معرفی
Rogers Orock serves as an Assistant Professor of Africana Studies at Lafayette College, having joined the institution after teaching for two years at Louisiana State University. Originally from West Africa with connections to Cameroon and Nigeria, Orock brings a distinctive international perspective shaped by academic training in Cameroon, Finland, and Denmark, and professional experience across multiple continents.
Dr. Orock's research centers on elites in West Africa, examining complex relationships between power, morality, leadership, and corruption. His scholarship traces the evolution of West African perspectives on elites—from initial aspirations for economic development to increasingly conspiratorial interpretations of power structures. In collaboration with Amsterdam-based colleague Peter Geschiere, he has investigated connections between these phenomena and popular rumors regarding elite associations with Freemasonry, homosexuality, and illicit enrichment, which forms the basis of a forthcoming book. Orock has also identified significant parallels between African and American conspiracy theories about elites, noting how fears about corruption manifest across cultural contexts.
Orock teaches AFS 102: Introduction to Africana Studies and AFS 101: Ideas of Africa, employing an interdisciplinary approach that draws from anthropology, economics, political science, cultural studies, and African literature. He particularly values Lafayette's small class sizes for facilitating meaningful student engagement and aims to elevate discourse around the rise of conspiracy narratives within broader conversations about Blackness, human identity, and historical struggles.
Beyond academia, Orock is a father of three young children (two daughters and a son) who actively participates in their lives, researching dance schools for his daughters. He enjoys films and documentaries and expresses enthusiasm about engaging with Lafayette's campus community through clubs and organizations.
