Glocal Citizens - Episodes Tagged with “Researcher”

Episode 320: On the State of the Africa Diaspora with Dr. Ashley D. Milton

Florence Amerley Adu — Tue, 19 May 2026 05:00:00 -0400

Greetings Glocal Citizens!

This week on the podcast I’m back in Accra, back on the Continent, just in time to commemorate African Liberation Day--Africa Day 2026. Last year around this time, my guest and I were preparing for our respective sessions at AfroTalks 2025 @ University of Ghana-Legon where we shared stories and proposed solutions centering the theme "HOW?" aimed at fostering critical introspection, sustainable community impact, and the amplification of African stories by Africans. I shared insights taken from our Future of Work salon series and featured Glocal Citizens specifically engaged in impact-driven solutions for us by us. My guest, Dr. Ashley D. Milton was part of a duo presenting The Triangle Offensive Policy. She joins us a year later to share how her work has progressed and her consortium prepares to release the The State of the Africa Diaspora Report, a first-of-its-kind continental grounding document examining how Africa and its global diaspora connect across mobility, investment, culture, skills, governance, technology, and development systems. The report brings together policymakers, researchers, entrepreneurs, creatives, and community stakeholders across Africa and the diaspora to shape a more coordinated and regenerative future.

As a strategist, researcher, and systems builder working at the intersection of Africa, its global diaspora, and the future of regenerative economic development she is the Founder and Managing Director of She Grows It™ (SGI), a Pan-African consulting and investment migration advisory firm. Ashley leads work across green infrastructure, trade and industry, tourism and hospitality, diaspora engagement, governance strategy, and emerging technology systems designed to support long-term African growth and resilience. She has advised on projects ranging from IFC EDGE green building certification and sustainable development strategy to diaspora policy frameworks, investment positioning, and institutional ecosystem development. Her work consistently centers one core question: how do we build systems that allow African people, businesses, and communities to thrive across generations?

Where to find Dr. Ashley?
The Africa Diaspora Report
On LinkedIn
On Instagram

What’s Ashley watching?
The Eyes of Ghana
When Malcolm Smiled a film by Glocal Citizen Muhammida el Muhajir

Other topics of interest:
Africa Day
Accountability and the March 2026 UN Resolution
How the US justifies it’s denial of the gravest crime against humanity.
Kwame Nkrumah, books on Pan-Africanism
About the long history of smog in Los Angeles
About FAMU, a top ranked HBCU
About the book, White Malice by Susan Williams
Nautilus Diving - Dakar
Special Guest: Ashley D. Milton.

Episode 246: Writing as Activism: Ghanaian Voices and Pan-African Perspectives Across Genres with Nicole Amarteifio, Kwame Dawes and Nydia A. Swaby Live at Pa Gya!

Florence Amerley Adu — Tue, 05 Nov 2024 05:00:00 -0500

New Month Greetings Glocal Citizens!

The first Tuesday in November represents the official US election day. As polling evolves for higher participation and greater inclusion, most states offer early voting so millions have already cast thier votes. Throughout this year of elections across the globe, the build up to the two where I have a say, the United States and Ghana, has played a critical role in inspiring my most activist self to move the dial in different ways toward manifesting a new world. Coincidentally, this week on the podcast kicks off our Writing as Activism series in coordination with the Pa Gya! Literary Festival in Accra. Recorded live at the eighth installment of the festivaland in the days that followed, starting the panel, Writing as Activism: Ghanaian Voices and Pan-African Perspectives Across Genres, the conversation starts with a distinguished voices covering works of poetry, screenwriting, and nonfiction scholarship with:

Nicole Amarteifio is an acclaimed Ghanaian-American TV/film writer, director, and producer. She successfully launched the hit web series 'An African City’ - dubbed by CNN and the BBC as Africa’s answer to ‘Sex and the City’.

Returning Glocal Citizen, Nydia A. Swaby is a Black feminist artist, researcher and curator. Her practice engages archives, autoethnography, photography, the moving image, and the imagination to explore the gendered, diasporic and affective dimensions of Black being and becoming. In addition to curating artistic programmes, she creates visual narratives, research and performance texts. Nydia's first book, Amy Ashwood Garvey and the Future of Black Feminist Archives, was published by Lawrence Wishart in October 2024 as part of LW's Radical Black Women book series. She is also developing an artist film, Amy and Me in the Archive, which will be screened at the forthcoming Singapore International Photography Festival 2024.

