About

Kodzo Gavua is an archaeologist and ethnographer whose research focuses on relationships that may be found between cross-cultural interactions, cultural transformations, heritage, and human development in Africa. He engages in public archaeology, material culture studies, cultural and heritage resource management, and museum development programmes in Ghana. Projects in which he is currently involved include the reconfiguration of museums to reflect alternative histories and narratives, studies of alternative archives and archiving as means to fostering social cohesion, social justice, and relative peace in coastal Ghanaian communities, and restitution processes and cultural diplomacy in West Africa and beyond. Gavua is Technical Chair of Ghana Heritage Committee (GHC) and Chair of Ghana’s Focal Team on Restitution and Repatriation. He founded and directs the A.G. Leventis Digital Resource Centre (LDRC) at the University of Ghana. International collaborative projects in which he has been involved as Co-Principal Investigator include the following:

• Legba-Dzoka Project: Provenance Research into Missionary Carl Spiess’ collections from Togoland
• Imagining Futures Through Un/Archived Pasts (IF) Initiative
• African Cultural Heritage Programme
• Remaking Societies, Remaking Persons: A Supranational Forum for Rethinking Heritage, Museums and Memory Work (RSRP)

• Research and Digitization of Gold Forging in Ghana: A Study of Endangered Material Knowledge 

  You can also reach him through: kgavua@gmail.com

Education

• Ph.D. (Archaeology), University of Calgary, Alberta, Canada. 1990.
• M.A. (International Affairs), University of Ghana, Legon. 2000.
• M.A. (African Archaeology), University of Calgary, Alberta, Canada. 1985.
• B.A. Honors (Archaeology and Philosophy), University of Ghana, Legon. 1980.

Research Interest

Interests:

• Legacies of cross-cultural interactions in Africa
• Heritage, material culture, and restitution studies
• Legacies of the enslavement and colonization of people in Africa
• Cultural Resource and Museum Management in Ghana 

Graduate Courses Taught and Examined

• ARCH 718: Issues in Heritage Studies
• ARCH 605: Visual Anthropology
• ARCH 717: Advanced Visual Anthropological Methods and Strategies
• ARCH 715: Material Culture Studies
• ARCH 713: Topics in Art History of Ghana
• ARCH 621: Exhibition Development and Management
• ARCH 619: Issues in Heritage Management
• ARCH 609: Issues in Economic Anthropology
• ARCH 608: Anthropology of Tourism
• ARCH 603: Advanced Field Methods and Techniques
• ARCH 602: Analysis and Interpretation of Material Culture
• ARCH 601: History of Archaeological Method and Theory 

Undergraduate Courses Taught and Examined

• ARCH 426:  Monuments Conservation
• ARCH 423:  Ethnographic Field Methods and Techniques
• ARCH 416:  Introduction to Economic Anthropology
• ARCH 406: Cultural Resource Management
• ARCH 405:  Archaeological Field Methods and Techniques
• ARCH 402:  Post-Field Laboratory Analysis
• ARCH 331:  Art History of Ghana
• ARCH 324:  Ethnoarchaeology of Africa
• ARCH 323:  Archaeological Method and Theory
• ARCH 302:  Archaeology, Anthropology and Cultural Evolution
• ARCH 301:  Archaeology and the Natural Environment

Publications

Edited Books

• Peterson, D., Gavua, K. & Rassool, C. (eds.). (2015). The Politics of Heritage in Africa: Economies, Histories and Infrastructures. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• Johnson, C., Gavua, K. & T. Oldknows (eds.). (2006). Intercultural Perspectives on Ghana. Portales: The Scopcraeft Press.
• Gavua, K. (ed.). (2000). A Handbook of Eweland Vol. II: The Northern Ewes of Ghana. Accra: Woeli Publishing Services.

