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WEEK of September 20, 2004
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“Field Trip” to Ghana

by Jeffrey Stanley

Middle School humanities teacher Ed Herzman spent six weeks in the West African nation of Ghana this summer, thanks to a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities. Herzman made the trip along with 25 other middle- and upper-school teachers from around the country with the goal of “exploring the history, geography and culture of the country” in order to develop new curricula. The trip was part of an NEH seminar entitled “Ghana: Continuity and Change,” the focus of which was how history—for instance, British colonialism and the slave trade—continue to impact the present-day country.

“We went all around Ghana, from the capital of Accra to coastal cities such as Cape Coast,” says Herzman. “I was particularly fascinated by the north, which has been heavily influenced by trans-Saharan trade and is therefore predominantly Muslim.” Herzman says that he had hoped to gain “a sense of the daily life of Ghanaians, which is a difficult concept to glean from textbooks.”

He found what he was after. “The Ghanaians I met were open and generous,” he says—adding that the food was tasty, too. Even the cuisine was reflective of the country’s history, ranging from the British-inspired fish and chips to peanut soup. “I ate well,” says Herzman, “although the spicy food could be tough to digest at times.”

Gustatory detours aside, Herzman was disturbed by the incredible poverty he observed throughout the country. “Many problems aren’t being solved because the world chooses not to focus on them. For example, the world has the money to supply clean drinking water to Ghana, but it still hasn’t come. Children die simply from drinking the water.”

Although his overall goal with the trip was to enhance his humanities curriculum, he couldn’t help but return with an additional agenda. “I’d like to help my students understand just what type of privileges they have and what types of responsibilities come with those privileges.”

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