And Poet Laureate of Jamaica, Kwame Dawes, author of numerous books of poetry and other books of fiction, criticism, and essays. His most recent collection is Sturge Town (Peepal Tree Press, UK 2023). Dawes is Professor of Literary Arts at Brown University. He teaches in the Pacific MFA Program and is the Series Editor of the African Poetry Book Series, Director of the African Poetry Book Fund, and Artistic Director of the Calabash International Literary Festival. He is a Chancellor for the Academy of American Poets and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. Kwame Dawes is the winner of the prestigious Windham/Campbell Award for Poetry and was a finalist for the 2022 Neustadt International Prize for Literature. In 2022 Dawes was awarded the Order of Distinction Commander class by the Government of Jamaica. He is the Poet Laureate of Jamaica (2024-2027).

Click through to find out more about the Pa Gya! Literary Festival and the Writer’s Project Ghana and watch this and other festival panels at WPGTV.

Where to find Nicole?
On LinkedIn
On Instagram
On Facebook
On YouTube
On X

Where to find Kwame?
On LinkedIn
On Instagram
On X
On Facebook

Where to find Nydia?
On Glocal Citizens
On LinkedIn
On Instagram
On X

Other topics of interest and the Essential Pan-African Activism reading list coming soon!

*This audio recording has been edited for clarity from the original video recording.
Special Guests: Kwame Dawes, Nicole Amarteifio, and Nydia Swaby.

Episode 175: Innovation in Acculturation with Kobina Ankomah Graham Part 2

Florence Amerley Adu — Tue, 23 May 2023 05:00:00 -0400

Greetings Glocal Citizens!

My guest this week is Ghanaian-Briton, DJ, lecturer, cultural writer and researcher Kobina “Kobby” Ankomah Graham. Raised between the alternate realities of Ghana and Britain, he is passionately curious about music, African culture, and counterculture. Through almost two decades of lecturing, researching, public speaking, developing creative projects, curating music and freelance writing, he has championed arts and culture.

He has explored this idea in settings ranging from classrooms to international conferences, and in numerous workshops, panels, podcasts, publications, and dance floors. Along the way, he has been profiled by platforms like the BBC, written for others like The Guardian, received a Miles Morland African Writers Scholarship and DANIDA funding for Ph.D. research on Ghana’s alternative music scene. In doing these things, he is creating pathways for young African creatives, cultural practitioners and journalists to follow. These sentiments come through poetically in this two-part conversation offering wonder-filled insight into a life lived in Accra in view of an evolving arts and culture scene impacting both the local and global creative landscapes.

Where to find Kobby?
kobbygraham.com
On LinkedIn
On Instagram

What’s Kobby reading?
A Quick Ting on Afrobeats by Christian Adofo
The Sleep Revolution: Transforming Your Life, One Night at a Time by Arianna Huffington
Harmattan Rain

What’s Kobby watching?
The Power
Citadel
Star Trek: Strange New Worlds
African Queens on Netflix
Cleopatra on Netflix

What’s Kobby listening to?
TedEd
Big Think
Soulection Radio
Oroko Radio

Other topics of interest:
Koforidua, Ghana
Mmofra Channel
JDilla
Kweku Ananse
Ovation Magazine
About Dust Magazine
PinkPanthress
Ashesi University
Webster University
JoyFM
What happened to Damilola Taylor?
About the murder of Stephen Lawrence
Buduburam Refugee Camp
Professor John Anarfi
University of Ghana’s Institute of Statistical Social and Economic Research (ISSER)
Kasapreko Company, Ltd Ghana
Some notes on Pidgin English
What is Detty December
Ebo Taylor
Asakaa Boys
Black Sherif
Amaarae
Efua Sutherland
Esi Sutherland-Abby
KiDi’s latest release, I lied
Worlasi
Gabriel Myers Hanson
Pigeons & Planes Special Guest: Kobina Ankomah Graham.

