Press release

Berg en Dal, 14 January 2010

Songo – Houses, generations and transformations

What is a house?What is living?How can a house be a body?What does ‘modern’ mean in rural Africa?How are local and global worlds linked with each other?

Dwellings and extended families

The answers to all these questions can be found in the exhibition SONGO -houses, generations and transformationsin the Afrika Museum in Berg en Dal from 1 April to 31 October.This exhibition is based on years of anthropological research and, using unique images and audio material, shows how the Kasena of northern Ghana design their dwellings.The word songo refers both to the houseitself and the extended family or clan that lives in it.The exhibition shows the construction process of the house, and introduces visitors to its inhabitants.In an architecture that is created without a plan, text or language, it is the everyday actions of women that continuously create the house.

Life cycle

Songo shows how the house’s material form is also a direct representation of the order and symbolism of the body and the world inside the house.Children are born in the woman’s private quarters, and the dead are buried in the yardand are part of the inhabitants’ day-to-day living environment.

The dwelling is an organic whole that links up past and present.It is a place where life and death meet, where family ties are defined and where the link between private and public space or between male and female takes shape.Each child is born in the innermost room of the house and, from there, goes out into an ever wider world:to other houses and communities, to the market, the bar, the town and the world beyond the horizon of the village.The exhibition takes visitors on a journey along these life paths, allowing them to discover the life cycle of a Kasena for themselves.

Reshaping one’s identity

The exhibition also documents how the houses and the lives of their residents are changing today in their connection with the cities and, more in general, the 'modern' world.The exhibition shows how these changes do not necessarily lead to the loss of one's identity.New construction elements are incorporated into the existing architecture in a highly dynamic way and are reshaped by local living practices.

Guest curator:Ann Cassiman (Anthropologist, K.U.Leuven)

Design:Peter Missotten (Filmfabriek)

Design and realisation of interactive module:Wies Hermans and Ief Spincemaille

Digital imaging:Jan Missotten

Afrika Museum, Postweg 6, Berg en Dal (near Nijmegen)

Opening hours

  • Monday to Friday: 10am – 5pm
  • 1 November - 1 April: Closed on Mondays.
  • Saturdays, Sundays and public holidays: 11am – 5pm

Photo caption: Photography by Ann Cassiman

Note for the editorial team: For further information and/or photos, please contact Marieke Pompe in the Communications department, on +31 (0)24 – 6847277, email: