Global cars, local landscapes: Capturing automobility in Acra (Gana)

Abstract

Acra like other urban centers in West Africa, is a destination for used cars, car parts, and scrap, coming from European and North American countries, mainly the United States. This essay endeavors to capture the high presence of vehicles in Acra's urban landscape and to picture the marks of the "automobility system" in the city routine and the production of urban space. Starting in the famous Abossey Okai market, the essay calls attention to tires, roads, bottled streets, car repair, gas stations, vehicle advertising billboards, small insurance offices, and traditional wooden coffins made in the shape of cars to bury drivers. The ensemble of images invites the reader to reflect on the role of the automobile in how the experience of the city, as well as its centrality in the process of building symbolic, cultural, and identity representations.