Episode 174: Innovation in Acculturation with Kobina Ankomah Graham Part 1

Florence Amerley Adu — Tue, 16 May 2023 05:00:00 -0400

Greetings Glocal Citizens!

Where to find Kobby?
kobbygraham.com
On LinkedIn
On Instagram

What’s Kobby reading?
A Quick Ting on Afrobeats by Christian Adofo
The Sleep Revolution: Transforming Your Life, One Night at a Time by Arianna Huffington
Harmattan Rain

What’s Kobby watching?
The Power
Citadel
Star Trek: Strange New Worlds
African Queens on Netflix
Cleopatra on Netflix

What’s Kobby listening to?
TedEd
Big Think
Soulection Radio
Oroko Radio

Episode 167: Herstories 2023: What is your Craft?

Florence Amerley Adu — Tue, 28 Mar 2023 05:00:00 -0400

Greetings Glocal Citizens!

This week on the podcast, rather than one last guest rounding out our March 2023 herstories series, I went into our archives with a specific goal of putting together a salon of sorts about craft. I think of craft as how vocation, location, persistence and passion fulfill us. According to Merriam-Webster, it is skill in planning, making, or executing.

I always ask this question because I feel it allows my guest to share more than what they do on a day-to-day basis for economic returns i.e. work, and gets closer to the heart of who they are and how they go about manifesting a new world. So, this week we’re re-visiting with:

Jamaican-American, Nydia Swaby a Black feminist researcher, writer, and curator based in London about Archives, Art and Freedom Dreams;
Filipino-Jamaican-American, Zee Clarke an author, mindfulness practitioner and racial healing professional about Healing in Breathing;
Ghanaian-Afro-German, Ekua Yankah a thought leader in international development on being a Polyglot, Professor, Policy Advisor and Art Patron;
Ghanaian-Brit, Esther Armah an author, journalist and entrepreneur on storytelling for structural change;
Nigerian, Sarah Adeyinka a humanitarian researcher and author on Humanitarian CoCreating; and
and Detroit Native, Dereca Blackmon an inclusion innovator, speaker and spiritual activist about Uncommon Conversations.

Be sure to check out full episodes using the links above, there’s a wealth of valuable, craft-inspired insights from each of these audacious women! Special Guests: Dereca Blackmon, Ekua Yankah, Esther Armah, Nydia Swaby, Sarah Adeyinka, and Zhalisa "Zee" Clarke.

Episode 120: Transitional Justice Now with Makmid Kamara Part 2

Florence Amerley Adu — Tue, 12 Apr 2022 05:00:00 -0400

Greetings Glocal Citizens!
This week's episode brings to mind a lot of "What nexts?" in the context of conflicts, wars across the globe. My guest has his mind on this as a matter of everyday practice. Makmid Kamara, a Sierra Leonean human rights leader, researcher and development communications practitioner has over 18years’ experience working with national and international development and human rights organizations in Africa and the United Kingdom. He is the Director of the Africa Transitional Justice Legacy Fund (ATJLF) based in Accra, Ghana.

Prior to joining the ATJLF, Makmid worked at the International Secretariat of Amnesty International in London as Deputy Director of Global Issues and (Ag.) Head of the Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ESCR) Team; and served as interim Country Director for Amnesty International Nigeria and West Africa Researcher.

As you'll learn in our two-part conversation, Makmid's lived encounters and life works are in many ways culminating the initiatives he is now spearheading which is a testament to the impact that focused attention on the importance of putting people at the center of solutions.

Where to find Makmid?
On LinkedIn
On Twitter

What's Makmid listening to?
Fela Kuti
Bob Marley
Morgan Heritage

Out and about in Accra:
+233 Jazz Bar & Grill and the Lipstick Band
Santoku Restaurant
Sky Bar

Other topics of interest:
Campaign for Good Governance
Day of the African Child
Human Rights Clinic-University of Sierra Leone
MacArthur Foundation
Truth and Reconciliation Commission
Center for Memory and Reparations Civil War Memorial
HumAngle - Nigeria
WAVE - Gambia
Ahmad Tehan Kabbah wartime president of Sierra Leone
Manchester United
Hearts of Oak
Old Edwardians FC
Special Guest: Makmid Kamara.

