Editors
Professor of African and Gender Studies, University of Ghana – Legon
Professor Ampofo is Professor of African and Gender Studies at the University of Ghana, Legon. An activist-scholar, she is a member of, and has worked with many organisations in Ghana and abroad, addressing African Knowledge systems; Identity Politics; Gender-based Violence; Women’s work; Masculinities; and Gendered Representations in Popular Culture (music and religion). She is the Founding Vice-president of the African Studies Association of Africa (ASAA) and Fellow of the Ghana Academy of Arts and Sciences. She has recently published “Reviewing Studies on Africa, #Black Lives Matter, and Envisioning the Future of African Studies” African Studies Review (59)2: 7-27 (2016). She seeks to understand where some of our “gender trouble” has come from and the new “gender troubles” being invented. Earlier work looked at reproductive health issues, critiquing Euro-centric notions (that infantilized African women). Follow her via Twitter at: @adomakoampofo.
Penda Ba
Associate Professor, Political Science, Université Gaston Berger | Co-Founder, Interdisciplinary Research Group on Inequalities and Vulnerabilities (GRIV)
Pr. Mame-Penda BA est Maître de conférences agrégée en science politique à l’Université Gaston Berger de Saint-Louis (Sénégal). Elle est la première femme dans l’espace CAMES à obtenir l’agrégation en science politique. Pr. BA est actuellement la directrice scientifique du Master II de science politique et dirige le Laboratoire d’Analyse des Sociétés et Pouvoirs / Afrique-Diasporas (LASPAD). Elle est aussi co-fondatrice du Groupe de Recherche interdisciplinaire sur les Inégalités et les Vulnérabilités au Sénégal (GRIV). Pr. Ba est chargée de la mise en place de l’Institut d’Études Politiques de l’Université Gaston Berger de Saint-Louis (UGB). Ses champs de recherche couvrent l’analyse des politiques publiques, les études sur le genre, la sociologie politique du religieux ainsi que la sociogenèse et les dynamiques de l’Etat en Afrique.
Professor Mame-Penda Ba is Associate Lecturer in Political Science at Gaston Berger University in Saint-Louis (Senegal). Dr. Ba is currently the Scientific Director of the Master II of Political Science and heads the Laboratory of Analysis of Societies and Powers / Africa-Diasporas (LASPAD). She is also co-founder of the Interdisciplinary Research Group on Inequalities and Vulnerabilities in Senegal (GRIV). Dr. Ba is responsible for the establishment of the Institute of Political Studies of the Gaston Berger University of Saint-Louis (UGB). Her fields of research include public policy analysis, gender studies, political sociology of religion, and sociogenesis and state dynamics in Africa.
Cilas Kemedjio
Director, Frederick Douglass Institute for African American Studies, University of Rochester
Professor Cilas Kemedjio, Associate Professor of French and Francophone studies at the University of Rochester is also the director for the Frederick Douglass Institute for African and African-American Studies. Kemedjio is an expert on Francophone African and Caribbean literatures, French theory, and the French novel during the 20th century. He is the author of De la Négritude à la Créolité. Édouard Glissant, Maryse Condé et la malédiction de la théorie (Hamburg: LIT Verlag, 1999) and guest editor of a special issue of Présence francophone (No. 62, 2004) on Postcolonial Mythologies.
Director of Centre for Constructive Theology, Head of Theology and Ethics, School of Religion, Philosophy and Classics, University of KwaZulu-Natal
Prof R Simangaliso Kumalo, is Head of the Department of Theology and Ethics, School of Religion, Philosophy and Classics, University of KwaZulu-Natal. He is a Public Theologian and Historian. He has a BTh, BTh Honours from the University of Natal, an MTh from the University of South Africa and a PhD from the University of KwaZulu-Natal. He is fellow of Wesley House College, University of Cambridge.
