Professor Ama de-Graft Aikins

Academic position: British Academy Global Professor.

Department: Institute of Advanced Studies

Biography:

Ama de-Graft Aikins is a British Academy Global Professor, based at IAS. She is Principal Investigator for the British Academy funded Chronicity and Care in African Contexts Project. The project aims to explore how social responses to chronic non-communicable diseases (NCDs) can shape public engagement and intervention models for chronic care in African communities on the continent and in the diaspora.

Research Projects:

Ama's Chronicity and Care in African Contexts project aims to explore how social responses to chronic conditions can shape public engagement and intervention models for chronic care in African communities on the continent and in the diaspora. She is conducting two sets of activities - a social psychological study of chronic illness experiences and care among Londoners of West African heritage; and synthesising evidence on arts based interventions for NCDs and associated conditions in African contexts as a model for public engagement. Both activities provide insights for two thematic areas of SHS Health, Mind and Society: Biosocial continuums and the Lifecourse; and Situating the Mind.

Teaching:

Ama is guest teaching on graduate courses at the LSE, Oxford and Bernard Nochte Institute of Tropical Medicine this year. At the LSE and Oxford she is focusing on Arts and Health Communication (with case studies on COVID-19 and NCDs); at BNITM she focuses on the psychosocial context of Africa's NCD burden.