- Phone
- (909) 621-8657
- Office Location
Bernard 215
- Office Hours
- Contact Professor
With Pitzer Since: 2009
Bio
Dr. Harmony O’Rourke is Professor of History and Gender and Feminist Studies at Pitzer College, with expertise in modern African History. She is author of Hadija’s Story: Diaspora, Gender, and Belonging in the Cameroon Grassfields (Indiana University Press, 2017), and her scholarly articles have appeared in History in Africa: A Journal of Method, Journal of West African History, and Oxford University Press’s Encyclopedia of African Women's History. Her current research explores the cultural histories of natural disaster, global science, and postcolonial politics in Cameroon. Her research and teaching have been supported by a number of grants and awards, including the U.S. Department of Education Fulbright-Hays Doctoral Dissertation Research Award and the American Council of Learned Societies.
- PhD, Harvard University
- AM, Harvard University
- BA, Macalester College
- Cultural History of Modern Africa
- Environmental Humanities
- Gender and Sexuality
- Religion and Belief
- West and Central Africa
- Colonial and Post-Colonial Governance and Society
- Oral History
- The World Since 1492 (History/Anthropology 11 with C. Johnson)
- Colonialism in Africa (History 24A)
- West African History through Novel and Film (History 45)
- African History through Film (History 46)
- Oral History: Methodology and Practice (History 66)
- Natural Disaster and “Latent Violence” in Cold War Cameroon (History 68)
- Contemporary Africa: Digital Archives of Recent Pasts (History 140, with R. Talmor, cross-listed with Media Studies)
- Death and Dying in African History (History 144, cross-listed with Anthropology, Environmental Analysis, and Human Biology)
- Gender and Sexuality in Africa (History 148, cross-listed with Gender & Feminist Studies)
- Senior Seminar (History 197)
- Women and Political Change in Africa (First-Year Seminar Program)
Hadija’s Story: Diaspora, Gender, and Belonging in the Cameroon Grassfields, Indiana University Press (2017).
“Cameroon’s Lake Explosions and the Levelling of Scientific, Spiritual, and Conspiratorial Knowledges,” manuscript in progress.
“Religion and Belief: Binding Lives, Orienting Visions,” with Beth Ann Williams, in A Cultural History of Gender: The Contemporary World (1950 to the Future), ed. Adrian Bingham and Susan Broomhall. Bloomsbury Press, forthcoming.
“Women in Cameroon,” Oxford Encyclopedia of African Women’s History, ed. Dorothy Hodgson, Alicia Decker, Abosede George, Tabitha Kanogo, Kathleen Sheldon, Fatima Sadiqi, and Pamela Scully. New York, NY: Oxford University Press, forthcoming.
“Women in Cameroon,” Oxford Reference Encyclopedia of African History, http://africanhistory.oxfordre.com, ed. Thomas Spear. Oxford Research Encyclopedias. New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2020.
“The Ongoing Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Gender and Equity in Academia: Statement by the Women's Caucus of the African Studies Association,” with Anita Plummer, Tshepo Masango Chéry, and Beth Ann Williams, African Studies Association Women’s Caucus, July 2021: http://www.asawomenscaucus.com/covid-statement.
“Beyond the World of Commerce: Rethinking Hausa Diaspora History through Marriage, Distance, and Legal Testimony,” History in Africa: A Journal of Method, 43 (June 2016), 141-167.
“The Life and Experiences of Saeed Ibn Hayatu, A Mahdist Leader: New Findings from the Buea Archive,” with Mohammed Bashir Salau, Journal of West African History, 2, 2 (2016), pp. 51-78.
“Native Foreigners and the Ambiguity of Order and Identity: The Case of African Diasporas and Islamic Law in British Cameroon,” History in Africa: A Journal of Method, 39 (2012), 97-122.
“Latent Violence and Deciphering Meaning in Cameroon’s Crater Lake Disasters,” Invited Talk for the Journal of West African History (JWAH): 10th Anniversary Conference: The State of the Field and New Directions, October 3-4, 2024.
“Centering Africa’s Gendered Religious Knowledge and Practice: A Decolonial Approach,” Decolonising Religion, Liberating Faith, Wits Centre for Diversity Studies Symposium, University of Witwatersrand, South Africa, May 22, 2024.
“Lake Explosions and the Levelling of Scientific, Spiritual, and Conspiratorial Knowledges in Cold War Cameroon,” Rocky Mountain Workshop on African History, Brigham Young University, Salt Lake City, April 12-13, 2024.
“Cameroon’s Lake Explosions and the Levelling of Scientific, Spiritual, and Conspiratorial Knowledges,” Spirits in Struggles for Environmental Conservation and Renewal panel, African Studies Association Annual Meeting, San Francisco, November 30 – December 2, 2023.
“Natural Disaster, Latent Violence, and Technopolitical Failure in Cameroon,” Climate Change and Environmental Disasters: Governance and Politics panel, African Studies Association Annual Meeting, San Francisco, November 30 – December 2, 2023.
“Science, Memory, and the Limits of Knowledge Production: Contrasting Narratives of Cameroon’s 1986 Lake Nyos Disaster,” African Studies Association Annual Meeting (Virtual), November 16-20, 2021.
“Is Digital Humanities in the Classroom Just Code for Interdisciplinarity? Teaching Gender, Media, and History of Contemporary Africa,” Western Association of Women Historians Annual Meeting, Online, April 22-24, 2021.
“Hadija’s Story and the Method of Oral History,” Invited Talk, Baylor University, January 31, 2018.
“The Ordeal of Mubahala: The Qur'an as Talisman in Mediating Disputes and Belonging among Grassfields' Diasporic Muslims, 1947-1960,” paper presented at the African Studies Association Annual Meeting, Chicago, IL, November 2017.
"The Strength of a Woman is in Her Talk": Muslim Women's Words and Reorienting Representations in West Africa,” paper presented at the African Studies Association Annual Meeting, Washington, D.C., December 1, 2016.