African Studies Centre

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The African Studies Centre is an interdisciplinary centre of research and teaching excellence that plays a leading role in transforming knowledge production on Africa, through training graduate students, conducting theoretically innovative and empirically grounded social science research, and supporting collaborative networks in Oxford and with African institutions and researchers.  

Since the founding of the African Studies Centre in 2004, it has become the focal point for graduate level work and faculty research on Africa in Oxford and one of the world's leading centres of African Studies. Alongside a vibrant doctoral programme, the MSc in African Studies, inaugurated in 2005, is already recognised as one of Europe's most prestigious and successful training programmes in the field.  

The Centre has trained graduate students who now hold a range of important positions in diverse spheres of social, economic, cultural and political life in Africa and globally.  

With particular strengths in the Social Sciences and Humanities, the Centre enjoys a reputation for high quality, relevant research that plays a leading role in academic debates as well as public policy. The Centre sits within Oxford's School of Global and Area Studies (OSGA) which holds one of the largest expert communities of Area Studies scholars anywhere in the world. 

Apart from hosting and working with regional study groups and running frequent workshops and conferences to disseminate research findings and publicise topical issues, the Centre runs a weekly seminar where scholars in Oxford and from different parts of the world present their work. The Centre also regularly hosts prominent African statesmen, leaders, entrepreneurs, activists, intellectuals, writers, artists, and others who are interested in Africa and African affairs. 

Faculty in other departments researching in African Studies

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