Africa-International Education and Research- Tufts University

Africa

Tufts commitment to African studies is demonstrated in a multitude of programs, exchanges, and courses. Our Africa in the New World Interdisciplinary Minor encourages students to explore Africa, the African Diaspora in the Americas, and global Africa through a range of perspectives. Particular emphasis is given to three intellectual currents: Diaspora studies, identity construction, and the globalization interdisciplinary minor for Schools of Engineering and Arts and Sciences.

As an international research university, Tufts has a strong presence on the continent as our scholars seek to understand and ameliorate health and environmental issues, notably HIV, cryptosporidium, and water pollution.

Whether students choose to study in an African nation, conduct field work there, or opt to stay on our Massachusetts campus while studying the arts, history, language, culture or religions of the region, they will find something to satisfy their curiosities and career aspirations.

Regional Programs

Africa in the New World

The Africa in the New World (ANW) Interdisciplinary Program encourages students to explore Africa and the African diaspora in the Americas and globally through a range of perspectives. Particular emphasis is given to three intellectual currents: Diaspora studies, identity construction and globalization. ANW sponsors an annual Africa-Diaspora lecture series to showcase these themes.

http://ase.tufts.edu/anw/

Africana Center

Founded in 1969, the Africana Center seeks to ensure that students have access to a variety of academic and cultural resources available on campus. The Center works with students of African descent from many different backgrounds. It implements programs such as lectures, workshops and a range of additional activities that are designed to support the individual growth of all Tufts undergraduates and which reflect and celebrate the intellectual and cultural traditions of black people in the diaspora.

http://ase.tufts.edu/africana/index.html

African Student Organization

The African Student Organization is a cultural group open to all members of the Tufts community. The organization seeks to bring issues concerning modern African politics, traditions, and cultures to the awareness of both the African and non-African communities at Tufts. It achieves this goal by hosting several community outreach and awareness initiatives, as well as bi-monthly interactive discussions, cultural workshops, intercultural shows and other events.

http://ase.tufts.edu/aso/index.aspx

An Ecological Analysis of Cryptosporidium in Kenya

Led by principle investigator Jeffrey K. Griffiths, MD MPH&TM, the major goal of this research is to map the genotypes of /C. parvum/ isolates found in water, animal feces, and from cases of human diarrhea in a region of Kenya where HIV is prevalent and human-animal contact is frequent (Meru Town and Meru game park, Kenya). Collaborators include the Vice Chancellor of Kenya Methodist University and the Kenya Wildlife Service.

http://www.tufts.edu/med/phfm/faculty/griffiths-jeffrey.htm

Anthropology

Anthropology at Tufts provides students not only with a strong background in critical thinking, analysis, and writing, but also with first-hand experience through original field research. The combination of intellectual community, disciplinary breadth, global and local understanding, hands-on research and public engagement makes anthropology a strong liberal arts major and an excellent preparation for both graduate school and a wide range of careers.

http://ase.tufts.edu/anthropology/about.html

Art and Art History

The wide range of courses offered by the department is designed to familiarize students with important artists, traditions and themes in world art and visual culture. Some courses focus on individual achievements, great artists and schools, while others explore significant periods, such as the Renaissance or the 1960s, or themes that cross time and cultures, such as the treatment of nature or the fear and destruction of images (inconoclasm and iconophobia). Artistic style and culture from a number of regions are explored, with course offerings such as Japanese Architecture, Contemporary Art in Africa, and Latin American Cinema.

http://ase.tufts.edu/art/default.asp

Borghesani Memorial Prize

This prize is awarded to second-semester sophomores and juniors who undertake a research project, internship, volunteer activity, or plan of study in any field involving international issues. The prize encourages personal growth and independence, while increasing one's understanding of all peoples and encouraging a commitment to the world community. Past recipients of the prize have traveled abroad in order to study, conduct research, participate in international internships, and become involved in social change movements.

http://ase.tufts.edu/ir/researchOppBorghesani.htm

Center for International Environmental and Resource Policy (CIERP)

Established in 1990 to support the growing demand for international environmental leaders, the Center for International Environment and Resource Policy's mission is to educate students to become policy and decision-makers who will keep environmental concerns at the forefront of the national agenda. Through the Center, students develop the skills necessary to formulate effective environmental strategies and solutions.