Episode 119: Transitional Justice Now with Makmid Kamara Part 1

Florence Amerley Adu — Tue, 05 Apr 2022 05:00:00 -0400

Where to find Makmid?
On LinkedIn
On Twitter

What's Makmid listening to?
Fela Kuti
Bob Marley
Morgan Heritage

Out and about in Accra:
+233 Jazz Bar & Grill and the Lipstick Band
Santoku Restaurant
Sky Bar

Episode 118: Archives, Art and Freedom Dreams with Nydia Swaby

Florence Amerley Adu — Tue, 29 Mar 2022 05:00:00 -0400

Greetings Glocal Citizens!
This week in our final #herstory in our 2022 March series, I'm happy to welcome Black feminist researcher, writer, and curator Nydia Swaby. Nydia is a Jamaican-American and have called London home for the past decade. She has a PhD in Gender Studies (SOAS), an MA in Women’s History [Sarah Lawrence College], and a BA in Anthropology and African American Studies [Rollins College]. Her practice builds on theories of racial, gendered, diasporic, and queer formation, Black feminism, Black studies, and my previous experience working at the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture.

In her creative approach to knowledge production, she uses archives, ethnography, photography, film, and the imagination to curate programs and visual narratives, write essays and performance pieces exploring the gendered and diasporic dimensions of Black being and becoming. She also creates ancestral altars using family pictures and memorabilia, found photographs and archival images, West African textiles and wood carvings, crystals, fossils, stones, shells, and other curios. These practices converge in her forthcoming monograph, Amy Ashwood Garvey and the Future of Back Feminist Archives (Lawrence Wishart, Summer 2022) and Caird Research Fellowship at The National Maritime Museum, ‘Curating Archives of Affect: Black Feminist Pasts, Presents, and Futures’ (December 2021 - September 2020), and my ongoing visual series, ‘Becoming with Archive: Blackness, Gender, Diaspora’ (2010 - Present).

Alongside her practice-based research, Nydia work as the Curator of Learning at the Institute of Contemporary Arts in London, where she collaborates with academics, curators, artists, and writers to develop a multi-disciplinary, practice-based research and learning program. She is also a member of Feminist Review’s Editorial Collective and the Curator of Programmes, and co-edited a recent issue on queer, feminist, diasporic, and decolonial archives.

Please read on and explore the topics of interest below for a thoughtfully curated account of the many individuals discussed in the episode.

Where to find Nydia?
www.nydiaswaby.com
On LinkedIn

What's Nydia reading?
The Sex Lives of African Women by Nana Darkoa Sekyiamah
Dear Science and Other Stories by Katherine McKittrick

What's Nydia watching?
Master
Daughters of the Dust

Other topics of interest:
Amy Ashwood Garvey
Universal Negro Improvement Association (UNIA)
Pan African Movement
Garveyism
Jamaica Kincaid
On Code Switching
Double Consciousness
Girl, Woman, Other by Bernardine Evaristo
Ifeanyi Awachie
Imani Perry
Lorraine Hansberry
Barby Asante
S. Pearl Sharp
Akosua Adoma Owusu
Rita Gayle
Joan Morgan
Brittney Cooper
The Politics of Pleasure
Special Guest: Nydia Swaby.

Episode 104: Building the Square on the Longest Street in the World with Ayobisi Osuntusa

Florence Amerley Adu — Tue, 21 Dec 2021 05:00:00 -0500

Season's Greetings Glocal Citizens!
This week I'm sharing heartfelt cheer and lots of laughter as I meet with one to Africa's education super stars. In the past decade, her organization has quietly trained more than 10,000 teachers across five countries and the number is set to continue growing with each new initiative under her belt. As CEO and Executive Director of the Sesame Square Foundation in Abuja, Nigerian-born Ayobisi "Bisi" Osuntusa manages and oversees all aspects of the Education Research and Outreach departments of the Sesame Square project. In this capacity, she also co-develops teacher training and other educative materials, providing trainings for teachers, guardians, and educational officers, among her other leadership and implementation duties. Education has always played center stage in Bisi's life as you'll learn listening to the episode. And I trust that you'll come away with loads of new insights into the work necessary to prepare families, teachers and children to be the best that they can be!

