Prof Nana Aba Appiah Amfo is UG’s first female Vice-Chancellor

The University of Ghana (UG) has confirmed Professor Nana Aba Appiah Amfo, as the Vice-Chancellor, making her the first female to have occupied the position in the history of the 73-year-old university.

The governing council of the university made the decision to affirm the professor of Linguistics as the substantive Vice-Chancellor on Wednesday, October 20, 2021, and she would take office, effective, Tuesday, October 26, 2021.

Prior to her new position, Prof Amfo, who was the Pro Vice-Chancellor, in charge of academic and student affairs of the country’s premier university, served as the acting Vice-Chancellor from August 2021.

Aside from being the first female Vice-Chancellor of the University of Ghana, she has now become the third female to have occupied such a Ghana’s public universities.

Before her, Prof Rita Akosua Dickson and Prof Naana Jane Opoku-Agyemang, rose to such ranks at the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST), and the University of Cape Coast (UCC) respectively.

With this confirmation, Prof Amfo who will serve for five years, subject to being retained or replaced, will man the day-to-day activities of the university, as the chief disciplinary officer in addition to other administrative responsibilities.

Commenting on her appointment, the university said the professor of linguistics, an experienced academic and university administrator, with twenty years of experience in the higher education sector will bring on board “a lot of innovation, resourcefulness, and tact to her professional engagements, and is adept at change management.”

“As Pro Vice-Chancellor, she brought significant technological innovation to impact the University’s academic and administrative processes,” a statement announcing her appointment stated.

Brief profile of Prof Nana Aba Appiah Amfo

Professor Nana Aba Appiah Amfo, an alumna of the University of Ghana, had her secondary education at Holy Child School and Archbishop Porter Girls’ Secondary School before entering the university for her Bachelor’s degree in French and Linguistics.

Both her MPhil (2001) and Ph.D. (2007) degrees in Linguistics are from the Norwegian University of Science and Technology in Trondheim, Norway.

Prof Amfo has received additional training in higher education management and leadership from Harvard Business School, University of Applied Sciences, Germany, and INSEAD, France.

Her career in academia started in 2001 as a Lecturer in the Department of Linguistics after her Master’s degree. In 2007, the same year she obtained her PhD degree, she was promoted Senior Lecturer. She became 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 conversational interactions and how that influences communication in different domains such as health, politics, gendered and migratory contexts.

She has led several research projects in her disciplinary area of linguistics, as well as in multidisciplinary teams. Her research has resulted in numerous internationally recognized publications and conference presentations.

She has been an external examiner for a number of universities including University of Nairobi, University of Dar es Salaam, Stellenbosch University, University of the Western Cape, and Norwegian University of Science and Technology.

Furthermore, she serves on the Consultation Board of the International Pragmatics Association (the first African to be so elected since the Association’s establishment in 1986). She is an Assistant Secretary General of the Federation of Modern Languages and Literatures (a UNESCO affiliated scholarly association).

Prof Amfo was the president of the Linguistics Association of Ghana (2010 – 2014). She is a member of the West African Linguistics Society and the Society for Communication, Medicine and Ethics (COMET).

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