School of Social and Political Science

SPS academics receive research awards from the Royal Society of Edinburgh



Two academics from the School of Social and Political Science (SPS) have received Royal Society of Edinburgh (RSE) Research Awards, for projects on the energy transition in Africa and ecofeminism in Brazilian Amazonia.  

The RSE, Scotland’s National Academy, runs a Research Awards Programme twice a year to support Scotland's research sector by nurturing promising talent, stimulating research and promoting international collaboration. It offers various awards and grants to support academics involved in a range of research disciplines.  

  • Dr Nelson Oppong, Lecturer in African Studies and International Development, received the Research Collaboration Grant for the project ‘Fuming Cities: African Network for Ideas on Cities and Energy’ (Africa-NICE). Dr Oppong, who works in the Centre of African Studies subject area at SPS, will work with collaborators Dr Mohammad Amir, also from SPS, and Dr Pius Siakwah from the University of Ghana.  

    Africa-NICE aims to bridge gaps and asymmetries in research around clean energy transition and urbanisation in Africa. It will do this through production incubator workshops that will unearth locally relevant and thematic issues around the intersections of energy and urban Africa, and through the establishment of an interdisciplinary network of scholars. The network aims to produce academic scholarship, policy reports and practice-related interventions. 

  • Dr Maya Mayblin, a Senior Lecturer in Social Anthropology at SPS, received a Personal Research Fellowship for the project ‘Ecofeminism and anti-feminism in Catholic Amazonia: Interventions to address the compounding harm of rainforest deforestation.’  

    This project examines how gender, environment and religion intersect and shape one another in one of the world’s most critically endangered biomes - Brazilian Amazonia. It will open up new conversations between theology, feminist theory and the environmental humanities, and work with young environmentalists to generate concrete methods for combatting ‘anti-feminism’. 

Read the announcement on the Royal Society of Edinburgh website.