Select Articles:

• Gavua, K. (2023). Working as a proud archaeologist where I originate. In Being indigenous archaeologists: reckoning new paths between past and present lives.  Nicholas G. & Watkins, J. (editors). London: Routledge.
• Nutor, K. & Gavua, K. (2023). Historical Archaeology of the Dente Shrine at Peki, Ghana: Landscapes of Power and Memories of Atlantic Slavery in West Africa. African Archaeological Review.
• Gavua, K. & Kuntaa, D. (2021). Giving the Ghana National Museum a New Life. InNational Museums in Africa: Identity, History and Politics. Silverman R., Abungu, G & Probst, P. (editors), London: Routledge.
• Gavua, K. (2021). Monuments of Ghana. A new Chapter: Ghana’s Museums & Cultural Heritage. Jane Quinn, Bolton & Quinn, 19-24.
• Gavua, K. (2019). Researching our shared heritage: What do we want to see today? South African Archaeological Bulletin 74 (210), 82-85.
• Gavua, K. (2019). Researching the Legacies of the Historic Enslavement and Trading of People in Ghana. In Arqueologia e Historia da Cultura Material na Africa e na Diaspora Africana, Santos V.S., Symanski, L.C.P., & Holl, A. (eds.). Curibita: Brazil Publishing, 85-99.
• Gavua, K. (2018). ‘African Art’ and Cross-Cultural Negotiations in Ghana. CSU Faculty Seminar Proceedings. McGadney, B. (ed.). University of Ghana Printing Press.
• Gavua, K. 2017. James Anquandah, 1938-2017. Azania: Archaeological research in Africa, 52(4), 540-541.
• Apoh, W., and K. Gavua. 2016. ‘We will not relocate until our ancestors and shrines come with us’: heritage and conflict management in the Bui Dam project area, Ghana. In Community Archaeology and Heritage in Africa: Decolonizing practice. Schmidt, P.R., and I. Pikirayi (eds.). London & New York: Routledge, 204 - 223.
• Peterson, D., K. Gavua and C. Rassool (eds.). 2015.  The Politics of Heritage in Africa: Economies, Histories and Infrastructures. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• Gavua, K. (2015). Monuments and Negotiations of Power in Ghana. In The Politics of Heritage in Africa. Peterson, D., Gavua, K. & Rassool, C. (editors). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 97–112.
• Gavua, K. 2015. Material Expressions of Religious Identity in Ghana. In Theory in Africa, Africa in Theory: Locating Meaning in Archaeology. Wynne-Jones, S. and J.B. Fleisher (editors). London: Routledge, 137 – 155.
• Calvo, M., Gavua, K., García Rosselló, J., Javaloyas, D, & Albero, D. 2014. Social Identities and Material Culture: Oral Histories, Archaeology and Ethnoarchaeology in the Upper Basin of the White Volta (NE Ghana). Nyame Akuma No. 82: 23 – 36.
• Gavua, K. & Nutor, B.K. 2014. Bringing Archaeology to the People: Towards a Viable Public Archaeology in Ghana. In Current perspectives on the Archaeology of Ghana, James Anquandah, J., Kankpeyeng, B.W, & Apoh, W. (eds.). Department of Archaeology and Heritage Studies Reader, University of Ghana Reader Series. Accra: Sub-Saharan Publishers, 256-62.
• Gavua, K. & Apoh, W. (2011). Alternative Site Conservation Strategies in Ghana: The Adome Ancient Ironworking Site. In ‘Archaeological Site Management in Sub-Saharan Africa’ - Special Issue of the Conservation and Management of Archaeological Sites, Vol. 13 (2-3), 212-30.

Other Information:

Visiting Fellowships

• Honorary Research Fellow, University of Exeter, UK. May 18, 2020 - March 31, 2024.
• IAS Benjamin Meaker Visiting Professor, University of Bristol, UK. May, 2014.
• Visiting Scholar,  University of East Anglia, Norwich, K., Jan. 2014 – April 2014.
• Visiting Scholar, University of Balearic Islands, Palma, Mallorca, Department of Prehistory and Historical Sciences, Spain, February – April 2011.
• Visiting Scholar, Indiana University, Bloomington, Department of Anthropology/ African Studies Centre, Sept. 2002 – June 2003.