Rachel Spronk is a professor at the anthropology department of the University of Amsterdam. Her research focuses on culture, gender and sexuality, and is based on the intersection of three scholarly fields - anthropology, gender & sexuality studies, and African studies. Her various research projects evidence a concern with the historical trajectories that have shaped the present, the production of knowledge about gender and sexuality and, ultimately, how the lived experiences of people inform our theoretical models. Overall, she investigates the interface between sexuality and the middle class in Ghana and Kenya, examining problematic assumptions behind both terms.

2025

Spronk, R. (2025). Thinking with curiosity: The anthropology of sexuality and gender. Tijdschrift voor Genderstudies, 28(1), 5–22. https://doi.org/10.5117/TVGN2025.1.002.SPRO

Harmsen, S. L., & Spronk, R. (2025). What’s identity got to do with it? The social life of sexual identity in the Netherlands. Sexualities, 28(3), 860-876. https://doi.org/10.1177/13634607231215702

2024

Spronk, R. (2024). The defiance of multiplicity: Diabate’s lessons for contemporary decolonial feminist thinking. Safundi, 1-5. https://doi.org/10.1080/17533171.2024.2424543

2023

Wang, S., & Spronk, R. (2023). "Big data see through you": Sexual identifications in an age of algorithmic recommendation. Big Data & Society, 10(2). https://doi.org/10.1177/20539517231215358

Andrikopoulos, A., & Spronk, R. (2023). Family matters: Same-sex relations and kinship practices in Kenya. Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, 29(4), 899–916. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-9655.14011

2022

Spronk, R. (2022). Doing Knowledge through Knowing Women, Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa and the Middle East, 42(3), 676–680. https://doi.org/10.1215/1089201X-10148194

Spronk, R., & Knibbe, K. (2022). Theorizing secularity, religion and sexuality in postcolonial Europe: Introduction [Special issue]. New Diversities, 24(2), 1-12. https://doi.org/10.58002/8mrz-2v55

Spronk, R., & Bakuri, A. (2022). Piety and pleasure: Religion, sexuality and the cultivation of the self among Ghanaian-Dutch and Somali-Dutch women [Special issue]. New Diversities, 24(2), 29-43. https://doi.org/10.58002/zjs1-0y88

Spronk, R. (2022). Twenty years after: Gender and sexuality among middle-aged professionals in Nairobi. In B. B. Muhonja & B. M'Baye (Eds.), Gender and sexuality in Kenyan societies: Centering the human and the humane in critical studies (pp. 201–220). Lexington Books.

2021

Spronk, R., & Nyeck, S. N. (2021). Frontiers and pioneers in (the study of) queer experiences in Africa: Introduction [Special issue]. Africa, 91(3), 388–397. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0001972021000231

Spronk, R. (2021). My journey balancing the politics of critical feminist theory as an anthropologist. In E. Buchheim et a., (Eds.), Living concepts: 40 years of engaging gender and history (pp. 125-130). (Yearbook of Women's History/Jaarboek voor Vrouwengeschiedenis; No. 40), Verloren Publishers.

Spronk, R. (2021). In conversation about SEX…? Etnofoor, 33(1), 113–118. 

Spronk, R. (Ed.). (2021). Special series: Doing more on sexuality. African Arguments. https://africanarguments.org/2021/02/doing-more-on-sexuality/

2020

Spronk, R., & Hendriks, T. (Eds.). (2020). Readings in sexuality from Africa. Indiana University Press.

Spronk, R. (2020). Life is queer: Queer is life? HAU: Journal of Ethnographic Theory, 10(2), 618–622. https://doi.org/10.1086/709579

Bakuri, A., Spronk, R., & van Dijk, R. (2020). Labour of love: Secrecy and kinship among Ghanaian and Somali migrants in the Netherlands. Ethnography, 21(3), 394–412. https://doi.org/10.1177/1466138120938808 

Spronk, R. (2020). Structures, feelings, and savoir faire: Ghana's middle classes in the making. Africa, 90(3), 470–488. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0001972020000030

Spronk, R. (2020). Queering love: Sex, care, capital, and academic prejudices. In S. N. Nyeck (Ed.), Routledge Handbook of Queer African Studies (pp. 25-36). Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781351141963-4

Spronk, R. (2020). Response by the author. Reviewing of books: Debating Africa's middle classes. Africa, 90(3), 596–597. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0001972020000182

Spronk, R. (2020). Rerouting knowledge formation, following Dieter Neubert. In Bogner et a. (Eds.), Die Welt aus der Perspektive der Entwicklungssoziologie: Festschrift für Dieter Neubert (pp. 215-219). Nomos. https://doi.org/10.5771/9783748906681