Where to find Bisi?
On LinkedIn
On Twitter
On Instagram
On Facebook

What's Bisi reading?
Born a Crime: Stories from a South African Childhood by Trevor Noah

What's Bisi watching?
From Paris with Love

Other topics of interest:
Arewa24
Kanuri Language
IDP Camps
Lego Foundation
Shipt

When you click and purchase books using the link(s) above, as an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. Thank you for your support! Special Guest: Ayobisi Osuntusa.

Episode 96: Fighting for Honor with Dr. T.J. Desch-Obi Part 2

Florence Amerley Adu — Tue, 19 Oct 2021 05:00:00 -0400

Greetings Glocal Citizen!
For this two part conversation we're continuing on a narrative transformation path in conversation with another writer, author and researcher--meet Dr. T.J. Desch-Obi author of Fighting for Honor: The History of African Martial Arts in the Atlantic World. Currently based in Columbio, T.J. is of West African--NIgerian and Liberian parentage and grew up in the Midwestern United States. He received his doctorate in African history from the University of California Los Angeles and is currently a visiting professor at Universidad ICESI’s Centro de Estudios Afrodiaspóricos in Cali, Colombia. He specializes in the historical ethnography of pre-colonial Africa and the African Diaspora with a focus upon martial arts, physical culture, religion, sport, historical linguistics, and military history. His current research focuses on the social history of the machete and the Afro-Colombian machete fighting from 1848 to 1960, and twentieth century prison boxing. Dr. Desch-Obi is a permanent member of the history department at the City University of New York’s, Baruch College, where he also teaches in the Black and Latino Studies, Latin American and Caribbean Studies Departments.

I hope you enjoy this journey with T.J. across continents and through a world history often obscured!

Where to find T.J.?
Selected research
On YouTube

What's T.J. reading?
The Way of a Pilgrim

Other topics of interest:
Filipino Kali
Robert Farris Thompson
Beni Hasan Tomb
Nsibidi script of Nigeria
N'Golo
Holocene Climactic Optimum
Jan Vansina
Christopher Ehret
La Violencia
Phillip Zarrilli
Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass: An American Slave by Frederick Douglass

Special Guest: T.J. Desch-Obi.

Episode 95: Fighting for Honor with Dr. T.J. Desch-Obi Part 1

Florence Amerley Adu — Tue, 12 Oct 2021 05:00:00 -0400

Greetings Glocal Citizens!
For this two part conversation we're continuing on a narrative transformation path in conversation with another writer, author and researcher--meet Dr. T.J. Desch-Obi author of Fighting for Honor: The History of African Martial Arts in the Atlantic World. Currently based in Columbia, T.J. is of West African--NIgerian and Liberian parentage and grew up in the Midwestern United States. He received his doctorate in African history from the University of California Los Angeles and is currently a visiting professor at Universidad ICESI’s Centro de Estudios Afrodiaspóricos in Cali, Colombia. He specializes in the historical ethnography of pre-colonial Africa and the African Diaspora with a focus upon martial arts, physical culture, religion, sport, historical linguistics, and military history. His current research focuses on the social history of the machete and the Afro-Colombian machete fighting from 1848 to 1960, and twentieth century prison boxing. Dr. Desch-Obi is a permanent member of the history department at the City University of New York’s, Baruch College, where he also teaches in the Black and Latino Studies, Latin American and Caribbean Studies Departments.

I hope you enjoy this journey with T.J. across continents and through a world history often obscured!

Where to find T.J.?
Selected research
On YouTube

What's T.J. reading?
The Way of a Pilgrim

*When you click and purchase books using the links above, as an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. Thank you for your support! Special Guest: T.J. Desch-Obi.

