British West Africa

British West Africa was the collective name for British colonies in West Africa during the colonial period, either in the general geographical sense or more specifically those comprised in a formal colonial administrative entity. The United Kingdom held varying parts of these territories or the whole throughout the 19th century. From west to east, the colonies became the independent countries of the Gambia, Sierra Leone, Ghana, and Nigeria.

British West Africa or the British West African Settlements constituted during two periods (17 October 1821 until its first dissolution on 13 January 1850 and again 19 February 1866 till its final demise on 24 November 1888) an administrative entity under a governor-in-chief (comparable in rank to a Governor-general), an office vested in the governor of Sierra Leone (at Freetown).

The other colonies originally included in the jurisdiction were the Gambia and the British Gold Coast (modern Ghana). Also western Nigeria, eastern Nigeria and northern Nigeria.

British West Africa's present makeup includes Ghana, Sierra Leone, Gambia, Western Nigeria, Eastern Nigeria and Northern Nigeria. Each of these countries and areas are a post-colonial period, or what the Ghanaian writer Kwame Appiah dubs neo-colonialism.

British West Africa's development was solely based on modernisation, and autonomous educational systems were the first step to modernising indigenous culture. Cultures and interests of indigenous peoples were ignores. A new social order, as well as European influences within schools and local traditions, helped mould British West Africa's culture. Significant was the British West African colonial school curriculum. Local elites developed, with new values and philosophies, who changed the overall cultural development.

...
Wikipedia