Paul Tiyambe Zeleza is Dean of the Bellarmine College of Liberal Arts, and Presidential Professor of African American Studies and History, Loyola Marymount University, Los Angeles. He previously was head of the Department of African American Studies and the Liberal Arts and Sciences Distinguished Professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago, Director of the Center for African Studies and Professor of History and African Studies at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and Principal of Lady Eaton College at Trent University. He has taught at universities in the US, Canada, Kenya, Jamaica, and Malawi, and is currently Honorary Professor at the University of Cape Town. He has also worked as a consultant for the Ford and MacArthur foundations and as an adviser to the United Nations Research Institute for Social Development. He is a past President of the African Studies Association (2008-2009), the largest professional association in the world dedicated to the study of Africa and the African Diaspora.
Zeleza earned his B.A. from the University of Malawi and an M.A from the University of London, where he studied African history and international relations. He holds his Ph.D. in economic history from Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada.
His most recent books are Barack Obama and African Diasporas: Dialogues and Dissensions (Ohio University Press, 2009) and In Search of African Diasporas: Testimonies and Encounters (Carolina Academic Press, 2012). He has presented nearly 250 keynote addresses, papers, and public lectures at leading universities and international conferences in thirty-one countries, served on the editorial boards of more two-dozen journals and book series and edited an influential Pan-African online magazine, The Zeleza Post, from 2004-2012.