2019

Bosman, M., Spronk, R., & Kuipers, G. (2019). Verbalizing sensations: Making sense of embodied sexual experiences. Qualitative Sociology, 42(3), 411–430. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11133-019-09426-y

Spronk, R. (2019). Circulation, appropriation, and enacting: A response to Julia Vorhölter. Current Anthropology, 60(2), 212–213. https://doi.org/10.1086/702337

2018

Spronk, R. (2018). Invisible desires in Ghana and Kenya: Same-sex erotic experiences in cross-sex oriented lives. Sexualities, 21(5-6), 883–898. https://doi.org/10.1177/1363460716677284 

Spronk, R. (2018). Afterword: The (idea of) African Middle Classes: Theorizing from Africa. In L. Kroeker, D. O'Kane, & T. Scharrer (Eds.), Middle Classes in Africa: Changing Lives and Conceptual Challenges (pp. 311-326). Palgrave Macmillan. doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-62148-7_14

Bröer, C., Spronk, R., & Kraak, V. (2018). Exploring ADHD diagnosis in Ghana: Between disrespect and lack of institutionalization. In M. Bergey, A. Filipe, I. Singh, & P. Conrad (Eds.), Global perspectives on ADHD (pp. 354–375). Johns Hopkins University Press.

2017

Spronk, R., & Pijnaker, T. (2017). Africa's legends: Digital technologies, aesthetics and middle-class aspirations in Ghanaian games and comics. Critical African Studies, 9(3), 327–349. https://doi.org/10.1080/21681392.2017.1371617

Hendriks, T., & Spronk, R. (2017). Rethinking sexuality from Africa. CODESRIA Bulletin 2017(1&2), 28-33.

Krebbekx, W., Spronk, R., & M'charek, A. (2017). Ethnicizing sexuality: An analysis of research practices in the Netherlands. Ethnic and Racial Studies, 40(4), 636-655. https://doi.org/10.1080/01419870.2016.1181771

2016

Spronk, R. (2016). The making of the middle classes: From Kula Raha to Sophistication in Nairobi. In A. Boanada-Fuchs, Y. N. Gez, & J. M. Waldmüller (Eds.), (Re)Searching   Nairobi's Middle Classes (pp. 11-20). Kompreno.

Dapaah, J. M., & Spronk, R. (2016). When the clinic becomes a home: Successful VCT and ART services in a stressful environment. SAHARA-J: Journal of Social Aspects of HIV/AIDS, 13(1), 142-151. https://doi.org/10.1080/17290376.2016.1222301

2014

Spronk, R. (2014). The idea of African men: dealing with the cultural contradictions of sex in academia and in Kenya, Culture, Health & Sexuality 16 (5), 504-517. doi.org/10.1080/13691058.2014.889755

Spronk, R. (2014). Exploring the middle classes in Nairobi: from modes of production to modes of sophistication, African Studies Review 57 (1), 93-114.  https://doi.org/10.1017/asr.2014.7

Spronk, R. (2014). Sexuality and subjectivity: erotic practices and the question of bodily sensations, Social Anthropology 22 (1), 3-21. https://doi.org/10.1111/1469-8676.12055

Spronk, R. (2014). Response to commentaries, discussion, Social Anthropology, 22 (1): 32-35. doi.org/10.1111/1469-8676.12055

Spronk, R and M. de Witte (2014). “African”: a contested qualifier in global Africa, Introduction [Special Issue], African Diaspora A Journal of Transnational Africa in a Global World 7(2): 165–176.

Spronk, R. (2014). “I am African iko nini”. Generational conflict and the politics of being in Nairobi, African Diaspora A Journal of Transnational Africa in a Global World 7(2): 205-233.

2012

Klaufus, C and R. Spronk (2012). Introduction: Taste, Etnofoor 24(2): 7-11. 

2011

Spronk, R. (2011). Media and the praxis of sexual knowledge in Nairobi, Anthropologica 63: 145-158

Verkaaik, O. and Spronk, R. (2011). Sexual practice: notes on an ethnography of secular practice, Focaal 59: 83-89.

2009

Spronk, R. (2009). Media and the therapeutic ethos of romantic love in middle-class Nairobi. In Love in Africa, J. Cole and L.M. Thomas (Eds.),(pp. 181-203). University of Chicago Press.

Spronk, R. (2009). Sex, sexuality and negotiating Africanness among young professionals in Nairobi Africa 79(4): 500-520.

