Close
Fabian Krautwald joined UCL in 2024. He works and teaches on the social, political, cultural, economic, and intellectual history of Africa from the late nineteenth to the early twenty-first century. He is especially interested in comparative and transnational histories, which he explores in eastern and southern Africa based on vernaculars such as Swahili and Otjiherero. Before coming to UCL, he held postdoctoral fellowships at Binghamton University in upstate New York and at Princeton University.
Major publications
- “The Past Will Set You Free: Prophetic Memory in Twentieth-Century Herero Religious Thought” International Journal of African Historical Studies, 56:3 (2023): 387-411.
- “Genocide and the Politics of Memory in the Decolonization of Namibia.” Journal of Southern African Studies, 48:5 (2022): 805-823. (Received the journal's Terence Ranger Prize for first-time authors for 2022).
- “The Bearers of News: Print and Power in German East Africa.” The Journal of African History, 62:1 (2021): 5-28.
Public Engagement
Fabian's research sits at the interstice of growing public interest in the colonial past and academic research. He therefore enjoys engaging with communities, organizations, and groups beyond academia, whether in oral history research, commemorations, popular publications, or at public talks.
He recently published an article in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, one of Germany's major daily newspapers, on comparisons between colonial genocides and the Shoah:
"Von Auschwitz nach Windhuk", Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, November 12, 2024.
He has also written about demands for reparations by postcolonial African nations for Africa at LSE, the London School of Economics' African studies blog, as well as for the American-German Institute.
"Namibia's Long History of Anti-Colonial Justice," Africa at LSE, February 9, 2023.
"A Zeitenwende for Whom?," American-German Institute Blog, January 21, 2025.
Teaching
Africa, Decolonization, and Internationalism (Thematic, Autumn 24/Spring 25)
Decolonization and Development (MA module, Spring 25)
For more information, visit Fabian's RPS profile.
