After three years as head of IFRA-Nigeria, Professor Barbara Morovich finished her contract at the end of August 2025. She will be joining the Université Panthéon-Sorbonne in Paris in September 2025 as a Professor in the Department of Urbanism. Below is her farewell message, in both French and English.
Secretary, Communication and Logistics Assistant
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Edafe holds a master's in Translation from the Advanced school of Translators and Interpreters in Buea Cameroon. She worked from 2020 to August 2023 in the Consulate General of Nigeria in Douala, Cameroun, first as consular assistant/translator and then as social secretary/translator. She joined IFRA-Nigeria as secretary, communication and logistics assistant in 2023. Fluent in French, she is in charge of updating IFRA-Nigeria's social networks, drafting correspondence, and she plays a key role by managing IFRA's logistics, relations with local partners and organising the travel of researchers and exchange students.
Research Project Manager
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After a master's degree in International Cooperation and Development at Sciences Po Bordeaux, Marie began studying Nigeria as an intern with Crisis Group's West Africa Program. She then worked for a year as a project manager for social impact studies at Insuco in Gabon, followed by experiences at the Office of the Director-General of the UN in Geneva and as a partnerships officer at the French National Center for Scientific Research (CNRS). Marie joined IFRA-Nigeria in 2025 as a research project manager. She is responsible for IFRA's communication and website, supports the development of research projects, organizes events, and will also conduct her own research.
Documentalist & Archivist
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Olushola holds a Bachelor's degree in Library, Archival, and Information Studies, as well as a Master's in Archival and Records Management from the University of Ibadan. He began working as a library officer at IFRA-Nigeria in 2009 before becoming our documentalist and archivist in 2013. He oversees the management of IFRA's Resource Center and its collection, including the acquisition of new books. In addition to assisting researchers and students in making the best use of our resources, he shares his extensive expertise by organizing workshops and training sessions at IFRA and beyond. As an archivist, he is also dedicated to digitizing parts of the Institute's material. Beyond these responsibilities, he plays a key role in event logistics and photography.
Driver
Olaolu has extensive experience as a driver, having worked in the field for 20 years—first for a decade at the Lister Flour Mill in Ibadan, then with Uber before joining IFRA-Nigeria in 2016. A trusted and essential member of our team, he is responsible not only for IFRA-Nigeria's daily transportation needs but also for facilitating the arrival of researchers from abroad. Additionally, he provides invaluable support for various practical tasks within our offices.
Secretary-General
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A graduate from the Polytechnic Ibadan, with a higher national diploma in Office Technology and Management, Emmanuel Udoh previously worked with the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA Ibadan), Africa Rice Center (AfricaRice), and Center for French Training and Documentation (CFTD Ibadan). Emmanuel became IFRA's secretary-general in 2023. His role involves overseeing the day-to-day operations of the Institute, including financial management and coordinating with various departments and stakeholders.
Cleaner
Originally from Lagos, Tobi trained in bag-making and sold her creations before moving to Ibadan five years ago. Since joining IFRA in 2023, she has been an integral member of our team, responsible for maintaining our offices and assisting with events' setup. In addition to her work at IFRA-Nigeria, she continues to practice bag-making.
Director of IFRA-Nigeria
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I hold a master's degree in archaeology from the University of Trieste (Italy), a doctorate in anthropology and ethnology from EHESS-Paris (France) and a Habilitation (HDR) in social anthropology (Université de Paris-Cité). I’m currently Associate Professor in social anthropology at the École nationale supérieure d'architecture of the University of Strasbourg, and on detachment as director at IFRA-Nigeria.
In my view, the anthropologist, far from being a mere observer of the society, is involved in its making: her/his economically, politically and physically ‘situated’ view must be deconstructed. After a thesis on religious movements in disadvantaged contexts in Nairobi (Kenya), I focused on social emergences and socio-spatial, memory and heritage transformations in working-class or stigmatized neighbourhoods affected by urban change in France (Strasbourg), Argentina (Buenos Aires) and South Africa (Johannesburg). To carry out a 10-year fieldwork project in a stigmatized neighbourhood of Strasbourg, I founded a transdisciplinary association, Horizome. This has led to a strong desire to democratise anthropological knowledge, thanks to projects co-constructed with community players, leading to the publication of transdisciplinary works.
The research I carry out in Nigeria has two components. First, the setting up of a project to capitalise research into the digitisation of archives to create a network of researchers in Africa and Europe on African digital archives: the “Archiving and digitizing the future from Africa: production, circulation, mobilisation” project. Secondly, a field-work in Ibadan, to explore the dynamics of urban change (demolitions, renovations, deforestation, etc.) in relation to so-called ‘cultural’, memorialisation and heritage projects, which mask neo-liberal logics.
Latest publications
2025 (forthcoming): Céline Barrère, Muriel Girard, Barbara Morovich (coord.), « Faire avec ou défaire l’héritage : espaces, architectures et paysages de la colonialité / Making or breaking with legacy: colonial spaces, landscapes and architecture », Les Cahiers de la recherche architecturale et urbaine et paysagère.
2025 (forthcoming): Barbara Morovich & Sa’eed Husaini, « Promises and Perils of Participation in Digital Restitution Projects in Nigeria ». (Submitted to Journal of African Cultural Studies).
2023: Barbara Morovich et Monique Selim (coord.), « Imaginaires en pandémie », Journal des Anthropologues, n° 172-173, 2023.
2023: Judith Hayem et Barbara Morovich, « Un jardin urbain rastafari face au Covid en Afrique du Sud », Journal des Anthropologues, n° 172-173, 2023, dans « Imaginaires en pandémie », Barbara Morovich et Monique Selim (coord.), p. 43-60.
2022: Barbara Morovich, « Hautepierre, Strasbourg. L’entre-deux d’une situation de rénovation urbaine : négociations, ruses et espaces associatifs », in O. Boucheron et M. Palumbo (dir.), L’Entre-deux barres, une ethnographie de la transformation des ensembles de logements collectifs par leurs habitants, Presse universitaire de Saint-Étienne.
2021: Barbara Morovich & Pauline Guinard, « An Uncertain Heritage and Resistance: Transforming the Drill Hall in Johannesburg », in Hilton Judin (dir.), Falling monuments, reluctant ruins. The persistence of the past in the architecture of apartheid, Johannesburg, Wits University Press, p. 174-190.
Director
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Secretary-General
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Researcher & Deputy Director
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Secretary, Communication and Logistics Assistant
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Research Project Manager
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Documentalist
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