Raymond Awadzi

Adjunct Lecturer

Religious Studies


Email: rawadzi@fiu.edu

Bio

Raymond K. Awadzi serves as an adjunct professor in our department while pursuing his doctoral program in anthropology at the Department of Global and Sociocultural Studies (GSS), Florida International University. His current research focuses on the new African diaspora, their initiatives, and their ramifications for the socio-cultural, political, and economic developments in Africa and the African diaspora. His work delves into the emergent vertical and the horizontal transnational networks among the African diaspora, mobilization, and deployment of capital for their socio-cultural, political, and economic transformation with a focus on the West African Ewe ethnically based diaspora communities in North America. Raymond received his BA in Political Science and Study of Religions in 2008, and an MPhil in Study of Religions in 2011, all from the University of Ghana, Legon. He obtained an MA in Religious Studies at Florida International University, Miami in 2016. Raymond Awadzi also worked as a teaching and research assistant at the University of Ghana, Legon, and Florida International University, Miami. He applies his interdisciplinary background to research and teaching in the areas of religion and public spaces, church history and Christian missions in Africa and the African diaspora, identity politics through the lenses of postcolonialism, the invention of tradition, ethnogenesis, reverse mission, and sociocultural theories, and concepts. Awadzi aspires to use his rich research and teaching experience to address socio-cultural, economic, and political injustices in our world through research, teaching, and learning.

Areas of Expertise

Religion (Christianity and African Indigenous Religions) in Africa and the African Diaspora, Religion and Politics, Studies in World Religions.