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Modern Skills
by Phil Bartle
Modern Skills

La version française de ce document.
Following the path of least resistance makes all rivers -- and some men -- crooked.
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As Ghana modernises and industrializes, new skills are being developed.  Here are illustrations of a few developed through the twentieth century.
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Electricity from Akosombo
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The dam at Akosombo, during the sixties, the flooding of Lake Volta, produced electricity.  Much was used for smelting bauxite, and then a grid was built to serve the country.  The electricity allowed the development of much electrically driven modern machinery.
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Operating a Drill Press and Grinder at a Trade School
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While the Swiss Missionaries introduced some practical skills, mainly carpentry, masonry and black smithing to boys in the nineteenth century, independence in 1957 saw the expansion of trade skill institutions.
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A Private School for Seamstresses
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When Mrs Ramseyer, the Swiss Missionary, introduced sewing classes for girls in 1888, two things caught on, sewing by women and sewing classes for women.  With a long history of marketing, women found out how to make an independent income by sewing or teaching how to sew.  The trainees, as in this photo, often learn on brown paper, instead of cloth, because it is cheaper.
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Tractor.
Men Got Training in Driving Tractors –– Women Got Rides
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Although farming has historically been the work of women, the introduction of mechanization changed things; driving tractors was taught first and mainly to men.  Tractors plowed too deeply in the shallow rain forest soils, helping (along with commercial fertilizers) to destroy the soils.
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Tailors Electric Sewing Machines
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Historically, men were assigned to weaving kente, so working with cloth as tailors was seen as an easy transition.
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Modern Electronic Communications
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Nowadays, of Course, it's Computers; In the Seventies It Was Electric Typewriters
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Private Repair Businesses
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Gas Welding and Television Repair


The shortest distance is not always a straight line.
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See: Gender
Women I; Food
Women II;  Farming
Women III: Cooking; 2
Women IV: Marketing
Women V; Clay
Men I; Wood
Men II; Weaving
Men III; Hunting
Men IV; Transport
Oil Palm
Palm Farming
Palmwine Tapping
Palmwine Selling
Other Palm Products
Cocoa
Gender Comensality
Modern Skills
People
Kids
Gender, Introduction
Food
Farmer. Farming
Cooking Marketing Clay  
Wood
Weaving Transport Introduction: Oil Palm Tree Farming the oil palm Tapping: Collecting the palm sap
Marketing: Palm wine seller Other Palm Products Cocoa Industry Modern Skills
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