Charles D. Piot

Charlie Piot "does research on histories of slavery and colonialism, as well as on contemporary culture and politics, in rural West Africa. His book, Remotely Global: Village Modernity in West Africa (1999), attempts to retheorize a classic out-of-the-way place as within the modern and the global. He is currently engaged in several new projects. One explores the way in which (post-Cold War) human rights discourse, democratization, development, and charismatic Christianity are articulating with West African political cultures. A second tracks global discourses about female genital cutting from Western courtrooms and media into the capitals and villages of West Africa. A third explores West African expatriates in the US and Europe, examining the way in which exile reshapes questions of citizenship, sovereignty and national belonging."

Select Publications

 * Charles D. Piot, "Representing Africa in the Kasinga Asylum Case", In: Rogaia Mustafa Abusharaf, ed. Female Circumcision: Multicultural Perspectives (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2007), pp.224-233. (Concerns the Fauziya Kasinga case)