Rate My Professor Margot Luyckfasseel

Margot Luyckfasseel is a Junior Research Professor in Modern African History in the Department of History at the University of Antwerp, having joined the institution in October 2024. She earned her PhD in African Languages and Cultures from Ghent University in 2021, with a dissertation titled "Kongo with a K: acoustic repertoires and hegemony in Kinshasa." This study, drawing on archival research, literature, digital sources, and eight months of ethnographic fieldwork, investigates how cultural, historical, and linguistic Kongo references have been employed for emancipatory aims in Kinshasa's history. It highlights the (Ki)Kongo repertoire as a counterhegemonic tool against missionary paternalism, colonial governance, Mobutu’s and Kabila’s regimes, urbanity, Christianity, and unfulfilled modernity, with a focus on acoustic and linguistic dimensions in political memory, religious competition, and music authenticity. Previously, Luyckfasseel worked as an assistant researcher in African History and Anthropology at Ghent University from February 2016 to January 2022.

Her research specializes in Congolese history from below from the late 19th century to the present day, emphasizing urban-rural relations, language ideologies, debates on authenticity, and socio-economic themes such as slavery, labor, and trade. She has carried out fieldwork in Kinshasa, Kisangani, and Gemena, blending oral histories with archival sources. Notable publications include "Between marriage and slavery: women, social mobility, and the making of Ngwana power in late-nineteenth-century Central Africa" in the Journal of Eastern African Studies (2025); "Lingala only? A history of the D.R. Congo’s ideologies and counter-ideologies of monolingualism," co-authored with Michael Meeuwis and Joshua Castillo, in the Journal of Historical Sociolinguistics (2025); "“How will God hear us?”: Sonic and linguistic difference among Kinshasa's Églises des Noirs" (2023); "Opgedrongen maar omarmd? Koloniaal hokjesdenken, agency, en weerstand in Belgisch-Congo," contributed to the edited volume Consent: een geschiedenis van dwang en vrije wil en alles daartussenin; and "De wedloop om Afrika is terug van nooit weggeweest" (2026). She also authored the blog post "A bag of chips – and what it tells about Ghana's Pan-African history." At the University of Antwerp, she serves as an effective voting member on the Academic Committee on Global Engagement, multiple examination commissions for History programs, departmental councils, and education commissions. Recently, she undertook a four-month research fellowship at the Merian Institute for Advanced Studies in Africa in Accra, Ghana.