Marco Gardini is Associate Professor at the University of Pavia and Principal Investigator of the project PRIN PNRR 2022 “Transnational Aging between Italy and Africa: Anthropological Perspectives (TAIA)”. Marco earned his Ph.D. in Social and Cultural Anthropology in 2013 at the University of Milano-Bicocca in co-partnership with the University of Bayreuth. He has conducted ethnographic research in Togo (2006-2011), Madagascar (2013- present) and Italy (2018-present). His research interests include aging and migration, African slavery and post-slavery, stigma and forms of labour exploitation, land conflicts and banditry. He is the author of La Terra Contesa. Conflitti fondiari e lavoro agricolo in Togo(Edizioni Mimesis, 2017) and Anzianità e Invecchiamento in Africa e nella Diaspora. Prospettive Antropologiche (Carocci Editore, 2023).

Among his last publications: Gardini, M. 2022 (a) “The Chameleonic Nature of Freedom: Notes on the Concept of Fahafahana in the Highlands of Madagascar”, Africa: Journal of the International African Institute, Vol 92, n. 2, pp. 230-248; Gardini, M. 2022 (b), “Networks of Solidarity among Former Marxist Activists in the bas quartiers of Antananarivo”, Journal of Southern African Studies, Vol. 48, n. 4, pp. 653-665.

He is member of the board of the Ph.D. in History at the University of Pavia, where he also teaches Political Anthropology (MA in African and Asian Studies) and Social and Cultural Anthropology (BA in Political and International Sciences).