The Kellogg Institute for International Studies visiting fellowship program is one of the oldest and most competitive of its kind, bringing top scholars from around the world to the Institute for residential one- and two-semester fellowships, as well as two-year postdoctoral fellowships.
Learn more about Kellogg’s visiting fellowships – including opportunities available, eligibility information, and the application process – on the Kellogg website.
Find information about some of our visiting fellow Africanists, who study some of the most challenging issues facing democracy and human development around the world, and hear them describe their projects in the showcase below.
Catia Batista
Academic Year 2017–18
Associate Professor of Economics, Nova School of Business and Economics, Universidade Nova de Lisboa
Kellogg Institute Visiting Fellowship Project Title - "African Migration and Development: Experimental Evidence on the Role of Information"
Catia Batista (PhD, University of Chicago), a 2017–18 Kellogg visiting fellow, is associate professor in economics at Portugal’s Universidade Nova de Lisboa, where she is cofounder and scientific director of the NOVAFRICA research center. Her research includes randomized and lab-in-the-field experiments on topics related to international migration and remittance flows, mobile money, entrepreneurship, and technology adoption in both Africa and Europe.
Betsey Behr Brada
Academic Year 2018–19
Assistant Professor of Anthropology, Reed College
Kellogg Institute Visiting Fellowship Project Title - "The Global Health Frontier: AIDS, Pedagogy, and Moral Transformation in Botswana"
Betsey Behr Brada (PhD, University of Chicago) is Assistant Professor of Anthropology at Reed College. A specialist of southern Africa, her research investigates how individuals and institutions take up, negotiate, and transform aspects of biomedical education and treatment in the context of global health and humanitarian interventions.
Deborah Durham
Academic Year 2019–20
PhD Anthropology, University of Chicago
Kellogg Institute Visiting Fellowship Project Title - "Affective Materialism: Sentiments, Materialism, and the Developers of New Maturities in Botswana"
Deborah Durham is a cultural anthropologist. She specializes in the study of youth and identity, both in Botswana and worldwide, and she has also studied aging and the middle class in Turkey. Her recent research has focused on complaints voiced around the world about obtaining adulthood and the meaning of adulthood.
Sebastian Elischer
Academic Year 2021–22
Associate Professor of Political Science, University of Florida
Kellogg Institute Visiting Fellowship Project Title - "Military Juntas, Civil Society Activism, and Post-Coup Political Orders"
Sebastian Elischer is an associate professor of political science at the University of Florida whose work analyzes the interplay between identities and institutions. His research encompasses political Islam, violent extremism, and ethnicity, how identities shape and affect procedural democratization in sub-Saharan Africa, and the nature and effect of religious regulation in areas of weak statehood.
Susan Shepler
Academic Year 2020-21
Associate Professor, School of International Service, American University
Kellogg Institute Visiting Fellowship Project Title - “'Power you Can Trust': Fractal Sovereignty in Sierra Leone”
Susan Shepler is an anthropologist with extensive experience working in conflict-affected West Africa. Her research focuses on understanding how local communities engage with international interventions and the complexities of those local responses, including the micro-politics of gender, age, religious affiliation, and ethnicity.
Moumouni Soumano
Academic Year 2021–22
Assistant Professor of Administrative and Political Sciences, University of Bamako (Mali); 2021–22 Hewlett Visiting Fellow for Public Policy
Kellogg Institute Visiting Fellowship Project Title - "Preservation of Human Rights and the Roles of the State and the International Community in Mali: Weaknesses Synergies and Prospects For Development"
Moumouni Soumano is assistant professor of administrative and political sciences University of Bamako (Mali) and the Kellogg Institute’s 2021-2022 Hewlett Visiting Fellow for Public Policy. He studies development cooperation in fragile and conflict-affected states, with a focus on linking research and policy reform. He previously served as the senior program manager and executive director of the Centre Malien pour le Dialogue Interpartis et la Démocratie (CMDID) and has a dozen years of practical experience in working to support democratic consolidation and capacity-building for political and civil society actors in West Africa.
Elizabeth Sperber
Spring 2020
Assistant Professor of Political Science, University of Denver
Kellogg Institute Visiting Fellowship Project Title - "Christian Civic Engagement in sub-Saharan Africa? A Community-Collaborative Study of Faith- Based and Secular Civic Engagement Programs’ Impact on African Congregants’ Political and Religious Outcomes"
Elizabeth Sperber is an assistant professor of political science at the University of Denver who studies religion and democratization with a focus on sub-Saharan Africa. Her primary research interests include new Christian movements in African politics, the political economy of development, and mixed methods research design.
Pedro Vicente
Academic Year 2017–18
Associate Professor of Economics, Nova School of Business and Economics, Universidade Nova de Lisboa
Kellogg Institute Visiting Fellowship Project Title - "Political Accountability, Public Service Delivery, and Information Sharing: Experimental Evidence from African Countries"
Pedro Vicente (PhD, University of Chicago), a 2017–18 Kellogg Visiting Fellow, is associate professor of economics at Portugal’s Nova School of Business and Economics, Universidade Nova de Lisboa, where he is also the founding scientific director of NOVAFRICA (Nova Africa Center for Business and Economic Development). Specializing in development economics and Africa, with a focus on political economy issues, he is currently working on community-driven development in Angola, health worker incentives in Guinea-Bissau, and natural resource governance in Mozambique.