Akan shit Ge'tting rid of dirt in Ghana SJAAK VAN DER GEEST To Mike Warren, who died on 28 December 1997 at ings. A few times I saw my landlord or someone else Sjaak van der Geest is the age of 53. He started his anthropological career from his compound burning the paper. Professor in Medical Anthropology at the with research among the Bono people of Ghana. He At that time, in 1994, I brought a Ghanaian sociology University of would have enjoyed this rumination. student with me to the field as a research assistant. He Amsterdam. He has done stayed in the room next to mine and I felt I had to show fieldwork in Ghana and There is a peculiar paradox in the Akan culture of solidarity with him concerning toilet use. I thought I Cameroon. Presently he Ghana. It has to do with people's manner of dealing could not ask the priests at the Catholic mission if I is involved in with human faeces. On the one hand, they are ex­ might bring another customer to their toilet. That situ­ anthropological research on the meaning of old tremely concerned with cleanliness and removing dirt ation gave a new impulse to my determination to over­ age in a rural Ghanaian from their bodies. On the other hand, the way they ac­ come my toilet phobia and become a more complete community (E-mail.· tually get rid of human waste is so inefficient that they participant. vandergeest@ pscw. uva.nl) are continuously confronted with what they most detest: It did not last very long. I soon started to cheat on filth, in particular, faeces. my assistant and secretly use the priests' toilet. I If the Akan proverb that the stranger is like a child cleverly combined occasional visits to the Catholic (ohohoo te se abofra) is true, it certainly applies to my mission with visits to their toilet. My bowels cooper­ interest in Akan shit. As a child in its anal phase, I have ated, which again shows to what extent natural urges Note on transliteration been fascinated by toilets and faeces ever since I set can be tamed to obey social and cultural conditions. As The Twi character f: has been printed here as e, and foot on Ghanaian soil in 1969. soon as I approached the priests' place, I felt the urge as 0. At that time, I had found a room in the house of a coming. teacher in Kwahu-Tafo, a rural town of about five thou­ I never revealed my unfaithfulness to my research as­ Warren, D.M. 1974. sand people in the southeastern part of the country. I sistant. I felt too uneasy about it. It was indeed a Disease, mediczne and religwn among the explained to my host that I wanted to take part in serious breach of confidence which, I feared, would Techiman-Bono of Ghana: A everything and asked him to introduce me to his way of damage our relationship and the work. He, too, did not study m cultural change. Ann Arbor: University life, which he did meticulously. The morning after my like the landlord's toilet and started to visit the toilet of Microfilms International. first night in his house he took me to the public latrine. the Technical School, a walk of about ten minutes. So People prefer to go to the toilet early in the morning so again toilet use disappeared from my participant obser­ it was rush hour. About ten people were waiting out­ vation but it made the phenomenon the more intriguing. side. When it was my turn I entered the place. A pene­ After all, we are most attracted to the things which con­ trating stench hit me in the face. The floor was littered tinue to elude us. with used paper. Squatting people stared at me. I felt If there is anything dirty in Mary Douglas' sense of terribly uncomfortable, walked past them and left the the term, it is human faeces. In my own culture, their place. I told my host that I did not have the urge, which place is in a 'no man's land', a territory unseen and was very true. I never returned to the place. I asked an untouched by human beings. Human faeces are hy­ American missionary with a real water closet if I could gienically handled by technical devices which make use his facility. them disappear almost immediately, first under water, Altogether I have stayed more than three years in then underground. They leave no trace, not even their Kwahu-Tafo. I have tried to practise participant obser­ smell. vation to the letter, as an anthropologist should, but vi­ Only the faeces of small children are an exception. siting the toilet has remained my major weakness. In They are allowed to stay a bit longer above the ground 1994, when I revisited the town to conduct research and even pass through human hands, mostly those of among elderly people, I settled in the house of someone their mothers, although cleverly designed diapers make who had his own latrine. I asked him if I could use it it more and more possible to avoid contact with child­ and he generously gave me a key saying that I should ren's faeces as well. In general, one could say, how­ not give it to anybody. The use of this toilet was a pri­ ever, that the faeces of children are less 'dirty' than vilege. Only some grown-ups and his own children had those of older people. access to it. The faeces of sick and elderly people who have There were good reasons to restrict the number of become incontinent or cannot visit the toilet are more people using his toilet. The bucket, which was emptied problematic. They require professional treatment. The once a week, would soon be full and the place would fact that we need a special category of workers, nurses, become a mess. I discovered the place was a mess, at to deal with that type of faeces confirms that they are least in my eyes. Several times I found the bucket over­ really dirty. By assigning a profession to remove them, flowing. Flies loved the place as did chickens who en­ we make sure that they remain far from everyday life. tered through holes in the door and the walls. The ever­ They are restricted as much as possible to certain places present pieces of used paper, either tissue or news­ and handled by 'specialists'. The system seems to papers in all languages, added to my repulsion. Separa­ work. ting the faeces and the paper is a general feature in It does not work in Kwahu-Tafo and I assume in Akan toilet culture. The paper is deposited in a separate most other places in Ghana. In itself, this is not surpris­ bucket, basket or tin, but the wind, animals and careless ing. There are more things in Ghana which do not work people cause much of the paper to end up somewhere very well: schools, hospitals, trains and electricity. else, both in the toilet and in its immediate surround- Some roads are bad and some factories do not function 8 ANTHROPOLOGY TODAY Vol14 No 3, June 1998 well. These problems, some say, are mainly due to pov­ the expression 'she is neat' is almost synonymous with erty and 'under-development'. Poor sewage and a de­ 'she is pretty', with the connotation that she is also fective toilet system in particular, one could argue, are beautiful in a moral sense, 'pure'. The connection with caused by the same problems. Nevertheless there is also respect is always present. Cleanliness engenders respect reason for surprise. That they have not developed a and expresses it. Odi ne ho ni means 'he respects him­ more efficient system of getting rid of faeces is puz­ self as well as 'he keeps himself clean'. Another term zling if one takes into account their concern about dirt. for being clean is po, which literally means 'to rub', 'to Dirt is a key concept in the Akan perception of the scrape'. Wapb, he has scraped (himself), refers to some­ human being. Dirt is something unwanted, something one who is neat, polished, in the sense of civilized. one should get rid of. Ideas about dirt and cleanliness In summary, bodily cleanliness stands for physical pervade the entire culture. There are several terms and moral attractiveness, whereas dirt symbolises which refer to dirt. Eft is dirt which, according to some, physical and moral decay. Dirt, or rather the abhorrence comes from outside and attaches to the body, to of it, plays a central role in the local 'anthropology'. To clothes, to objects, or to a house. It has a temporary say that someone is dirty, is almost a rejection of the character. A man coming from his farm is dirty (ne ho whole person. Cleanliness of the body (the skin, the aye fi or ne ho wo fi) because of the work he has been orifices, the teeth, the nails) and cleanliness with regard doing. It is not his habit to be dirty. A child playing in to housekeeping, clothing, or one's children, constitutes the mud is dirty, as is a yard which has not been swept. a basic condition for a person's attractiveness. Physical Atantanee (lit. nasty or hateful things) is dirt which is beauty and sexual attraction are commonly explained in more detestable. Most people use the term for dirt com­ terms of cleanliness. ing from inside the body: vomit, phlegm, menstruation blood, urine or faeces.