Peyi Soyinka-Airewele

Professor, Politics
Phone: 607-274-3508
Office: Muller Faculty Center 314, Ithaca, NY 14850
Specialty: International and African Politics, The Politics of Memory, Critical Studies in Democratic Development, Politics of Popular African Cinema

Peyi Soyinka-Airewele is Professor of African and Comparative/International Politics at Ithaca College, New York and visiting professor at Covenant University, Nigeria. Among her works are Socio-Political Scaffolding and the Construction of Change, Africa World Press, 2008, co-edited with Kelechi Kalu;  Invoking the Past, Conjuring the Nation; and Reframing Contemporary Africa, with Kiki Edozie, published by the Congressional Quarterly press, 2010. Her research and speaking engagements have explored critical issues of memory, identity and other post-conflict dilemmas in the postcolony; the socio-political discourses of African cinema and its fluid interpretations of transforming identities in global and local spaces; biopower, necropolitics and repression in Africa; as well as the crisis of democratic development, rights and peace in the postcolony. She is founder of the International Collaborative Classrooms initiative and co-founder (with Beth Harris) of the Classrooms Beyond Borders program involving Ithaca College, Covenant University, Nigeria, the Obafemi Awolowo University, Nigeria, An-Najah University, Palestine and the University of South Africa.  

Peyi is the first black woman to earn tenure at Ithaca college and later, promotion to full professor. In 2008, she was elected to serve as the first female President of the Association of Third World Studies Inc. and Co-Vice Chairperson of the Ithaca City of Asylum (2007-8). Peyi was the founder of the Alliance for Community Transformation, ACT Africa and Director of the Partnership of the Academy and Community (PACT-OAU). She was elected as Director of Research (2010-12) and President (2012-14) of the African Studies and Research Forum (ASRF) and is currently co-President of the African Women’s Initiative, USA. Peyi Soyinka-Airewele was a fellow of the Global Security and Cooperation Program of the Social Science Research Council, the Oxford Round Table, United Kingdom and the Carnegie African Diaspora Fellowship. She is currently an ambassador for the Stephen's Children's Home, a center that nurtures, heals and educates hundreds of children orphaned and displaced by Boko Haram terrorism.