Western Academy Ideas Series: Meditations on the Dead

Please join us for this important conversation about anti-blackness and its impacts on peace and conflict in Africa.  “Meditations on the Dead, the Dying and the Displaced: Theorizing Structural Anti-blackness as the Root Cause of Africa’s ‘Forever Wars’" is presented by Western Academy post-doctoral scholar Ola Osman.

About the speaker:  Dr. Ola Osman earned her Ph.D. in Politics and International Studies from the University of Cambridge as a Gates Cambridge Scholar, and her Master’s degree in Women’s Studies from the University of Oxford as a Clarendon Scholar. Additionally, she was named an Honorary Prince Sultan Bin Abdulaziz Al-Saud Scholar. Dr. Osman’s interdisciplinary scholarship bridges International Relations and Black Studies, with a focus on Afro-pessimism. Her research investigates how the legacies of transatlantic slavery have shaped ethnic identities and hierarchies in sub-Saharan Africa, contributing to the proliferation of armed conflicts in the post-Cold War era. Building on her Ph.D. research, her next project examines why ex-combatant women took up arms during the Liberian war, their dual roles as perpetrators and victims of militarized violence, and their reintegration into society two decades later.

Please RSVP to Lindsey Bannister (lbannis@uwo.ca).