http://fletcher.tufts.edu/ierp/

Comparative Religion

The Department of Comparative Religion investigates the various expressions of religion encountered in human experience around the world. Students study the field of religion in both its functional and theoretical aspects. Courses explore the Western religions of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, as well as the Eastern religions of Hinduism, Buddhism, and others. Courses are designed to give a broad cultural appreciation of religion in accordance with the principles of a liberal arts education.

http://ase.tufts.edu/religion/

Drama and Dance

The Department of Drama and Dance provides a liberal arts approach to the creative, historical, and aesthetic dimensions of the theater arts. It fosters critical thinking and challenges the imagination in the study and performance of theater arts. Drama and dance have forever been powerful forces in the world, an imaginative mirror through which we can better understand psychology, politics, religion, and gender. The Drama and Dance department offers many study abroad opportunities, such as the British American Dramatic Academy, the London College of Fashion Design, and Tufts-in-Madrid, a strong theater program for students fluent in Spanish.

http://ase.tufts.edu/drama2Ddance

Economics

The mission of the department is to teach students to be critical thinkers and to use the discipline of economics to analyze important economic, political and social issues, ranging from international economic relations, development, growth, and income inequality, to education, housing and competition policy. Department courses, with continuing interaction with other scholars at Tufts and elsewhere, help mold future community leaders. Classes, collaborations, faculty research, and other study opportunities are available for students in the area of international economics.

http://ase.tufts.edu/econ/

Effectiveness and Cost of HIV Care Delivery and Treatment in Kenya

Dr. Mkaya Mwamburi of the Tufts University School of Medicine is conducting a trial of modified, directly observed therapy for HIV, and determining the cost-effectiveness of this approach. He is also doing qualitative research to determine why some people afflicted with HIV in Kenya may elect not to undergo antiretroviral therapy when it is available. His current focus is in operational and translational research in developing countries.

http://www.tufts.edu/med/stu-org/AMSA/faculty.doc

EPIIC

The Education for Public Inquiry and International Citizenship (EPIIC) program is a carefully integrated multidisciplinary program which, through its innovative and rigorous curricula and projects, prepares undergraduates to lead their communities -- local, national and global. Each year, EPIIC explores one broad global dilemma and provokes students to explore its complexity. High intellectual engagement, passion, and genuine objectivity have been the standard of EPIIC: the cornerstone of Tufts University's international relations education for the 21st century.

http://www.epiic.org

Ghana Gold: A Corporate Social Responsibility Study Tour

The Ghana Gold program takes 16 students to Ghana for 12 days each January. Students are introduced to Africa through examination of the gold mining industry and a series of interrelated issues, such as globalization and Africa's place in the world economy. Participants will be challenged to think about strategies that may improve the lives of people living in mining communities. Post-tour activities include a spring semester colloquium and plans for civic engagement research.

http://ase.tufts.edu/anw/

Global Health Framework Interdisciplinary MPH

This three-year program funded by the National Institutes of Health links all the Tufts graduate schools around the topic of Global Health. The program, which was first held in September of 2006, promotes interdisciplinary education and research at Tufts through a series of workshops. It is designed to integrate Tufts courses with those of institutions in East Africa, and soon in South Africa, India, and other sites, using the curriculum co-development model.

http://www.tufts.edu/med/education/globhealthedexp.html

Global Health Interest Group

The premise behind this Tufts University School of Medicine student organization is that students who have a positive experience abroad early in their training are likely to be more sensitive to issues of international health and to engage in such work in the future. The Global Health Interest Group strives to provide a monthly international health series seminar, help students engage in international work after their first year, establish an international summer selective program for first-year students, and encourage students to spend a fourth year rotation abroad.

http://www.tufts.edu/med/stu-org/ghig/index.html

Global Health Internships in East Africa

This project, based on work conducted by Dr. Jeffrey Griffiths, Associate Professor of Public Health and Family Medicine, places students at the Institute of Public Health at Makerere University in Kampala, Uganda, and the School of Public Health at Muhimbili University College of Health Sciences in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. Students function as facilitators, helping faculty at the participating institutions learn how to use Tufts University Sciences Knowledgebase (TUSK).

http://www.tufts.edu/med/education/globhealthedexp.html

Innovative Curricula in Water & International Research

The Innovative Curricula in Water & International Research is a five-year NIH-funded "Roadmap" program. Its goal is twofold: to develop and implement a health and water curriculum in the new Tufts University Water: Systems, Science, and Society interdisciplinary program, and to create novel interdisciplinary Internet-based curricula linking Tufts University with East African public health educators, researchers, and institutions.

