The role of taboos in conservation of sacred groves in Ghana's Tallensi-Nabdam district
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Bibliographic record
Abstract
Abstract More than half of Ghana's forest cover has been lost to deforestation. Although the Tallensi-Nabdam district has suffered deforestation, portions of the biosphere called sacred groves have survived. The purpose of this study was to explore the particular reasons why the groves have thrived by articulating precise sacred grove taboos, many of which are gender specific. Our enquiry led to a compendium of taboos categorized into environmental, social and regulatory conventions. We found that the adherence to taboo and fear of repercussions, including barrenness and even death, plays a role in the continued preservation of the sacred groves. Also, people who do not adhere to traditional religions still stayed away from sacred groves to avoid dealing with traditional authorities. The paper indicates that in spite of modernization, taboos serve useful purposes in the conservation of biodiversity within sacred groves. The paper extends the argument that biodiversity conservation is linked with cultural preservation. La déforestation a entraîné la perte de plus de la moitié du couvert forestier au Ghana. Alors que le district Tallensi-Nabdam a beaucoup été touché par la déforestation, certaines parties de la biosphère, connues sous le nom de bosquets sacrés, y ont échappé. L'étude présentée ici a pour objet d'explorer les raisons particulières pour lesquelles les bosquets se portent bien grâce à des tabous développés sur les bosquets sacrés et dont la plupart se distinguent selon les deux sexes. Cette exploration débouche sur une présentation de tabous sous une forme abrégée qui se subdivisent selon les conventions environnementales, sociales et réglementaires. Il en découle que l'acceptation des tabous ainsi que la crainte de subir des conséquences, telles que la terre stérile ou même la mort, contribuent à soutenir les efforts de préservation des bosquets sacrés. De plus, les gens qui n'acceptent pas les religions traditionnelles ne se sont pas aventurés dans les bosquets sacrés pour éviter de se heurter aux autorités traditionnelles. Cet article souligne que, malgré la modernisation, les tabous occupent une place de choix dans la conservation de la biodiversité des bosquets sacrés. L'article renforce ainsi l'argument que la conservation de la biodiversité et la préservation culturelle sont interdépendants. Ghana ha perdido más de la mitad de sus bosques a la desforestación. A pesar de sufrir una cierta desforestación, partes de la biosfera en el distrito Tallensi-Nabdam han sobrevivido. El objeto de este estudio es de explorar las razones concretas por las que los bosquecillos han crecido con fuerza mediante la articulación de tabúes precisas de los bosquecillos sagrados, muchos de los cuales son de género específico. Nuestra investigación nos llevó a un compendio de tabúes categorizados como convenciones medioambientales, sociales, y reguladoras. Descubrimos que la observancia del tabú y el miedo de las repercusiones, incluso la esterilidad y la muerte, influyen en la ininterrumpida conservación de los bosquecillos sagrados. Además, hasta las personas que no observan las religiones tradicionales se mantenían fuera de los bosquecillos sagrados para evitar contacto con las autoridades tradicionales. El papel señala que, a pesar de la modernización, los tabúes tienen una función útil en la conservación de la biodiversidad en los bosquecillos sagrados. El papel extiende el argumento de que la conservación de la biodiversidad está relacionada con la preservación cultural. Keywords: deforestation, sacred groves, taboo, conservation, GhanaKeywords: déforestationbosquets sacréstabouconservationGhanaKeywords: desforestaciónbosquecillos sagradostabúconservaciónGhana Acknowledgements We acknowledge the contributions of John Zoogah, Len and June Perry, Nicholina Yembilah and Solomon Barry for their support. We would like to thank all respondents and field assistants who participated in this study and especially Subazaa Dok who died shortly after an inspiring interview. Notes 1 See < unesco.org./mab/index.shtml>. 2 See < unesco.org./mab/index.shtml>. 3 Workshop on Combating the Effects of Drought and Desertification, Accra, Ghana, 1986. 4 Most of Northern Ghana's significant Muslim population is concentrated in urban areas. 5 Our sense is that night 'groves' are not trees but the bare earth, although conclusive evidence could not be collected at the time of this work. 6 Wicked groves are purported to be so powerful and vengeful that not enough time is given for offenders to seek redress. 'Night groves' might also be termed wicked since they are also supposedly very powerful.
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Full frame distilled prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. Learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and 10,348 direct Gemma labels. Candidate is the union of thresholded teacher heads; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels or direct frontier model labels.
Codex and Gemma teacher scores by category
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.000 | 0.001 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.000 | 0.001 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Open science | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Research integrity | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from it