Bio
Harcourt Fuller, Ph.D. – Exhibition Creator and Director
Dr. Harcourt Fuller is Associate Professor of History in the Department of History at Georgia State University (GSU). He holds a Ph.D. in International History from the London School of Economics (LSE), in addition to other degrees from LSE and the City University of New York (CUNY). He has previously taught at Connecticut College, Emmanuel College, Florida International University, and was a Visiting Researcher at the African Studies Center and a Visiting Scholar in the African American Studies Program at Boston University. Dr. Fuller was also a Research Assistant in the Department of Coins and Medals at the British Museum in London. As an internationally recognized scholar, Dr. Fuller has conducted research, given invited lectures and presented conference papers in Africa, Europe, North and South America, and the Caribbean.
Dr. Fuller’s multidisciplinary research and teaching expertise include the socio-political, cultural and economic history of West Africa (Ghana in particular), and the African Diaspora in the Americas. His scholarship focuses on the history of resistance against slavery and colonialism (particularly through Marronage), as well as anti-colonial nationalism, trans-nationalism, symbolic nationalism, and the construction of national and ethno-national identity in the Africana World.
Dr. Fuller's publications include the monograph, Building the Ghanaian Nation-State: Kwame Nkrumah's Symbolic Nationalism (New York: Palgrave-Macmillan, 2014), and the co-edited book Money in Africa (London: Trustees of the British Museum, 2009). His chapter in the latter book is titled, “From Cowries to Coins: Money and Colonialism in the Gold Coast and British West Africa in the Early 20th Century.” His published articles in peer-reviewed academic journals include “Civitatis Ghaniensis Conditor: Kwame Nkrumah, Symbolic Nationalism and the Iconography of Ghanaian Money, 1957 – the Golden Jubilee," in Nations and Nationalism. He has also published articles in other scholarly journals, such as African Studies Quarterly, African Arts, Journal of Africana Religions, and Canadian Journal of Latin American and Caribbean Studies.
Dr. Fuller has also given invited lectures and conference papers on the history and symbolism of money in Africa and the African Diaspora, at educational and cultural institutions. These talks include “Un-Free Money: Free Labor, Money and Nationalism, from Confederate Georgia to Colonial Ghana,” “Teaching the History of Money,” “Monetary Sovereignty: African Resistance to the Colonization of Currency in British West Africa in the Early Twentieth Century,” and “Minting the Nation: Money and Anti-Colonial Nationalism in the Gold Coast/Ghana, 1957 – 1966.”
In addition to appearing as a commentator and discussant for documentaries, Dr. Fuller is the producer of the award-winning documentary on the 18th century African-Jamaican Maroon leader, Queen Nanny: Legendary Maroon Chieftainess (2015). Dr. Fuller is also the co-creator of the Jamaican Maroon Photo & Art Exhibit, which was shown at the Auburn Avenue Research Library on African American Culture and History, from September 2017 – March 2018.
As a public scholar, Professor Fuller has contributed articles, op-eds and/or quotes to media outlets and periodicals such as the New York Times, Christian Science Monitor, Huffington Post, Le Monde (France), Chronicle of Higher Education/Diverse Issues in Higher Education, the Conversation, Motto/Time Magazine, National Geographic Magazine, BBC Mundo, Deutsche Welle (Germany's international broadcaster), Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC), United Nations Radio and Web TV, NPR, Radio Free Georgia (WRFG), and Nationwide Radio, Jamaica.