Daivi Rodima-Taylor

Dr. Daivi Rodima-Taylor is a social anthropologist and Africanist, and researcher and lecturer at the Frederick S. Pardee School of Global Studies, Boston University. Her research focuses on collaborative economies, financial technology and inclusion, migration and diaspora, and land and agrarian relations. Her longitudinal field research in East Africa studied local associations of mutual security such as collaborative work groups and savings-credit associations.

She has been leading Boston University interdisciplinary Task Force on migrant remittances and human security, which was one of the very first initiatives to systematically study post-conflict remittances and their role in reconstruction and development. Daivi has taught anthropology, international relations, and sustainable development and contributed to international development work. She has served as Senior Researcher at the Boston University Center for Law and Policy, and as Fellow at the Boston University Institute of Culture, Religion, & World Affairs. She is the Project Manager for Boston University African Ajami research projects, and has directed the BU African Studies Center’s Diaspora Studies Initiative and the Working Group on Land Mortgage. She has presented at more than 100 conference panels, workshops, and invited lectures across national and international scholarly venues, contributing to academic exchange across regional and disciplinary contexts.

Daivi’s guest edited special issues have appeared in Africa, African Studies Review, Journal of Cultural Economy, Environment and Planning: Politics and Space, Applied Geography, and Islamic Africa. Her co-edited books include Cryptopolitics: Exposure, Concealment, and Digital Media (Berghahn Books, 2023) and Land and the Mortgage: History, Culture, Belonging (Berghahn Books, 2022). She has published in journals including Africa: International African Institute, African Studies Review, Anthropology Today, Islamic Africa, Distinktion: Journal of Social Theory, American Anthropologist, Social Analysis, Geoforum: Journal of Physical, Human, and Regional Geosciences, Journal of Cultural Economy, Review of International Political Economy, Georgetown Journal of International Affairs, Global Networks, Migration Information Source, Environment and Planning: Politics and Space, American Ethnologist, Journal of International Relations and Development, Global Policy, JRAI: Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, Economic Anthropology, and International Journal of African Historical Studies. She has also contributed chapters to the Encyclopedia of Economic Anthropology, Routledge Handbook on Debt, and Oxford Bibliographies.