Dr Eva Namusoke
- Fellow, McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research
- Partner - Cambridge Heritage Research Centre
- Senior Curator, African Collections Futures
About
Dr Eva Namusoke is Senior Curator, African Collections Futures, working across collections from and about the African continent in the University of Cambridge’s museums, garden, libraries, archives, and departments. Eva published a report on these collections in December 2024. She was the curator of Bound Together: Leather from Northern Nigeria (2025-2026) at The Fitzwilliam Museum. Eva’s history PhD from the University of Cambridge focused on the development of the Anglican church in Uganda post-independence. She obtained an MA in African Studies from Yale University. After her PhD, Eva worked on the Commonwealth Oral History Project at the Institute of Commonwealth Studies (ICwS) in London, followed by roles in academia, public health, and policy research in Mauritius and Kampala.
Research
Eva’s current research project, ‘Afterlives of Return’, funded by Cambridge Humanities Research Grants and Isaac Newton Trust and Trinity College, is focused on a Cambridge to Kampala loan of Ugandan artefacts and explores what happens after return, how artefacts are (re)interpreted, and how the relationships around these returns are changed and sustained. Her wider work focusses on institutionalising the findings of the African Collections Futures report and supporting greater engagements for public and scholarly audiences with the African collections at Cambridge. She developed a tour in collaboration with Uncomfortable Cambridge, ‘African Legacies in Cambridge Museums’, which goes through The Fitzwilliam Museum, University Museum of Zoology, and Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology.