By Prince Acquah
Cape Coast, May 18, GNA – The Department of Sociology and Anthropology of the University of Cape Coast (UCC), has held its second anthropology alumni homecoming, calling on corporate institutions to employ anthropologists to enhance the quality of their products and services.
During the event, Evangelist Augustine Mensah, the President of the Anthropology Alumni, urged employers to engage anthropologists as core staff to conduct ethnographic research and carry out investigations into the production of new products and services to make them more endearing and acceptable to the market.
As people who studied cultures and focused on understanding humanity, he said anthropologists possessed unique skill sets critical to the progress of every sector including health, education, governance and journalism.
“If a company wanted to bring out a product for a particular group people, they need an anthropologist to do research.
“A company produced a product for a community, and they rejected it simply because of a colour. That unfortunate situation would not have arisen if ethnographic research was done,” he said.
The alumni homecoming was put together to engage with the current students and to sensitise Ghanaians to Anthropology and its prospects.
With many alumni landing jobs in various fields home and abroad, it was also a means to celebrate the achievements of the programme over the past 15 years, give back to the school and reconnect with old acquaintances.
The event also offered an opportunity to brainstorm on improving the Anthropology programme.
It was held on the theme: “Anthropology in the Global Context.”
Evangelist Mensah noted that as a real estate developer, he relied largely on his wealth of knowledge from Anthropology to enhance his business.
He entreated the current students of the course to take their lessons seriously and urged more students to pursue the programme.
As entrenched in the objectives of anthropology, Evangelist Mensah encouraged the world to peace, love and harmony in diversity to make the globe a better place and ensure sustainable development.
Prof Georgina Yaa Oduro, the Head of Department for the Department of Sociology and Anthropology, observed that people were often hesitant to take the course because they did not understand the field and its prospects; hence the need to sensitise the public.
Contrary to the thinking of many Ghanaians, she noted that education was not mainly for jobs but to make people better.
“Most people think of education as solely for jobs but it’s about grooming you generally for society and how society can benefit from you,” she noted, and expressed excitement about the improvement in the course and commended her predecessors for building the foundation.
Dr Saibu Mutaru, a Social Anthropologist and lecturer at UCC, underscored the need to observe ethics in carrying out anthropological research.
He said any research that had the tendency to harm participants in any form must be discontinued because it was unethical.
“Be open and honest about your research and disclose the purpose or objective of your research to your participants,” he added.
GNA
AT/BM