Spronk, R. (2009). Fear for aids: moralizing youngsters in Kenya. Theory and action: essays for an anthropologist. S. van der Geest and M. Tankink (Eds.), (pp. 178-183). AMB.

2007

Spronk, R. (2007). Beyond pain, towards pleasure in the study of sexuality in Africa’, Sexuality in Africa Magazine 4(3): 6-14

2005

Spronk, R. (2005). Female sexuality in Nairobi: flawed or favoured?, Culture, Health & Sexuality 7(3): 267-279

2002

Spronk, R. (2002). Narrating AIDS as the signs of the times in middle-class Nairobi, Etnofoor 13(1): 76-98.

Spronk has various research projects, finished and ongoing: 

She has been awarded an NWO VICI grant for the project titled 'The social life of sexuality: erotic practices, cultural formations, and the unruliness of sexuality', which will start in 2026. The research team will study sexual practices and the continuum of same-sex and cross-sex sexual behaviour in four distinct sociocultural contexts (Ghana, Kenya, the Netherlands, and Poland). Scholars in and from Africa have long recognised that focusing on identity and rights only partially illuminates sexual and gendered subject positions, for it does not adequately capture the contradictions of social life. Building on their critiques, this project will study sexuality as a cultural formation, shedding light on how social, political, historical, and cultural contexts shape sexual practices and experiences. The research team will investigate variation in sexual practices using four lenses: a diachronic perspective to chart changes over time, a synchronic perspective to understand variation within historical eras, a generational approach to capture similarities and differences within and across eras, and a multi-sited approach to compare places with distinct histories and contexts. It will do so by applying a historical-ethnographic lens. 

One of her ongoing research projects deals with the ethnographic study of the love and sexual relationships of young urban professionals in Nairobi, Kenya, since 1997. She will follow up with the cohort that formed her 2001/2 study every five years, which will result in a longitudinal study of the formation of the middle classes in Kenya, of growing into adulthood in the 21st century and of the role of gender and sexuality herein.    

In another project she focused on shifts in the practices and imagination of intimacy and how these relate to the notion of modern personhood, from an intergenerational perspective, for which she studies family histories in Ghana since 2011. She was awarded with a NWO VENI grant for the research project “Transformations in intimacy. Sexuality and modern personhood among middle-class Ghanaians from 1940 to the present”.

The third project is entitled "Sexuality and the making of the middle class. A comparative study of desire and status in three African countries", for which Spronk was awarded with a NWO VIDI grant. This project investigated the interface between sexuality and the middle class. A four-generation historical perspective provided a vantage point from which to analyse changing notions of sexuality and of class distinction. Four contentious questions stood central: homosexuality, bride-wealth, female circumcision and polygyny – issues that are often conceptualised as traditional and therefore assumed to be stable. Groups that aspire middle-class status play a salient role in the debates about these issues, as ideas and practices of distinction are typically articulated via gender and sexuality. The project theorised the middle class as a desirable position and thus as a classification in the making, emerging from (shifting) ideas of distinction. The topic was investigated from a comparative perspective, in three countries: Ghana, Kenya and Senegal. A comparison of these three countries is challenging because of similarities and differences in economic profile, colonial legacy and cultural-religious contours. See also https://aissr.uva.nl/content/research-groups/globalizing-culture/globalizing-culture.html#Queerying-gender--sexuality-from-Africa-Sexuality-and-the-making-of-the-middle-class-A-comparative-study-of-desire-and-status-in-three-African-countries  

Other research projects in the Netherlands:

In 2012 the FWOS grant was awarded for the study titled “Sexualities and diversities in the making, among young adolescents in the Netherlands”. Rather than taking up a priori categories of diversity (such as race / ethnic groups) and sexuality (such as homo- and/or heterosexuality), the aim is to follow young people's cultural and sexual practices in order to flesh out the lived realities of identities in the making. The focus is on two kind of spaces that are crucial in adolescents' lives: online worlds, i.e. social media, as well as offline worlds, in this case the school grounds. This project is a cooperation between the University of Nijmegen and the University of Amsterdam.

