Research Interests: Cultural Studies, Gender Studies, Visual communication Design, Design and Multimedia, Scholarly Writing, Critical Thinking and Art and Gender
In 2020, Dr. Amanda Tumusiime was the first female researcher, artist, gender scholar and innovator at MTSIFA to be appointed to the rank of Associate
Professor since MTSIFA’s humble birth as the first Art School in East Africa in 1939. She was also the first woman to be appointed to this position in the Department of Visual Communication, Design and Multimedia at MTSIFA, Makerere University.
Dr Tumusiime graduated with a PhD in 2012. She has done four post-doctoral research studies in the period 2013–2019, namely: 1). Post-doctorate (Princeton University, USA) 2017, The Evolution of Uganda’s Contemporary Gendered Art: Institutions and Actors, that was funded by the African Studies Association; 2) Postdoctorate (UNC-Chapel Hill), 2015–2016, On Beautiful Bodies after Antiretroviral Therapy (ART): A Challenge for HIV and AIDS Prevention, funded by the Fulbright Programme; 3) Post-doctorate (MUK) 2014–2015, Kampala’s Public Monuments/Allegories of Exclusion: Perspectives of Gender Equality, Visual Equality and Development, funded by Next Generation of Africa Academics (NGAA II); 4) Post-doctorate (Rhodes University) 2013–2014, On Sexist Art and Women’s Violence, funded by the American Council for Learned Societies through the African Humanities Program.
Dr Tumusiime also holds two master’s degrees, namely: MA (Arts), University of the Witwatersrand, 2005, and MA (Fine Art), Makerere University, 2001. She further holds a Bachelor of Industrial and Fine Arts degree from Makerere University, 1997. Besides, she holds a Diploma in Religious Studies from the New Life Correspondence School, Kvinesdal, Norway. Also, she has done five (5) relevant short courses.
Assoc. Prof. Amanda Tumusiime has a great deal of managerial experience accumulated as follows: 1). Dean MTSIFA (October 2022 to date); 2) Head, Department of Visual Communication, Design and Multimedia (2020–2022); and 3) Head, Department of Sculpture and Drawing (2020–
2011). She has been, and continues to serve as, a Senior Research Associate in the Department of Fine Art at Rhodes University (2016-2025). She is a Fellow of the American Council for Learned Societies (since 2012). She is the CEO of Dr Amanda Tumusiime Foundation that uses art and research to improve the lives of marginalised girls. She has in her leadership role at MTSIFA acted as Secretary for the Makerere University Dean’s Forum, as Dean and as Head of Department at MTSIFA at two different intervals. In addition, she is a Board Member of
Africa International Trade, headquartered in Nigeria. She is a Reviewer for the African Humanities Programme that awards funding opportunities for African PhD students and post-docs to improve their research and publications. She was one of the Reviewers for the Institutional Development Plan for Rhodes University in 2018 and a Reviewer for the National Research Foundation, a national agency that funds research in the Republic of South Africa. She is a Guest Editor for African Arts, the prestigious journal of Art History that is published by the UCLA’s African Studies Center (USA), among many others. She is a Senior Research Associate at Rhodes University. She is a Fellow of the American Council for the Learned Societies; a Fellow of Carnegie Next Generation of African Academics; an African Studies Association Presidential Fellow; a Fulbright African Research Scholar; a Senior Research Associate at Rhodes University; and a Maya Angelou recipient.
Dr Tumusiime has linked dynamic teaching to creative and innovative research, and writing, to hone a multidisciplinary approach to discourse. This is the context in which she has taught graduate and undergraduate courses at MTSIFA for the period spanning May 1997 to date. She has been teaching for 25 years. She has supervised and mentored many undergraduate students at Makerere University and also
supervised and mentored research projects at PhD and MA (Fine Art) levels in all disciplines at MTSIFA. She has maintained academic excellence at MTSIFA and CEDAT at large.
Dr Tumusiime has vast experience in networking for research and resource mobilisation. As such, she has established strong networks at international and national levels for both academic and non-academic engagements. For example, she has had collaborations on art and health and art and disability. She has engaged in relationships between Uganda Manufacturers Association (UMA) and the Indian community in Uganda and Makerere University on skilling graduates via improving and mastering new skills of learning, innovativeness and mindset change.
Department of Visual Communication Design and Multimedia (DVCDM)
Graduate
Undergraduate
SOLO EXHIBITIONS
JOINT EXHIBITIONS
INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCES
LOCAL CONFERENCES
LOCAL ACADEMIC WORKSHOPS
SEMINARS/OUT REACH LECTURES
ACCREDITED JOURNAL: SINGLE AUTHOR
ACCREDITED JOURNAL: JOINT AUTHOR
Tumusiime, A.2015. “Feminizing HIV/AIDS pandemic? Contemporary Ugandan art and the construction the new woman as a seropositive vampire” in The humanities and Africa’s contemporary challenges. Nigeria: Delta State University Press.
Tumusiime, A. 2014. On Uganda’s Sexist Art: Its Institutions and Actors in Sida Regional collaborations. Kampala: Makerere University.