New LUCAS-LAHRI Visiting Fellows announced for 2024-25

Leading researchers from Uganda, South Africa, Tanzania, Lesotho, and Namibia are among the 2024/25 cohort of LUCAS-LAHRI Visiting Fellows announced today

Leading researchers from Uganda, South Africa, Tanzania, Lesotho, and Namibia are among the 2024/25 cohort of LUCAS-LAHRI Visiting Fellows announced today by the Leeds University Centre for African Studies (LUCAS) and the Leeds Arts and Humanities Research Institute (LAHRI).

Made possible through a collaboration between LUCAS and LAHRI, the Virtual Visiting Research Fellowships give scholars based at institutions in Africa the opportunity to pursue their research and establish research partnerships with academics at the University of Leeds. Each Visiting Fellowship provides £1,000, to be used by the scholar to undertake their research.

In line with this year’s theme of ‘African Ecologies’, the 2024/25 Visiting Fellows will explore a range of topics, from enhancing human and wildlife coexistence, to exploring the potential for climate justice in Lesotho, and rethinking gender in the mediation and resolution of conflicts over natural resources.

The LUCAS-LAHRI Visiting Fellows, 2024-25, clockwise from top left: Rosemary Nakijoba, Emmanuel Lwankomezi, Aaron Chando, Nelson Mlambo, Mavis Thokozile Macheka, Dominic Makwa.

Dr Brendon Nicholls, Director of the Leeds University Centre for African Studies (LUCAS) and Associate Professor of Postcolonial African Studies, said:

“We are delighted to announce the fourth cohort of our popular LUCAS-LAHRI Visiting Fellowships. In line with our ambitions for the scheme, the awards will support these exceptional scholars to pursue fascinating research underpinned by an intellectual and political commitment to ecological and epistemic justice in Africa. We wish the researchers the best of luck with their work and look forward to seeing the results.”

The 2024/25 LUCAS-LAHRI Visiting Fellows and their research projects are:

• Aaron Chando, a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at Sol Plaatje University in South Africa – ‘An Hunhu/Ubuntu-based ecological justice framework: An intervention in literary studies’ 
• Emmanuel Lwankomezi, a lecturer in Project and Environmental Conservation at the St Augustine University of Tanzania – ‘Enhancing human-wildlife coexistence: a multidisciplinary approach around protected areas in Tanzania’
• Mavis Thokozile Macheka, a Lecturer in the Department of Development Studies at National University of Lesotho in Lesotho – ‘The potential for climate justice in Lesotho: Experiences from mining companies in Mokhotlong district’
• Dominic Makwa, a lecturer at the Department of Performing Arts and Film (PAF), Makerere University in Kampala, Uganda – ‘We can’t settle Mu Mubimbi: contesting resettlement through singing’.
• Nelson Mlambo, an Associate Professor in the Department of Humanities and Arts at the University of Namibia – ‘Namibian Environmentalism and Ecological Justice Through Poetry’
• Rosemary Nakijoba, an Associate Professor in Development Studies and Dean of the Faculty of Social Sciences, Arts and Humanities at Muteesa I Royal University in Kampala, Uganda – ‘Let’s do it together: rethinking gender in the mediation and resolution of natural resources conflicts in a changing climate in post war northern Uganda’.