The Centre for the Advancement of Scholarship congratulates Professor James Ogude, who has been elected as a member of the African Studies Association's (ASA's) Board of Directors. Professor Ogude will join the leadership of ASA in November 2025, and the Centre looks forward to supporting him in this prestigious leadership role. 

Professor Ogude was elected alongside Professor Prinisha Badassy (University of the Witwatersrand) and Professor Harmony O'Rourke (Pitzer College, USA), with Professor Leonardo Arriola (University of California, USA) elected as Vice-President of the Board. ASA Board Members are elected for three years. They are elected to provide leadership to the Association, work to achieve the mission and goals of ASA, and participate in refining, advancing and transforming the programs and priorities of ASA.  

Professor Ogude has been associated with ASA for over two decades, having participated in a roundtable discussion at an ASA Annual Meeting in 2024. This discussion was on Mau Mau and Nationhood: Arms, Authority and Narration, edited by Atieno Odhiambo and John Lonsdale, which includes a chapter authored by Professor Ogude. Professor Ogude reflects that "during this meeting, I was enlightened by the incredible scholarly networks that the association fosters, and I have since endeavoured to attend every meeting of this influential fraternity". Professor Ogude subsequently served as the co-theme and program chair for the ASA Annual Meeting held in Boston in November 2019 and served on the panel of judges for the Allan Bethwel Ogot Book Prize in 2021 and as the panel chair in 2023. He was also invited to deliver the 2023 African Studies Review (ASR) Distinguished Lecture titled 'Decoloniality and its Fissures: Whose Decolonial Turn?" 

Professor Ogude was the CAS director between 2017 and 2024, and is a senior research fellow and Professor of African Literature at the Centre. He is the principal investigator of the African Urbanities Project, funded by the Mellon Foundation, and the Sounding East Africa Project, funded by the Perivoli African Research Centre at the University of Bristol. Furthermore, Professor Ogude has published extensively in peer-reviewed journals and has authored and edited several manuscripts and volumes. His academic excellence is evident in his A-rating from the National Research Foundation (NRF).