Current PhD supervisions 

- Myra Bosman, ‘Heteronormativity from within: negotiating norms and pleasure during heterosexual sex’ (with Giselinde Kuipers)

- Carolyne Egesa, ‘Gender, power and male-targeted “gender-based violence” prevention efforts in urban informal settlements in Kenya’ (with Eileen Moyer and Chimaraoke Izugbara)

- Dilys Amoabeng, ‘Marriage across time: transformations in the ideals and practices of marriage among Ghanaian middle classes’ (with Julie McBrien)

- Bo Wang, 'Men who play with men: a study on contemporary Chinese masculinity in the age of rising cyber contact' (with Jeroen de Kloet) 

- Lysanne Charles, When Island(er)s le(a)d: An ethnographic exploration of the interaction between local knowledges and practices and the Water, Food Shelter, Energy Nexus on Policy Preparation and Execution during and the hurricane season (Saba, Sint Eustatius and Sint Maarten) (with Ellen van Bueren, Francio Guadeloupe)

- Yicun Jin, 'Doing the movement: Practicing sexual wellbeing at an Amsterdam-based commercial pleasure-seeking venue' (with Willemijn Krebbekx)

- Avery Franken, 'Knowing love differently: a multimodal engagement with enduring romantic love at midlife in Malmö, Sweden' (with Rahil Roodsaz) 

- Jasmine Bruce-Rogers, 'The Nonsense of Enduring Love: Midlife Bodies Sensing Love in Kreuzberg, Berlin' (with Rahil Roodsaz) 

Completed PhD supervisions

- Loes van Oudenhuijsen, ‘“Wicked” women. Gender panic and Savoir-Vivre in urban Senegal’ (with Rijk van Dijk)

- Ke Ma, 'The allure of white bodies. Race, capital, and nationhood in contemporary China' (with Shanshan Lan and Jeroen de Kloet)

- Janine Häbel, ‘A choreography of life. Conviviality and secrecy among same-sex oriented women in northern Tanzania ’ (with Eileen Moyer)

- Peter Miller, ‘In the shadows of respectability. Gendered trajectories of marital dissidence amongst Dakarois professionals' (with Peter Geschiere)

- Lieve de Coninck, ‘Making change against the odds, Entrepreneurial pursuits among young professionals in South Africa’ (with Oskar Verkaaik)

- Amisah Bakuri, ‘In pursuit of well-being. Sexuality and religion among Ghanaian-Dutch and Somali-Dutch in the Netherlands’ (with Rijk van Dijk, 2021)

- Wang Shuaishuai, ‘Media discourse of gay men and their everyday practices in China’ (with Jeroen de Kloet, 2019)

- Willemijn Krebbekx, ‘Sexualities and diversities in the making in secondary schools in the Netherlands’ (with Amade M’charek, 2018)

- Benjamin Kwansah, 'Safety in the Midst of Stigma. Experiencing HIV/AIDS in Two Ghanaian Communities' (with Sjaak van der Geest, 2013)

 - Jonathan Dapaah, 'HIV/AIDS Treatment in Two Ghanaian Hospitals. Experiences of patients, Nurses and Doctors' (with Sjaak van der Geest, 2012)

Local supervisor of visiting PhDs and postdocs

- Paula Vermuë, 'Fathering in Kampala, Uganda' (2026-2027)

- Marlyse Debergh, postoc research project on women’s experiences of late-term abortion in Switzerland from an ethnographic and feminist perspective (2022-2024)

- Heather Tucker, “The courageous sisters": Erotic subjectivity, and the manoeuvring of NGO frictions in Accra, Ghana' (2017)

- João Soares Pena, 'Beyond the window: the production of the city, control and prostitution in the Amsterdam Red Light District'. College of Architecture of the Federal University of Bahia' (2015)

I teach anthropology -theory and methodology- at the anthropology department. I am also involved with the organisation of teaching gender and sexuality courses at bachelor and graduate level in anthropology, sociology and political science.

Gender and sexuality studies are devoted to enhancing our understanding of the differences among certain groups of women and certain groups of men - as well as between women and men - in an era of globalization and transnational migration. A range of social distinctions among and between women and men, and the particular forms of agency available to them, are grounded in their ethnic and religious identities, age categories, class location, sexual orientation, or access to political power. These distinctions produce different experiences and entitlements in civil society and citizenship; they endow most human beings with contrasting perspectives ontheir options inthe environment in which they live, work, and forgesocial andsexual bonds. This scholarly endeavor represents a systematic attempt to address structurally embedded prescriptions concerning gender relations and sexual behavior on a par with other analytical variables such as class, ethnicity, religion, age, or political ideology. It is generally accepted that differences between rich and poor, between white-skinned and black or brown-skinned people, or between Christians and Muslims are undeniable factors in people's lives. Functioning as either a woman or a man, or as a heterosexual or homosexual person, holds comparable significance.

Together with Kim Knibbe and Brenda Bartelink we have developed a MOOC (Massive Open Online Course) on Religion and Sexual Well-being, https://www.futurelearn.com/invitations/university-of-groningen/religion-sexual-wellbeing-private/rcekds8ds4y3xnqjvdusyn148sikqpv