying last respects[link]

The Ga people are known for their funeral celebrations and processions. The Ga believe that when someone dies, they move to another life. Therefore, special coffins are often crafted by highly skilled carpenters since this tradition spread in the 50's. Pioneers were master craftsmen like Paa Joe, Paa Willy and Seth Kane Kwei^[3] from Teshie.

The coffins can be anything wanted by relatives of the deceased from a pencil to any animal such as an elephant. Coffins are usually crafted to reflect an essence of the deceased, in forms such as a character trait, an occupation, or a symbol of one's standing in the community.^[4] For example, a taxicab driver is most likely to be buried in a coffin shaped as a car. Many families spend excessive amounts on coffins because they often feel that they have to pay their last respects to the deceased and being buried in a coffin of cultural, symbolic as well expensive taste is seen as fitting. Prices of coffins can vary depending on what is being ordered. It is not unusual for a single coffin to cost $600. This is expensive for local families considering that it is not unusual to meet people with an income of only $50 a month. This means that funerals are often paid for by wealthier members of the family, if such a member exists, with smaller contributions coming from other working members of the family. This is needed as the coffin is only a portion of the total funeral cost that will be incurred. Some people foreign to Ghana are known to have been buried in Ga-styled coffins.^[5]

Ataa Oko and his third wife, in front of his boat coffin, about 1960. page 137,The buried treaures of the Ga. 2008

Pompidou coffin, Kudjoe Affutu. 2010. Photo Regula Tschumi

Symbolic coffins of the Ga[link]

The use of these fantasy coffins is explained by the religious beliefs of the Ga people regarding their afterlife. They believe that death is not the end and that life continues in the next world in the same way it did on earth. Ancestors are also thought to be much more powerful than the living and able to influence their relatives who are still living (lucky as they are). This is why families do everything they can to ensure that a dead person is sympathetic towards them as early as possible. The social status of the deceased depends primarily on the size and the success of the burial service and of course the usage of an exclusive coffin. Design coffins are only seen on the day of the burials when they are buried with the deceased. They often symbolise the dead people’s professions, the purpose being to help them continue with their earthly profession in the afterlife. Certain shapes, such as a sword or chair coffin, represent royal or priestly insignia with a magical and religious function. Only people with the appropriate status are allowed to be buried in these types of coffins. Various creatures, such as lions, cockerels and crabs represent clan totems. Similarly, only the heads of the families concerned are permitted to be buried in coffins such as these. Many coffin shapes also evoke proverbs, which are interpreted in different ways by the Ga. Design coffins have been used in the Greater Accra region since around the 1950s, especially in rural groups with traditional beliefs, and have now become an integral part of local burial culture.

Today, figural coffins are made in several workshops across the whole Greater Accra region. Successful coffinmakers are for example Cedi and Eric Adjetey Anang of Kane Kwei Carpentry Workshop and Kudjoe Affutu. Most of the figural coffins are used for funerals, only a few are exported for international art exhibitions.

Origin[link]

Some scholars believe the Ga-Adangbe people originated to the east of their current location on the Accra plains. What is certain is that the modern Ga is an ethnic group of several origins which include Guan, Akan, and possibly some distant origin with the Volta-Niger speakers^{[6] [7][8]} Linguistically the Ga speak a language which is closest to their Guan and Akan neighbors what is unclear is if this is due to cultural influence or a common origin.^[9] Culturally the Ga are patrilineal thus, are not Akan but, largely "Akanized" in many aspects^[10]

History of land[link]

Due to the Geopolitical significance of the Land the Ga occupy it was part of the Empire of Akwamu, Akyem, Ashanti and later part of the Gold Coast (British colony).^[11][12]

Notable Ga people[link]

See also[link]

Publications[link]

• 2010. "The Deathbead of a Living Man. A Coffin for the Centre Pompidou", in: Saâdane Afif (ed.), "Anthologie de l'humour noir", Paris: Editions Centre Pompidou, p. 56-61.
• 2008. The Buried Treasures of the Ga: Coffin Art in Ghana. Benteli, Bern. ISBN 978-3-7165-1520-4
• 2004. A Report on Paa Joe and the Proverbial Coffins of Teshie and Nungua, Ghana in: Africa e Mediterraneo, Nr. 47-48, S. 44-47.

References[link]

External links[link]

• Ethnologue report for Ga
• Ga people
• Pictures of different themed Ghanaian Ga coffins
• History of Accra
• Stories by Rev. P.E Adotey Addo
• Ga and Dangme Proverbs for Preaching and Teaching by Joshua N. Kudadjie

This biographical article needs additional citations for verification. Please help by adding reliable sources. Contentious material about living persons that is unsourced or poorly sourced must be removed immediately, especially if potentially libelous or harmful. (August 2011)

Tyrone "Tye" Tribbett (born January 26, 1976 Camden, New Jersey) is an American gospel music singer, songwriter, keyboardist, choir director and founder of the Grammy-nominated and Stellar-Award winning gospel group Tye Tribbett & G.A. (short for 'Greater Anointing.')^[1]

Biography[link]

Tribbett toured with Faith Hill in 2000, leading to work with Will Smith, Usher, Don Henley, Justin Timberlake, and Sting.^[1] He has since released four albums.

