Council of the University of Ghana has, today, October 20, 2021 appointed Prof. Nana Aba Appiah Amfo as the substantive Vice-Chancellor of the University.
The appointment takes effect from October 26, 2021.
Prof. Appiah Amfo by this appointment, becomes the first woman to occupy the position of Vice Chancellor of the premier university, the University of Ghana.
Prior to her appointment, she was the Pro-Vice-Chancellor for Academic and Student Affairs from November 1, 2019 until this elevation.
An alumni of the University of Ghana, Professor Nana Aba Appiah Amfo had her secondary education at Holy Child School and Archbishop Porter Girls’ Secondary School.
She proceeded to the University of Ghana from 1991 to 1996 for a Bachelor’s degree in French and Linguistics. Both her MPhil (2001) and PhD (2007) degrees in Linguistics are from the Norwegian University of Science and Technology in Trondheim, Norway.
Prof. Appiah Amfo has received additional training in higher education management and leadership from Harvard Business School, University of Applied Sciences, Germany, and INSEAD, France.
The new VC’s career in academia started in 2001 as a Lecturer in the Department of Linguistics and was promoted Senior Lecturer in 2007, Associate Professor in 2011, and Professor in 2017.
Her research interests are in the linguistic sub-discipline of Pragmatics, which allows her to explore the role that context plays in our conversational interactions and how that influences communication in different domains.
Before her appointment as Pro-Vice-Chancellor, Professor Appiah Amfo served as Dean of the School of Languages, having previously served as the Head of the Department of Linguistics from 2013 – 2014.
She has participated in the governance of the University of Ghana through her service on several statutory and Adhoc Boards and Committees.
Professor Appiah Amfo is currently an Advisory Board member of the Coalition of People Against Sexual and Gender Based Violence and Harmful Practices (CoPASH) – A UNFPA supported programme.
She is a member of several professional associations including the Society of Communication, Medicine and Ethics, International Pragmatics Association (where she serves on its Consultation Board; the first African to serve in this capacity since the Association’s establishment in 1986); West African Linguistics Society and Linguistics Association of Ghana (where she served as President from 2010 – 2014); a pioneer fellow, senior scholar and Chair of the Steering Committee of the African Humanities Program of the American Council of Learned Societies.
She is also a fellow of the German Academic Exchange Services (DAAD), Commonwealth Professional.
Professor Appiah Amfo is married to Frank Amfo and the couple have three children.
By Vincent Kubi