Ato Quayson is a distinguished academic, currently serving as a Professor of English and the Director of the Centre for Diaspora and Transnational Studies at the University of Toronto since August 2005. He completed his Bachelor of Arts at the University of Ghana and earned his Ph.D. from Cambridge University in 1995.
After obtaining his Ph.D., Quayson worked as a Research Fellow at the University of Oxford before returning to Cambridge in September 1995. At Cambridge, he became a Fellow at Pembroke College and a member of the Faculty of English, eventually attaining the position of Reader in Commonwealth and Postcolonial Studies.
Professor Quayson is highly regarded for his extensive contributions to African literature, postcolonial studies, and literary theory. He has published widely on these subjects and is the founding editor of the journal „Postcolonial Literary Inquiry,“ launched at the MLA convention in Chicago.
Among his notable works is the two-volume „Cambridge History of Postcolonial Literature“ (2012), and he has also co-edited the „Blackwell Companion to Diaspora and Transnationalism Studies“ (2013). His most recent book, „Oxford Street, Accra: City Life and the Itineraries of Transnationalism,“ was published by Duke University Press in 2014 and includes a chapter on salsa culture in Accra.
In recognition of his scholarly achievements, Ato Quayson was elected Fellow of the Ghana Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2005 and Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada in 2013. Apart from his academic pursuits, Quayson is known for his love of dance, although he acknowledges lacking the discipline to master any single dance style. His association with Modern Moves is seen as an opportunity for him to further explore and develop his passion for dance.