Professor of Political Science, University of California, Irvine
Professor Lynch is Professor of Political Science at the University of California, Irvine. She is an expert on international relations, religion and ethics, social movements and civil society and has researched and published extensively on topics related to peace, security, international organization, globalization, humanitarianism, and religion. In 2006, she was awarded an Andrew W. Mellon New Directions Post-doctoral Fellowship for her current research on Islamic and interfaith religious ethics in world crises. She received her Ph.D. in Political Science from Columbia University in New York City.
Director, Hekima Institute of Peace Studies and International Relations (HIPSIR), Nairobi
Elias O. Opongo, SJ, is currently visiting fellow and Jesuit Chair at Government Department at Georgetown University. He is the director of Hekima Institute of Peace Studies and International Relations (HIPSIR), Hekima University College. Opongo, a peace practitioner and conflict analyst and Jesuit priest, holds a PhD in Peace and Conflict Studies from University of Bradford, UK and MA in International Peace Studies from University of Notre Dame, USA. His research focus is in the areas of transitional justice and post conflict reconstruction, state fragility and militarization of conflicts, religious extremism and violence, state building and community peacebuilding, and extractive industries, conflict and natural resource governance. He runs professional training in conflict resolution, mediation and peacebuilding. He has carried out many research projects in areas of proliferation of small arms, state fragility and conflict in Africa; extractive industries’ implications on policy, livelihoods and conflicts in Africa; post-conflict and liberal peace and implications on reconciliation, forgiveness, International Criminal Court, roles of NGOs, religious and cultural institutions, among others. Besides presenting in many public conferences, Opongo has been a visiting scholar at St. Louis University, USA. Opongo has published books, book chapters and articles on conflict resolution, transitional justice, peacebuilding and Catholic Social Teaching. His book titles include, among others: (2019) Religious Extremism and Violence in Africa: Reviewing the Practice of Intervention and Inter-religious Dialogue; (2018) Pope Francis on Good Governance and Accountability in Africa; (2016) Transitional Justice in Post-Conflict Societies in Africa; (2014) Catholic Leadership in Peacebuilding in Africa; (2008) Peace Weavers: Methodologies of Peacebuilding in Africa; (2007) Faith Doing Justice: A Manual for Social Analysis, Catholic Social Teaching and Social Justice; (2006) Making Choices for Peace: Aid Agencies in Field Diplomacy.
Toussaint Kafarhire Murhula, SJ, PhD
Managing Director, Centre Arrupe pour la Recherche et la Formation (CARF) | President of African Studies Association of Africa (ASAA)
Toussaint Kafarhire Murhula is a Jesuit priest, poet, theologian, literary critic, Executive Coach, and social scientist. He received a B.A. in philosophy from Facultés Saint Pierre Canisius (Kinshasa, 1998), and another B.A. in Theology from the Catholic University of Eastern Africa (Nairobi, 2003). He then went to earn an STL (Sacred Theology Licentiate) in Ethics and Social Theories from the Jesuit School of Theology at University of Santa Clara University (California, 2005), and a PhD in Global Politics and International Relations from Loyola University Chicago (2016). His research interest focuses on issues related to democracy and peace, political violence and conflicts, religion and society, social justice, Global Public Health, and postcolonial theories. He has taught at Loyola University Chicago in the US, the Episcopal Theological College in Pecs (Hungary), Hekima University College in Nairobi (Kenya), and Université Loyola du Congo (ULC) in Kinshasa, the Democratic Republic of Congo.
He currently works as Managing Director of Centre Arrupe pour la Recherche et la Formation (CARF, www.centrearrupe.org) and visiting professor at the Universite Loyola du Congo (ULC, https://loyola.cd). He is a member of several academic networks including; Reseau Elikya www.reseauelikya.org ; the Pan-African Catholic Theology and Pastoral Network www.panafricantheologyandpastoralnetwork.org as well as the African Studies Association of Africa (ASAA) www.as-aa.org, which he currently serves as president. He is also a member of the Editorial Board of Global Africa Review www.globalafricapress.org and the Africa Region coordinator of the Catholic Theological Ethics in World Church (CTEWC) network, www.catholicethics.com. Follow him via twitter at: @kafmurhula
Nadine Machikou
Professor in Political Science at the University of Yaoundé II (Cameroon).
