Akosua Adomako Ampofo is a Professor of African and gender studies at the Institute of African Studies, University of Ghana (UG), and a leading international scholar and public intellectual with over 30 years of expertise, known for her commitment to social justice and activism. With a strong focus on the intersectionality of gender, race, and culture, her scholarship integrates critical theory with artistic expressions, highlighting the transformative power of the arts in advocating for marginalized voices.  Her areas of interest include African Knowledge systems (especially ‘decolonizing’ knowledge and praxis); Higher education; Race and Identity Politics; Gender relations; Masculinities; and questions of the aesthetics of Popular Culture as expressed in art, music, the built environment and so forth. She describes herself as an activist scholar, and her work is informed by among other things, her faith and an eclectic disciplinary background (a BSc in Architectural Design and an MSc in Development Planning from the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST) Kumasi; a PG Dip. in Spatial Planning from the University of Dortmund; and a PhD in Sociology from Vanderbilt University.

In 2005 she became the foundation Director of the University of Ghana’s Centre for Gender Studies and Advocacy and from 2010-2015 she was the Director of the Institute of African Studies.

Adomako Ampofo is the founding vice-president and immediate past President of the African Studies Association of Africa, and a Fellow of the Ghana Academy of Arts and Sciences. She has been an honorary Professor at the Centre for African Studies at the University of Birmingham and in 2023-2024 was the Wangari Maathai Visiting Professor at the University of Kassel.

In her current work on black masculinities, she explores the shifting nature of identities among young men in Africa and the diaspora. Earlier work on masculinities has explored the ways in which the discourse of “men of God” (i.e religious leaders) becomes a meta knowledge and (re)defines femininity. Her most recent book, co-edited with Josephine Beoku-Betts, is titled Producing Inclusive Feminist Knowledge: Positionalities and Discourses in the Global South (Bingley: Emerald Publishing 2021). She co-produced the documentary When Women Speak with Kate Skinner (and directed by Aseye Tamakloe © 2022) as part of a project titled, an “Archive of Activism: Gender and Public History in Postcolonial Ghana”.

Adomako Ampofo’s work has been variously recognized: She has been a Fellow at the Rockefeller Foundation’s Bellagio centre; a Mellon Fellow at the Centre for African Studies at the University of Cape Town; a Junior Fulbright Scholar; a New Century Fulbright Scholar and a Senior Fulbright Scholar-in-Residence. In 2010 she was awarded the Feminist Activism Award by Sociologists for Women and Society (SWS).  In 2015, she was the African Studies Association (USA)’s African Studies Review Distinguished lecturer; and in 2019 she delivered the Audrey Richards Distinguished Public Lecture at the Centre for African Studies at the University of Cambridge. 

Adomako Ampofo is Editor-in-Chief, Contemporary Journal of African Studies; Co-Editor, Critical Investigations into Humanitarianism in Africa (CIHA) blog, and serves or has served on the boards of organisations such as the U.S African Studies Association; The Centre for the Advancement of Scholarship, University of Pretoria; “Africa Multiple” Cluster of Excellence, University of Bayreuth of which she is Chairperson; Perivoli Africa Research Centre, University of Bristol; Institute for Humanities in Africa, HUMA, University of Cape Town; Advisory Council, North Rhine-Westphalian Academy of International Affairs; SOS Herman Gmeiner International College; “Beyond Borders” ZEIT-Stiftung Ebelin und Gerd Bucerius Scholarship Programme; and the Next Generation of the SSRC, among others.  She is a member of The Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa (CODESRIA); the Network for Women’s Rights in Ghana (NETRIGHT), and the Ghana Domestic Violence Coalition. She has consulted for several organisations including UNICEF, UNIFEM, UNAIDS, Save the Children, Ministry for Gender & Social Protection, Ghana; Participatory Development Associates; Gender Studies and Human Rights Documentation Centre; Kofi Annan Peacekeeping Training Centre; and WHO.

In the classroom and through public lectures, publications, and community engagement, she challenges prevailing narratives and fosters dialogue on issues of equity, representation, and healing, making significant contributions to both academic discourse and public awareness. In 2024 she established 715House, a creative media company, with her daughter, Akosua-Asamoabea Ampofo, a filmmaker, and is currently pursuing a certificate course in the Business of Entertainment at New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts.