I am a historian of West Africa with a particular interest in the period from the seventeenth to the nineteenth centuries. My research focuses on the history of Afro-European encounters in the context of trade, Christian mission and scientific exploration, as well as the economic, political, social and cultural changes which these encounters have entailed for African societies and individuals. It has been concerned mainly with the coastal regions of Ghana, Togo, Bénin, Nigeria and Sierra Leone.
Research interests: the Atlantic slave trade, Africa’s role in the Atlantic world, education in precolonial and colonial Africa; family, marriage and gender; technology and society; knowledge production; biographical approaches; sources for African history.