Professor Machikou is currently Vice-Rector in charge of research, cooperation and relations with the business world at the University of Yaoundé and Seminar Director at the Cameroon International War College since 2012. She is co-editor-in-chief of the French journal Politique africaine. Since 2021 she has been the Vice-president of the African Association of Political Science, and the chair of the Committee on participation and membership at International Political Science Association. Her research today focuses on the practical and symbolic expressions of violence, autocratization, the political and moral economy of emotions (compassion in foreign policy, anger in the context of the Anglophone crisis or the Islamist sect Boko Haram, etc.).
Professor Machikou is a visiting professor at several higher education and research institutions, including the Global Institute of the University of Geneva, the University of Nanterre, the University of Dauphine, the International Institute of the Francophonie of the University of Lyon, the Diplomatic Academy of Vietnam, the University of Lomé, the University of Abomey-Calavi, the University of Kara and the University Félix Houphouët-Boigny.
She also collaborates with the Bayreuth International Graduate School of African Studies and the Contending Modernities Project research group at the University of Notre Dame, Indiana (USA). She is also a conciliatory judge on the National Olympic Committee, founder and honorary president of the think tank Ayen-Observatory of Politics in Africa, and founder Polit’Elles, African francophone female political scientists Network.
Editorial Assistants/Luce Graduate Fellows
Saturnin Modeste Agramako
Master’s Student, Hekima Institute of Peace Studies and International Relations (HIPSIR)
Saturnin Modeste AGRAMAKO is from Central African Republic. He is a Master’s student at Hekima Institute of Peace and International Relations (HIPSIR), Hekima University College. He holds a Bachelor degree in Philosophy from Saint Augustin University of Kinshasa (USAKIN) and a Diploma in Theology from Tangaza University College in Nairobi, Kenya. Modeste’s research interests are in the areas of Conflict Resolutions, Peacebuilding and conflict analysis, Democracy, and International Relations. He currently works as part-time research assistant at the Centre for research Training and Publications (CRTP) at Hekima University College.
Albert Billy Bangirana
PhD Student, Theology, University of KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa
Albert Billy Bangirana is a PhD student in Theology at the University of KwaZulu-Natal in South Africa. Albert researches on Sexual Surveillance and Students’ Moral Agency focusing on Catholic Moral Theology and HIV prevention in a South African Higher Education Context. He serves as an Academic Development Officer in the School of Religion, Philosophy and Classics where he doubles as a CIHA Blog representative at the Ujamaa Management Board and a CHART Committee member. He also serves as an adjunct lecturer at the Seth Mokitimi Methodist Seminary in Pietermaritzburg.
Ebenezer Kwesi Bosomprah
PhD Student, African Studies, University of Ghana-Legon
Ebenezer Bosomprah is a PhD student at the Institute of African Studies, University of Ghana. His research interests encapsulate Human security, religion, technology and gender. He worked with the Centre for Gender Studies and Advocacy of the University of Ghana as a Research Assistant. He holds a Bachelor’s and a Master’s degree in social work from the University of Ghana. He also holds a Master of Arts degree in Ministry from the Trinity Theological Seminary in Ghana. For His PhD dissertation, Ebenezer is conducting a cross-sectional study of the contributions of the church to human security in Ghana during the COVID -19 pandemic.
Ph.D. Candidate, Political Science, University of California-Irvine
Jenilene Francisco is a Ph.D. candidate in Political Science at the University of California, Irvine. Specializing in International Relations and feminist ethnography, Jenilene’s research centers on women’s activism in the Philippines. Her dissertation looks at the work of women’s organizations fighting to reclaim the silenced narrative of WWII’s sexual violence. Outside of academia, Jenilene can be found studying yoga philosophy and practice.