Episode 94: Giving to Help, Helping to Give with Dr. Bhekinkosi Moyo

Florence Amerley Adu — Tue, 05 Oct 2021 05:00:00 -0400

Greetings Glocal Citizens!
This week we're venturing down to South Africa where we meet one of Africa's most prominent experts on African philanthropy. Dr. Bhekinkosi Moyo, born and raised in Zimbabwe--now based in Pretoria, SA, is a descendant of the Moyo (heart/soul) and Ndlovu (elephant) clans. Over the course of his personal and professional lives, he has continued to marvel and draw strength from their combined histories and diversities. He is a writer, author, researcher and thought-leader with keen interest in questions of African resources, democracy and governance. He has, so far, championed African discourse on philanthropy, contributed to the growth of many African civil society formations and has taken part in most of the continental processes of development and governance. He is currently an adjunct professor at University of the Witwatersrand Business School where he also heads the Centre on African Philanthropy and Social Investment. Dr. Moyo has more than twenty years experience working on knowledge generation, research and policy analysis as well as building capable institutions across Africa. He writes and support institutions of civil society, private sector and intergovernmental agencies on matters of governance, development and sustainability. Dr. Moyo, over the years, has become a go to specialist on African philanthropy. There's sooooo much more to learn from this dedicated activist, #listenandlearn!

Where to find Dr. Moyo?
www.bhekinkosimoyo.com
On Twitter

On Facebook

What's Dr. Moyo reading?
In My Father's House by Kwame Anthony Appiah
Nervous Conditions by Tsitsi Dangarembga
The Beautiful Ones are not yet Born Ayi Kwei Armah
Chinua Achebe
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

Ghana Must Go by Taiye Selasi
I did not come to you by Chance by Adaobi Tricia Nwaubani

Other topics of interest:
Giving to Help, Helping to Give: The Context and Politics of African Philanthropy by Tade Akin Aina, Bhekinkosi Moyo, et. al.
Akwasi Aidoo
African Philanthropy Network
Allen Fowler
International Society for Third Sector Research
Kathleen McCarthy
On Karate
Chinua Achebe
CAPSI Journal

*When you click and purchase books using the links above, as an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. Thank you for your support!

Special Guest: Bhekinkosi Moyo.

Episode 64: Humanitarian CoCreating with Sarah Adeyinka Part 2

Florence Amerley Adu — Tue, 09 Mar 2021 05:00:00 -0500

Ẹ n lẹ [en-le] Glocal Citizens! That's "hello" in Yoruba which is hometown glocal speak for this week's guest, Sarah Adeyinka. Sarah is a humanitarian researcher currently carrying out research on exploitation, human trafficking and irregular migration. Prior to joining academia, Sarah worked with several NGOs for over a decade before transitioning into academia. She is also the founder of CoCreate VZW - a non-governmental organization that provides training for anti-trafficking organizations and aims to create multiple avenues through which survivors can sustain themselves and thrive. This March we're honoring women making history and hope you too can offer your support with a donation to CoCreate - find out more here.

Coupling the training, experience and information Sarah has gained as a researcher with her experiences as a practitioner are key for effectiveness in her field which facilitates her ability to consult with organizations and offer presentations on anti-trafficking measures and working with/caring for survivors of human trafficking with a focus on Nigerian women. Fun fact, Sarah's education, curiosity and work have taken her to over 40 countries on five continents.

This March, Sarah will become a published author with her first book, Nigerian and Ghanaian Women Working in the Brussels Red-Light District. Get your copy today!

Where to find Sarah?
www.sarahadeyinka.com
www.cocreatengo.org
On LinkedIn
On Twitter
On Instagram

What's Sarah watching?
The Mentalist

Other topics of interest:
Child Move Project
Médecins Sans Frontières
Tongan for Beginners
Special Guest: Sarah Adeyinka.

Episode 63: Humanitarian CoCreating with Sarah Adeyinka Part 1

Florence Amerley Adu — Tue, 02 Mar 2021 05:00:00 -0500

This March, Sarah will become a published author with her first book, Nigerian and Ghanaian Women Working in the Brussels Red-Light District. Get your copy today!

Where to find Sarah?
www.sarahadeyinka.com
www.cocreatengo.org
On LinkedIn
On Twitter
On Instagram

What's Sarah watching?
The Mentalist

Other topics of interest:
Child Move Project
Médecins Sans Frontières
Tongan for Beginners
Special Guest: Sarah Adeyinka.