The MIASA Public Lecture Series features MIASA fellows in residence. It is primarily directed to researchers and students but is also open to the wider public.
The Anton Wilhelm Amo Lecture is organized annually by MIASA at the University of Ghana in collaboration with the Institute of African Studies and the Department of Philosophy and Classics at the University of Ghana. It is named after the 18th century philosopher from present-day Ghana who taught at the universities of Halle and Jena. The lecture series promotes MIASA’s overarching commitment of making African thinking increasingly relevant in global academia, and it addresses questions of how the humanities and social sciences can contribute to the decolonisation of knowledge production and epistemic justice.
Lectures
The MIASA Public Lecture Series features MIASA fellows in residence. It is primarily directed to researchers and students but is also open to the wider public.
The Anton Wilhelm Amo Lecture is organized annually by MIASA at the University of Ghana in collaboration with the Institute of African Studies and the Department of Philosophy and Classics at the University of Ghana. It is named after the 18th century philosopher from present-day Ghana who taught at the universities of Halle and Jena. The lecture series promotes MIASA’s overarching commitment of making African thinking increasingly relevant in global academia, and it addresses questions of how the humanities and social sciences can contribute to the decolonisation of knowledge production and epistemic justice.
Public Lecture: Women as public transport providers. Speaker: Prof. Eyo Mensah (University of Calabar)
Abstract The public transport sector in Nigeria has often been stereotyped as a male-dominated industry. Over the years, the upsurge in unemployment rate and the necessity of economic empowerment have pushed women to adopt commercial tricycle riding as a means of livelihood. In this public lecture, I interrogate the perception of women as tricycle riders ... Read more
Public Lecture: Cultural intermediation and the mediation of culture: The issue of cultural hegemonies in social gatherings Speaker: Dr. Laure Carbonnel
MIASA Conference Room, 18th April 2023 Abstract: Different people, groups, social worlds, and experiences, even when opposed, may be connectedin cultural centres, art schools , on musical platforms or at dance gatherings. They are places ofsociability where people meet, share and discover, but are also places where certain social imagery, habits, andworld views, impose themselves ... Read more
Public Lecture: Mapping Rubondo Island: Knowledge and Ignorance in the Construction of ‘Natural Space’ in Interlacustrine Africa since 1875, Speaker: Felix Schürmann
Abstract: National parks and other nature reserves are not remnants of »untouched wilderness« somewhere outside civilisation. In general, they have been transformed into ostensibly authentic natural spaces by persons and institutions who considered nature as to be protected. Media play an important role in such transformations. Using the case of Rubondo, the oldest and largest ... Read more
Conference: Increasing Women’s Political Presence in West Africa
Organizers: Interdisciplinary Fellow Group on "Increasing Women's Political Presence in West Africa" (IFG 8) Keynote address by Ayisha Osori (Open Society Foundation) on Women’s Political Power in West Africa and the Global Context of Democracy and its Discontents: The Nigeria Case Programm Abstract: In Africa, significant regional disparities in women’s presence in political office exist, with West Africa ... Read more
Public Lecture: The People’s “Calls” and “Counter-calls” For Paul Biya’s Candidature: Pre-election Confrontation, Hegemonic Tensions and the Struggle for Political Change in Cameroon; Speaker: Dr. Jean-Marcellin Manga Lebongo
Abstract: This paper questions the “calls” and “counter-calls” for Paul Biya’s candidature as a means to participate in political life. The calls for the candidature of the incumbent President show the construction of political allegiances that underlie various clientelist negotiations initiated by political leaders to maintain their hegemonic positions. However, the counter-calls highlight how, through ... Read more
Public Lecture: Responsibilizing parents to overcome blindness: Changing intergenerational relations through education for all in Northern Benin; Speaker: Prof. Erdmute Alber (University of Bayreuth)
Abstract: The lecture traces how the large Education for All campaigns transformed parental responsibilities, not only in terms ofthe costs of enrolment and the maintenance of schools, but also in terms of other changes in children’s life courses, whichare related to their schooling trajectories under difficult conditions. Alongside parental responsibilities for schooling, responsibilities for marriage, ... Read more
Public Lecture: “Our Mothers are Not Free” The Ndi’ishi Tradition and Social Control among the Nsukka Igbo, Southeastern Nigeria, Speaker: Ngozika Obi-Ani (University of Nigeria, Nsukka)
Abstract: African writers normally romanticize the past ontologies of African women contending that they held considerable social power. This overarching narrative obscures the gender imbalances in precolonial and post-contact Africa. The nd’ishi tradition of northernmost Igbo communities–generally called Nsukka–is a paradox that all pre-contact Africa had a fair deal for women.Among them, married women that engage ... Read more
Public Lecture: Women and Survivability: Ecofeminist Representation of Oil Pollution and Environmental Degradation in Niger Delta Poetry, Speaker: Chinasa Abonyi (University of Nigeria, Nsukka)
Abstract: Environmental Degradation is a global phenomenon that affects all life forms including plants, animals, humans and especially women and children. One major cause of environmental pollution and degradation is oil exploration and this has been a major problem in the Niger Delta region of Nigeria. In contemporary Nigerian literature, ecological writings are dominated by ... Read more
Public Lecture: The Politics of the Punchline: Elections, Ebola and the Power of Laughter in Goma, DR Congo; Speaker: Silke Oldenburg (University of Basel)
Abstract In Goma, a provincial capital in Eastern DR Congo, the urban and the catastrophic have long been intertwined purveying analytical power to punchlines as indicative of everyday absurdity. Based on ethnographic fieldwork and social media analysis, this lecture reveals the 'Power of Laughter' by illustrating how Goma’s comedians turn the incongruity of expectation and ... Read more
Public Lecture: Akonedi, An African Deity and Her Shrines in Larteh: A Field Report, Speaker: Dr. Benedikt Pontzen
Abstract This presentation is a field report on my ongoing research about the deity Akonedi and her shrines in the Akuapem town Larteh. Doing ethnographic fieldwork at her shrines, I trace the multiple ways in which Akonedi is present in people’s lives in Ghana. Based on my findings, I tell a history of thisdeity. I ... Read more
Public Lecture: Changing Mortuary and Funeral Economy and the Politics of Prestige in Northwest Ghana, Speaker: Prof. Isidore Lobnibe (Western Oregon University)
Abstract n Africa more generally, funerals have been shown to bring together members of the extended family to renew and reaffirm their individual membership within the larger family and to also compete for social prestige. In Northern Ghana, the past few decades have witnessed dramatic changes in funerary and mortuary institutions because of changing political ... Read more
Public Lecture: From the African University we no longer want, to the one we will unavoidably build, Speaker: Abdorahmane Seck (Université Gaston Berger de Saint-Louis)
Abstract:From China to Africa, passing through Europe... are we not all wise? do we not all dance and sing? do we, indisputably, take care of ourselves, then? Taking up this simple common sense, I draw the two objectives that I intend to achieve in this presentation. Firstly, to draw a critical and epistemological reflection on the possible meaning, possibilities and virtues of the academy's knowledge in the context of African realities. Secondly, and consequently, to ... Read more
