Homowo is a harvest

festival A festival is an event ordinarily celebrated by a community and centering on some characteristic aspect or aspects of that community and its religion or cultures. It is often marked as a local or national holiday, mela, or eid. A festival c ...

celebrated by the

Ga people The Ga-Dangbe, Gã-Daŋbɛ, Ga-Dangme, or GaDangme are an ethnic group in Ghana, Togo and Benin. The Ga and Dangbe people are grouped respectively as part of the Ga–Dangme ethnolinguistic group. The Ga-Dangmes are one ethnic group that lives ...

Ghana Ghana (; tw, Gaana, ee, Gana), officially the Republic of Ghana, is a country in West Africa. It abuts the Gulf of Guinea and the Atlantic Ocean to the south, sharing borders with Ivory Coast in the west, Burkina Faso in the north, and To ...

in the Greater Accra Region. The

starts in the month of August with the planting of crops (mainly

maize Maize ( ; ''Zea mays'' subsp. ''mays'', from es, maíz after tnq, mahiz), also known as corn (North American and Australian English), is a cereal grain first domesticated by indigenous peoples in southern Mexico about 10,000 years ago. Th ...

and yam) before the

rainy season The rainy season is the time of year when most of a region's average annual rainfall occurs. Rainy Season may also refer to: * ''Rainy Season'' (short story), a 1989 short horror story by Stephen King * "Rainy Season", a 2018 song by Monni * ''T ...

starts. During the festival, they perform a dance called Kpanlogo. The Ga people celebrate Homowo in the remembrance of the

famine A famine is a widespread scarcity of food, caused by several factors including war, natural disasters, crop failure, Demographic trap, population imbalance, widespread poverty, an Financial crisis, economic catastrophe or government policies. Th ...

that once happened in their history in precolonial Ghana.

Etymology

The word Homowo (''Homo'' - hunger, ''wo'' - hoot) can mean "to hoot (or jeer) at hunger" in the Ga language.The

Library of Congress The Library of Congress (LOC) is the research library that officially serves the United States Congress and is the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It is the oldest federal cultural institution in the country. The library is ...

's article on Homowo. Retrieved 08 September 07 The tradition of Homowo started with a period of hunger leading to

due to failure of the seasonal

rain Rain is water droplets that have condensed from atmospheric water vapor and then fall under gravity. Rain is a major component of the water cycle and is responsible for depositing most of the fresh water on the Earth. It provides water f ...

s needed by crops in the

Greater Accra Region The Greater Accra Region has the smallest area of Ghana's 16 administrative regions, occupying a total land surface of 3,245 square kilometres. This is 1.4 per cent of the total land area of Ghana. It is the second most populated region, befor ...

, where the Ga people dwell. When the rains returned to normal, the Ga people celebrated it by creating the Homowo festival, hence its name and meaning. Homowo is greatly celebrated in all the towns in the Ga state with celebrations climaxing in Gamashie. The celebration begins with the planting of maize, which will be used in preparing the food for the festival named ''Kpokpoi'' or ''Kpekple''. During this period, noise making is prohibited or banned since it is believed that it will hinder the maturity of the crop. The meal is eaten with

Palm Nut Soup Palm nut soup is a soup made from palm fruit and it is common in the Ghanaian and Ivorian community. It originated from Akan tribe in Ashanti Region, Ghana. Palm nut soup has become a continental soup. In the Akan language (the native language o ...

and it is also sprinkled within the town. This is normally done by traditional leaders and family heads. All family heads sprinkle the "kpokpoi" in their family house. Celebration includes marching down roads and streets beating drums, chanting, merrymaking face painting, singing and traditional dances. On this day there is usually a lot of traffic and roads are usually blocked off to accommodate the festival. Even though it is a Ga tradition, many other ethnic groups are welcomed to also join in the celebration. Some of the towns that celebrate Homowo are La,

Teshie Teshie is a coastal town in the Ledzokuku Municipal District, a district in the Greater Accra Region of southeastern Ghana. Teshie is the ninth most populous settlement in Ghana, with a population of 171,875 people. Politics Teshie is in the ...

, Teshie Nungua, Osu,

Ga-Mashie Ga-Mashie is the home of the original Ga settlers and the original name of Accra, Ghana Ghana (; tw, Gaana, ee, Gana), officially the Republic of Ghana, is a country in West Africa. It abuts the Gulf of Guinea and the Atlantic Ocean to the ...

Tema Tema is a city on the Bight of Benin and Atlantic coast of Ghana. It is located east of the capital city; Accra, in the region of Greater Accra, and is the capital of the Tema Metropolitan District. As of 2013, Tema is the eleventh most popul ...

Prampram Prampram is a coastal town in the Greater Accra Region of Ghana. The town is located in the Ningo Prampram District. Prampram (Gbugbla), the capital of Ningo-Prampram, is 15 minutes' drive from the port city of Tema and 45 minutes from Accra, the ...

, and

Ningo Old Ningo is a town in the Greater Accra Region of Ghana. History Also known as Great Ningo, the inhabitants have always been a fishing and farming community. They form part of the Ga-Adangbe people. The name Ningo has a much more widely known an ...

Gallery

File:Homowo Festival in Ghana 3.jpg, The Ga people celebrate Homowo Festival in the remembrance of the famine that once happened in their history in precolonial Ghana File:Homowo Festival in Ghana 4.jpg, Homowo Festival File:Homowo Festival in Ghana 2.jpg, Homowo Festival File:Homowo Festival in Ghana 7.jpg, Homowo Festival File:Homowo Festival in Ghana.jpg, Homowo Festival File:Homowo Palm Nut Soup.jpg, Homowo Festival Palm nut Soup

References

External links

* {{Commons category-inline
Promoting and celebrating Homowo with

Obo Addy Obo Addy (January 15, 1936 – September 13, 2012) was a Ghanaian drummer and dancer who was one of the first native African musicians to bring the fusion of traditional folk music and Western pop music known as ''worldbeat'' to Europe and ...

Ghanaian culture Festivals in Ghana May observances Spring festivals

Etymology

Gallery

See also

References

External links