http://www.tufts.edu/med/education/globhealthedexp.html

Institute for Global Leadership

The mission of the Institute for Global Leadership (IGL) is to prepare new generations of critical thinkers for effective and ethical leadership, ready to act as global citizens in addressing international and national issues across cultures. The Institute emphasizes rigorous academic preparation and experiential learning. Students learn through intensive engagement in classes, global research, internships, workshops, simulations and international symposia -- all involving national and international leaders from the public and private sectors.

http://www.tuftsgloballeadership.org/

Kwabeng Project

Presently funded by Tufts University's Tisch College of Citizenship and Public Service, the Kwabeng Project builds upon the fieldwork of environmental engineer John Durant and epidemiologist David M. Gute in Kwabeng, Ghana, examining the area's increased rates of urinary schistosomiasis (Schistosoma haematobium) since the onset of surface gold mining activities in the early 1990s.

http://www.tufts.edu/home/feature/?p=gute&p2=2

Music

The Tufts Department of Music is committed to a vision of musical studies that recognizes the increasing globalization of music. In all of its activities -- graduate and undergraduate curricula in western music, world music, and composition; performing ensembles and its new community music programs -- the department seeks to create an environment in which the vast diversity of musical cultures in the United States and around the world is appreciated and valued.

http://www.tufts.edu/as/music/

Office of Programs Abroad

Tufts University has been offering foreign study programs to undergraduates for four decades, and at present runs its own programs for juniors and seniors to study in Chile, China, Ghana, Hong Kong, Japan, London, Madrid, Oxford, Paris, and Tübingen. Students may also choose from hundreds of approved programs run by non-Tufts providers.

http://ase.tufts.edu/studyabroad/

Pan-African Alliance

The purpose of the Pan-African Alliance is to promote solidarity and awareness among members of the black community and to teach others about the black experience, providing a cultural and spiritual link to Africa. The Alliance provides and coordinates social, educational, cultural and recreational activities to help enhance the quality of student life at Tufts. The Pan-African Alliance also serves as a voice through which to articulate the concerns of black students to the university as a whole.

http://ase.tufts.edu/africana

Surface Mining Impact on Spread of Schistosomiasis in Ghana

Dr. John Durant is a professor of civil and environmental engineering at the School of Engineering and teaches undergraduate- and graduate-level courses on environmental chemistry and chemical fate and transport. His research interests involve the human health consequences of environmental chemistry, particularly in air and water. Currently he is studying the influence of surface mining on changes in hydrology and its impact on the spread of schistosomiasis in Ghana.

http://ase.tufts.edu/cee/faculty/durant/bio.asp

Thermo-stable Measles Vaccine Research

In Sub-Saharan Africa, where measles is one of the top killers of children, vaccines are often rendered useless by lack of refrigeration. Led by Dr. Jeffrey Griffiths, an interdisciplinary team from the Famine Center, the School of Veterinary Medicine and the School of Medicine seeks to reverse that trend by developing a heat-resistant measles vaccine.

Tufts-in-Ghana

The Tufts-in-Ghana program, which takes place in the fall semester, offers undergraduates (usually juniors) the chance to study at the University of Ghana (Legon), located just outside the booming metropolis of the capital, Accra. Since English is the language of instruction at the University of Ghana and is widely spoken throughout the nation, there are no language prerequisites.

http://ase.tufts.edu/studyabroad/tpa/ghana.html

Tufts Uganda Internship Program

In summer 2005, under the coordination of the IR Assistant Director, Tufts interns worked with Friends of Orphans, the United Movement To End Child Soldiering in Uganda, and community leaders in planning, developing, implementing and sustaining a broad range of projects. TUIP was developed out of a student research project, and is a collaboration with the International Relations Program, Tisch College for Citizenship and Public Service, Peace and Justice Studies, and IGL.

http://ase.tufts.edu/pangea/uganda.html

Water: Systems, Science, and Society

Water: Systems, Science, and Society (WSSS) is an integrated, multi-disciplinary approach to managing and understanding the complexity of water issues worldwide. Students who elect to enroll in the program to complement their graduate studies in a related field emerge with both their degree and a WSSS certificate. Students in the WSSS program conduct research and plan projects related to global water issues, take courses and seminars, and undertake a field internship, learning on-site skills from professionals.

