Harvard University Center for African Studies

Harvard University Center for African Studies
Name	Harvard University Center for African Studies
Established	1959
Type	Research center
Parent	Harvard University
Location	Cambridge, Massachusetts
Director	Varied

Harvard University Center for African Studies The Harvard University Center for African Studies is an interdisciplinary research center based at Harvard University that coordinates scholarship on African history, society, culture, and politics. It serves as a hub linking faculty and students across Harvard College, the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, the Harvard Kennedy School, the Harvard Divinity School, the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, and professional schools, supporting comparative work that connects African studies to global debates involving the United States, United Kingdom, France, Portugal, and Brazil. The center fosters collaborations with African institutions such as University of Cape Town, University of Nairobi, Makerere University, and University of Ibadan.

History

The center traces institutional roots to Cold War era area studies programs and benefitted from philanthropic support patterns similar to those behind the Ford Foundation, Carnegie Corporation of New York, and the Rockefeller Foundation. Early faculty affiliates included scholars with ties to the School of Oriental and African Studies, Oxford University, and Cambridge University. Over successive decades the center adapted in response to turning points such as the end of apartheid in South Africa, the structural adjustment programs associated with the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank, and the expansion of digital archives exemplified by projects like the World Digital Library and the HathiTrust Digital Library. Directors and affiliated faculty have been drawn from the ranks of historians, anthropologists, political scientists, and literary critics with connections to prizes and institutions such as the MacArthur Fellowship, the Guggenheim Fellowship, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the African Studies Association.

Mission and Governance

The center's mission aligns with broader Harvard units and emphasizes interdisciplinary research, graduate training, and public engagement. Governance involves an executive committee composed of faculty from departments including Department of History, Harvard University, Department of Anthropology, Harvard University, Department of African and African American Studies, Harvard University, the Harvard Kennedy School, and the Harvard Law School. Advisory boards have included representatives from external partners such as the African Union, Council on Foreign Relations, United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, and private foundations like the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Funding and oversight interact with Harvard-wide offices including the Office for Scholarly Communication and the Harvard Global Institute.

Academic Programs and Research

The center sponsors language instruction in languages such as Swahili language, Amharic language, Yoruba language, and Arabic language (Library of Congress) through collaborations with departmental programs and summer institutes modeled on the Fulbright Program and the Critical Language Scholarship Program. Faculty research spans topics linked to the histories of the Scramble for Africa, the Transatlantic slave trade, the Berlin Conference (1884–85), urban studies in cities like Lagos, Johannesburg, Kampala, and Dakar, health research referencing outbreaks such as Ebola virus epidemic in West Africa and pandemics addressed by the World Health Organization, and literary studies engaging writers like Chinua Achebe, Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o, Wole Soyinka, Nadine Gordimer, and Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. Comparative political research intersects with cases such as Rwanda genocide, Kenyan general election, 2007–2008, South African general election, 1994, and governance debates involving the African Peer Review Mechanism.

Graduate and Undergraduate Opportunities

Undergraduates access Harvard College concentrations and special concentrations coordinated with the center, linking coursework in departments such as Department of Government, Harvard University, Department of Economics, Harvard University, Department of Comparative Literature, Harvard University, and the Harvard Extension School. Graduate students from the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, Harvard University engage in dissertation workshops, pre-doctoral fellowships, and training collaboratives that echo models from the Ford Foundation Fellowship Program and the Humanities Center at Johns Hopkins University. The center administers or co-sponsors funding for fieldwork in locations including Accra, Kano, Addis Ababa, Harare, and Windhoek, and supports study-abroad exchanges with institutions like Stellenbosch University and University of the Witwatersrand.

Outreach, Public Events, and Partnerships

Public programming includes lecture series, film screenings, and conferences drawing speakers affiliated with institutions such as the Smithsonian Institution, Brookings Institution, Council on Foreign Relations, and the African Studies Association. Partnerships extend to African museums and archives like the National Archives of Zimbabwe, the Kenya National Archives, and the Egyptian Museum in Cairo, as well as NGOs such as Oxfam, Amnesty International, and Médecins Sans Frontières. The center convenes forums on issues connecting to the United Nations, trade negotiations involving the African Continental Free Trade Area, and cultural exchanges featuring artists connected to the Festival au Désert and the FESPACO film festival.

Publications and Projects

The center supports working paper series, collaborative digital humanities projects, and oral history initiatives modeled after archives like the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture and the British Library. It has incubated projects that interface with journals such as the Journal of African History, African Studies Review, Transition (magazine), and Research in African Literatures. Notable collaborative projects have included digital mapping ventures, public health data collaborations with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and archival preservation efforts allied with the UNESCO Memory of the World Programme. The center also helps host symposium proceedings that later appear in volumes published by presses like Cambridge University Press, Oxford University Press, and Harvard University Press.

Category:Harvard University Category:African studies centers