Where is the Homowo festival celebrated?
Ghana
Homowo is a harvest festival celebrated by the Ga people of Ghana. The festival starts in the month of August with the planting of crops (mainly maize and yam) before the rainy season starts.
Which date is the Homowo festival 2021?
The Osu and Adabraka traditional areas will be commencing their Homowo festivals on August 17, 2021, and August 14, 2021, respectively.
What date is Homowo celebrated?
The celebration usually takes place in August, rarely in July or September. It is believed that the whole of Accra celebrated the Homowo Festival in 1888 as late as the 27th or 29th of September. ‘ 1st Day, Monday: The first day of the Ga year is reckoned from the first Monday after the Saturday feast.
How long is Homowo celebrated?
The Homowo Festival is a month long celebration of the harvest mainly celebrated by the Ga people in the Greater Accra area of Ghana. The festival is not necessarily held at one specific time but is usually held near August.
What is the biggest festival in Ghana?
Homowo – May Homowo is one of the grandest festivals in Ghana and it happens right in the capital, Accra, every year in May. Its history is one of a season of despair due to famine, which was eventually followed by a bumper harvest of plant food and fish, as such homowo – refering to the act of ‘hooting at hunger’.
What is the first rite for homowo festival?
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 disturbs the gods. The meal is eaten with Palm Nut Soup and it is also sprinkled within the town.
Which food is used during Homowo?
Kpekple (also referred to as kpokpoi) is a kind of food eaten by the Gas of Ghana during the celebration of Homowo festival, which is to hoot at hunger. It is prepared with the primary ingredients of steamed and fermented corn meal, palm nut soup and smoked fish.
Why is Homowo festival important?
Homowo means hooting at and ridiculing hunger. It is an annual festival to commemorate the day the ancestors won victory over hunger, hooted at it and ridiculed it with songs and dancing.
Why is homowo festival important?
Which food is used during homowo?
What is the meaning of hooting at hunger?
The word homowo means “hooting [in the sense of jeering or making fun] at hunger,” and the festival traces its origin to a legendary famine that befell the area surrounding Accra, now the capital of Ghana, hundreds of years ago.
What language is Ga?
Kwa language
Classification. Ga is a Kwa language, part of the Niger–Congo family. It is very closely related to Adangme, and together they form the Ga–Dangme branch within Kwa. Ga is the predominant language of the Ga people, an ethnic group of Ghana.
When is the Homowo festival in Accra Ghana?
Homowo Festival. This harvest festival is celebrated by the Ga people from the Greater Accra Region of Ghana. It begins with the sowing of millet by the traditional priests in May. After this, thirty-day ban on drumming is imposed on the land by the priests. The festival is highlighted at varying times by different quarters of the Ga tribe.
How did the Homowo festival get its name?
When the rains returned to normal, the Ga people celebrated 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.
What kind of food is eaten at Homowo festival?
There is a special meal for the celebration. This meal known as (kpokpoi) is made from maize and eating with palm nut soup. The paramount chief of the GA traditional area, the GA Mantse, goes round the town sprinkling the food on the ground.
What does the word Homowo mean in Ghana?
According to Ga oral tradition, a severe famine broke out among the people during their migration to present day Accra. They were inspired by the famine to embark on massive food production exercises which eventually yielded them bumper harvest. Their hunger ended and with great joy they “hooted at hunger” this is the meaning of the word HOMOWO.