TAILIEUCHUNG - Respect and reciprocity: Care of elderly people in rural Ghana

Listening to the radio is fairly common among elders although only half do so daily or almost daily and just over one fourth do not listen to the radio at all. Elders who are men, live in Phnom Penh, or are younger are more likely to listen to the radio and to listen to frequently than elders who are women, live in the provinces, or are older. TV watching is somewhat less common than listening to the radio. Two fifths of Cambodian elders indicate they did not watch TV during the last month while only modestly more. | Journal of Cross-Cultural Gerontology 17 3-31 2002. 2002 Kluwer Academic Publishers. Printed in the Netherlands. Respect and reciprocity Care of elderly people in rural Ghana SJAAK VAN DER GEEST Medical Anthropology Unit University of Amsterdam The Netherlands Abstract. This article deals with ideas and practices of care of elderly people in a rural Kwahu community of Ghana. It is part of a larger project on social and cultural meanings of growing old. Four questions are addressed What kind of care do old people receive Who provides that care On what basis do people care for the old or do they feel obliged to do so And finally what are the changes taking place in the field of care for old people Concepts of respect and reciprocity take a central position in accounts of care and lack of care. The article is based on anthropological fieldwork mainly conversations with 35 elderly people and observations in their daily lives. Keywords Ageing Anthropology Care Elderly Ghana Kwahu Reciprocity Respect This essay is based on fieldwork which I carried out intermittently between 1994 and 2000 in a rural town of southern Ghana called Kwahu-Tafo. The mainly Kwahu inhabitants of the town belong to the approximately seven million matrilineal Akan living in the south of the country. The aim of the research was to describe and understand the position of elderly people in this rapidly changing society. The research involved conversations with 35 elderly people. All conversations were taped and transcribed. Some people I conversed with only once or twice others more often up to ten times. Apart from these long conversations I often went to greet the old people informally and had brief chats with them. These more casual visits enabled me to make observations about their daily life and the attitudes of other people in the same house. Some local friends became co-researchers and accompanied me on many visits. Most of my observations were recorded in an elaborate diary which I kept .

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