http://www.tufts.edu/water

<h4>A Dental Education Delivered to your Doorstep</h4>

<p>Unlike most first-year students at Tufts, the students in the School of Dental Medicine's distance education program -- the first of its kind in the world -- don't get together on campus for study groups. Instead, they remain in constant communication with the school and each other from their homes around the world as they earn their M.S. degrees in craniofacial pain and temporomandibular joint disorder.</p>

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<p>Dr. Jeffrey Griffiths, an associate professor of public health and family medicine, is always on the go. But then he needs to be: he is bent on nothing less than changing the world. What makes him run? "I'd just like the world to be a better place when I go," he says. "And it's fun doing this stuff."</p>

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<h4>A Mission to Help </h4>

<p>During the summer of 2007, Tufts dental student Marjorie Brisard traveled to her native Haiti this summer with a team of classmates and faculty members. For Brisard, the trip was one step toward fulfilling a life's goal.</p>

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<p>Working for the United Nations Mission in Sudan gave two Fletcher School students a unique view into an international peacekeeping operation and a new outlook on the Darfur conflict.</p>

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<h4>Bienvenue à Talloires</h4>

<p>The Tufts in Talloires program allows students to explore a foreign culture -- and themselves.</p>

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<h4>Castle in the Clouds </h4>

<p>Elliot Hirshon (A'05) recalls a trip to Tibet with Engineers Without Borders.</p>

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<h4>Change Agent</h4>

<p>Salome Otami, a Tufts Eliot-Pearson Department of Child Development graduate student, hopes to make a difference when she returns to her native Ghana.</p>

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<h4>Connecting Across Continents </h4>

<p>Students in GMAP, a combined residency and Internet-mediated graduate program at Tufts University's Fletcher School, are gaining an interdisciplinary education in global affairs, while making lifelong connections with their classmates from around the world.</p>

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<h4>Deliverance</h4>

<p>Through the organization he founded, LimaKids, Joseph Donroe (A'98, MD/MPH'07) seeks to address both mental health and quality of life issues of orphaned children in Peru's capital city.</p>

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<h4>Depth of Field</h4>

<p>One of several programs offered by the Tufts Institute for Global Leadership (IGL), EXPOSURE is an institute for photojournalism, documentary studies and human rights. It all began when IGL Director Sherman Teichman and undergraduate Matthew Edmundson (A'05) teamed up with acclaimed photographer James Nachtwey.</p>

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<h4>Dr. Chotanga</h4>

<p>Jeffrey Lazar, M03, recalls his seven-week stint at Livingstone General Hospital in Zambia.</p>

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<h4>Growing Strong</h4>

<p>The New Entry Sustainable Farming Project (NESFP), part of the Agriculture, Food and Environment Program at the Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy, was founded in 1998. It now serves about 50 immigrant farmers from Laos, Cambodia, Liberia, Ghana, Cameroon, Zimbabwe, and Kenya.</p>

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<h4>It's All Breaking New Ground</h4>

<p>As the directors of Tufts University's Nutrition/ Infection Unit, Drs. Christine Wanke, MD, and Sherwood Gorbach, MD, explore the link between nutrition and HIV/AIDS.</p>

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<h4>Making Its Mark </h4>

<p>A decade after its inception, Tufts University's Feinstein International Center is making a powerful impact on humanitarian work around the world.</p>

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<h4>Re-engineering a River</h4>

<p>Applying engineering principles to primary disease prevention can help bolster public health efforts, says David Gute, an associate professor of civil and environmental engineering at Tufts.</p>

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<h4>Summer Smarts</h4>

<p>Through Tufts Summer Scholars program, Jamie Chang (A'06) spent a summer in Korea exploring her passion for theater history. With support from her faculty mentor, she studied how contemporary Korean theater incorporates traditional performance forms, such as one-man operas and masked dances.</p>

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<h4>True Blessings</h4>

<p>Sue Higgins, T86, G02, has seen firsthand the difference occupational therapy can make in the lives of adults and children living in Mexico.</p>

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<h4>Welcome to America </h4>

<p>In 2000, Jane Leu (J'91) founded Upwardly Global, a San Francisco nonprofit dedicated to helping legal immigrants find work in their field. Today, with more than a dozen employees and a field office in Manhattan, the organization has assisted immigrants, refugees, and asylum seekers from some 65 countries.</p>

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<h4>Welcome To Arada Vieja </h4>

<p>Jonny Crocker (E'07), the former president of Engineers Without Borders, talks about the group's water filtration project in rural El Salvador.</p>

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