Personal life[link]

Tribbett was raised in a Pentecostal Apostolic church in Camden, New Jersey. His father is a pastor and his mother is a minister as well as a well known disc jockey in the Philadelphia area. He is married to Shanté Tribbett, was a member of Greater Anointing, and they have two daughters together. He also has a brother, Thaddaeus, who is part of the band 'Soundcheck' and is now the current bassist for artist Estelle. Tye also has two sisters; one sister, DeMaris, also sang in Greater Anointing.

Albums[link]

• Life (2004)
• Victory Live (2006)
• Stand Out (2008)
• Fresh (2010)

References[link]

External links[link]

• Tye Tribbett's official website and messageboard
• Tribbett's Sony website
• Tye Tribbett interview on BlackGospel.com (2008)
• Tye Tribbett at Allmusic

Linda King (born 1940) is an American sculptor and poet.^[1] She was the girlfriend of American writer Charles Bukowski for several years in the early 1970s.^[2]

Linda King is a poet, playwright, and artist working in painting and sculpture who was immortalized in the poetry and prose of her former love Charles Bukowski. During the 1970s, King edited the little magazine, Purr.^[3]

Born in 1940, she was brought up in Boulder, Utah.^[4] She was divorced after a marriage for ten years to an Italian with a traditional outlook.^[5] They had two children, a boy and a girl.^[4] She was an actress before she become a sculptor and poet.^[5] If Bukowski's autobiographical writings are to be believed, King had a large ego and a flair for self-dramatization.

Relationship With Bukowski[link]

In 1970, shortly after the end of her marriage, she met Charles Bukowski, danced for him, and offered to make a sculpture of his head.^[5] He accepted her offer, and they soon had an affair. (The couple frequently broke up, and when they were parted, Bukowski would give her back the bust of him she had sculpted.)

She was 30 and Bukowski was 20 years her senior when they started their relationship.^[1] Their relationship was passionate and turbulent; on one occasion in 1971, Bukowski broke her nose in an argument.^[5] One night, King and Bukowski were accommodated in the City Lights apartment in San Francisco, after a reading at the City Lights Poets Theater.^[6] By the morning there was a broken window and a panel smashed in the door, and King had disappeared; Bukowski blamed her for the damage.^[6]

They split up after three years, when one night King threw his typewriter and books onto the street in a drunken spree, angry at his infidelities.^[1] The incident is detailed in Bukowski's novel, Women, whose leading character, Lydia Vance, is based on King.^[1]

Critic Robert Peters viewed the debut of Linda King’s play The Tenant in which she and Bukowski performed in the 70's in Los Angeles. The play ran for only one night in a seedy club, was viewed by fewer than a dozen people and was more of an ad-libbed conversational rant than an actual play.^[7] Their relationship was on-off; in 1975 she finally left him and Los Angeles for Phoenix, because of what she described as "one extended nervous breakdown".^[2]

She said of their relationship:

It wasn't that he had other women. It's that he always wanted me to know about them, always wanted to tell me all the details about what they did together. Who does that unless they really want to make you mad?^[1]

In his writings, such as the autobiographical novel Women, Bukowski characterized King as extremely competitive and burdened by his burgeoning fame.

After Bukowski[link]

She remarried and had a second son; the marriage ended in divorce.^[4] She made her way as a bartender, waitress, and, more recently, part-time care giver for old people.^[2] She sold her own traditional portrait busts in clay, and published poems, one in 1997 beginning, "I am the woman who knows for sure that Bukowski's balls were bigger I am the woman who knows that he liked hot chilies in his stew".^[2]

In 2004, the art Phoenix gallery The Paper Heart featured her paintings, busts and poems, along with documentary films about Bukowski, in a show, Friends and Foes of Charles Bukowski.^[2]

In 2009, she sold 60 love letters written to her by Bukowski for $69,000 at auction in San Francisco's PBA Galleries, receiving less than half of that amount after paying listing and other fees.^[1] That same year, in order to be nearer to her grandchildren, she moved from Phoenix into an apartment in the Sunset District of San Francisco.^[1] In September 2009, she was one of the three poets in the presentation, Tales of Bukowski & the Late 1960s LA Poetry Scene: a reading & report by key poet/participants at Bird & Beckett Books & Records in San Francisco.^[3]

In addition to her head of Bukowski, King also sculpted busts of Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Jack Micheline, Harold Norse, and A.D. Winans. A play she wrote, Singing Bullets, was staged as part of a showcase by Phoenix's Metro Arts Institute.

She has also sculpted a head of Bukowski and sold an edition of at least 15 bronzes for in the region of $5,000 each.^[1]

Bibliography[link]

King wrote a book Loving and Hating Bukowski.^[1] She also has written seven collections of poetry:

• Curled Inside the Curve of His Body…
• I Danced With a Man Last Night
• The Elephant Chronicles
• Exposed
• The Savageness of My Discontent
• Sweet and Dirty
• The World is Not What I Thought

She also has had her poetry published in a wide variety of magazines, including The Bukowski Review and Wormwood Review.

References[link]

External links[link]

• Linda King Arts Web Site
• King reviews Barfly (video)