Curriculum Vitae

Education

2005
Ph.D. in Social Anthropology, Queen’s University Belfast

1994
M.A. in Social Anthropology, Queen’s University Belfast

1993
B.A. (Hons) Anthropology and History, National University of Ireland

Positions Held

2016 - present
Research Partner, Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology

2016
Guest Scholar, Bayreuth Academy of Advanced African Studies

2011-2016
Senior Research Fellow, Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology

2011 and 2012

Visiting Lecturer, Department of Development Studies, University of Makeni, Sierra Leone.
Course taught: Research methods (part of an MA in Development Studies).

2009
Honorary Research Fellow, School of Anthropology and History, Queen’s University Belfast, Northern Ireland.

2008
Senior Tutor, Department of Anthropology, University of Auckland, New Zealand. Courses taught: The Anthropology of Conflict; (with colleagues) Anthropology Today: Debates in Culture, Theoretical Approaches to Society and Culture, and History of Anthropology.

2006‒2007
Lecturer, Centre of West African Studies, University of Birmingham, United Kingdom.
Courses taught: History and Theory/Debates and Controversies; Introduction to Anthropology/Anthropology and Ethnography; Environment and Societies/Sociology of Africa. Coordination of the student-led seminar course Perspectives on Africa.

Lecturer, Summer School, Griffith College Dublin, Ireland.
Course taught: Conflict Resolution in Northern Ireland.

2005‒2006
Resident International Scholar, Smolny Institute of Liberal Arts and Sciences, St. Petersburg, Russia.
Courses taught: Symbols, Politics and Identity in Ireland; Globalisation, Terrorism and War;  Religion, Ritual and Resistance.

2003
Online Teacher, Module for the course Cultural Tourism, University of Wales at Lampeter.

2002
Online Teacher, Module for the course Globalization, University of Wales at Lampeter.

2001‒2004
Lecturer, Dublin Business School, Ireland.
Courses taught: Applied Medical Anthropology; Folklore; Psychological Anthropology; New Trends in Current Research; Globalisation, Terrorism and War (elective postgraduate course);  African Ethnography; Globalisation (MA elective course).  

1999‒2001
Lecturer, University of Asmara, Eritrea.
Courses taught: History of Anthropological Theory; Political Anthropology

1997‒2005
Teaching Assistant and Lecturer, Queen’s University Belfast, Northern Ireland. Courses taught: Introduction to Anthropology; Symbols, Politics and Identity in Ireland.

Fieldwork

2011 and 2012
Postdoctoral research, Makeni, Sierra Leone

1998 to 2001
Doctoral research, Embaderho, Eritrea

Conferences, Conference Panels and Colloquium Organized

2014
Panel: The Future of African Middle Classes
Conference of the African Studies Association in Germany (VAD), Bayreuth, Germany (with Tabea Scharrer, Florian Stohl, Lena Kroeker).

2013
Panel: Travelling Models of Policy Making in Contemporary Upper Guinea Coast Societies.
Conference, American Anthropological Association, Chicago, USA.

Joint Institutes Colloquium: Citizenship Today
Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology and the Institute for Social Anthropology of the Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg (with Tabea Scharrer, Martin Ramstedt, Katharina Schramm), Halle/S., Germany.

2010
Panel: A Regional Crisis of Global Consequence: Conflict and Political Imagination in the Horn of Africa and its Diaspora.
Conference, European Association of Social Anthropologists, Maynooth, Ireland.

2004
Panel: Societies in Transition
Conference, Anthropological Association of Ireland, University of Limerick, Ireland.

Outreach and Related Activities

2014
Symposium: Deciphering the Black Box, U.S. State Department Symposium on Eritrea, Washington/DC, USA.

Symposium: Governance and its Future in Eritrea, University of Ottawa, Canada.

Correspondence with Irish Ministry of Foreign Affairs on the West African Ebola epidemic, November and December 2014.

2009:
Research Consultant, Horn of Africa People’s Aid, Dublin, Ireland.

Membership in Academic Organizations

  • European Association of Social Anthropologists: Convenor of the Africanists Network of EASA
  • Anthropological Association of Ireland
  • Editorial board, Anthropology Reviews: Dissent and Cultural Politics





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