Uroš Kovač

(he/him)

5

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1

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Uroš Kovač is a social anthropologist researching youth, gender, migration, and religion, often through the prism of sports in Africa. He is a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Postdoctoral Fellow in the Faculty of Religion, Culture and Society at the University of Groningen.

His first monograph, "The Precarity of Masculinity: Football, Pentecostalism, and Transnational Aspirations in Cameroon" (2022), is an ethnography of young men in west Africa who aspire to migrate by becoming football players. It explores relations between neoliberalism, Pentecostalism, masculinity, and the commercialization of sports, and counters simplistic assumptions of a crisis of masculinity in Africa and elsewhere.

His current project investigates the intersection of football, migration, and religion among African migrants in Europe in order to study hope.

Experience

  • 2022–present
    Postdoctoral research associate, University of Groningen
  • 2023–2025
    Marie Skłodowska-Curie Postdoctoral Fellow, University of Groningen
  • 2019–2021
    Postdoctoral research fellow, University of Cologne
  • 2013–2018
    Doctoral researcher, University of Amsterdam

Education

  • 2018 
    University of Amsterdam, PhD in Social and Cultural Anthropology

Publications

  • 2026
    ‘Vitamins’, shortcuts, and athletic citizenship in Ethiopia and Cameroon: considering sporting ethics beyond biomedicine, JRAI: Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute
  • 2025
    The promise of empowerment: football migration brokerage between west Africa and Europe, Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies
  • 2024
    A leap of faith: football and religion among aspiring migrants in Cameroon, Africa
  • 2023
    Masculinity, Morality, and the State in Northern Kenya: The Case of Baringo County's Il Chamus, Africa Spectrum
  • 2023
    Suspension as Politics: A Stadium and its Ruins in Northwest Kenya, Ethnos
  • 2023
    Living with ruins: ruination and future-making in Kenya (and beyond), Journal of Eastern African Studies
  • 2023
    ‘A place for training, not for competition’: negotiations of competition and agency among long-distance runners in Kenya, JRAI: Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute
  • 2022
    The Precarity of Masculinity: Football, Pentecostalism, and Transnational Aspirations in Cameroon, Berghahn Books
  • 2021
    Becoming Useful and Humble: Masculinity, Morality, and Association Football in Cameroon, Anthropological Quarterly
  • 2018
    Rethinking Masculinity in the Neoliberal Order: Cameroonian Footballers, Fijian Rugby Players, and Senegalese Wrestlers, Comparative Studies in Society and History

Grants and Contracts

  • 2023
    JANUSHOPE: Two-Faced Hopes
    Role:
    Postdoctoral researcher
    Funding Source:
    European Union (Horizon Europe)

Contact Uroš for

  • General
  • Media request
  • Speaking request
  • Consulting / Advising
  • Research collaboration
  • Research supervision