Evelyn Odonkor

Assistant Professor

Biography

Born in Ghana, Professor Odonkor joined The American University of Paris in 2016. She acquired her bachelor’s degree in business at the University of Washington, and her MBA at Seattle University. Professor Odonkor held multiple management positions in various industries before leaving the United States to France where she began her doctorate. Her doctoral thesis was a cross-cultural analysis of the influence of values on advertising messages targeting children in France, Ghana and the United States. During this period, she was a lecturer at the Université Paris-Dauphine, where she taught various business courses. She was also the head of international relations and student exchange for one of the university’s most prestigious programs in banking, and finance. Professor Odonkor’s research interest is varied.  She has a strong interest in cross-cultural issues in consumer behavior and management. Her work expands from the role of children in society and how it affects advertising messages to how consumers express “the self” through the acquisition of mobile phones. She also has a strong interest in Cuba, where she has studied the magic of marketing when advertising is illegal and the deep rooted meanings behind the acquisition of mobile devices.

Education/Degrees

  • BA: University of Washington
  • MBA: Seattle University
  • PhD: Université de Caen

Publications

  • Media, Communications and the Postcolonial Symposium « Values in advertising to children in Ghana » Media, Communications and the Postcolonial Symposium (March 27 and 28, 2009); Le cahier de CiCLAS, 2012.
  • L'Interculturel en entreprise : quelles formations? « Les thèmes évoqués dans les publicités destinées aux enfants : influence de la culture. L’exemple des produits alimentaires », dans Danielle LEEMAN (éd.), Limoges, Lambert-Lucas, 2011, p. 17-20.
  • The place of children in Ghanaian society; Cultures of the Commonwealth; n° 2011.

Conferences & Lectures

  • International Conference on Contemporary Marketing Issues (ICCMI): Cuba: Marketing When Advertising is Illegal (Heraklion,2016)
  • 7th Africa Business and Entrepreneurship Conference: The Missing Pieces: Improving Childhood Education in Ghana (Syracuse, 2016)
  • American Conference on Information Systems (AMCIS): Mobile Technology and the Extended Self in Developing Countries (Puerto Rico, 2015)
  • Academy of Marketing Conference: Cuba: An Investigation of the Effects of Liberalisation on Marketing (Limerick, 2015); The role of children in American, French and Ghanaian society and its effect on advertising (2014).
  • Center for the Study of Childhood and Youth (Sheffield, 2014). The influence of culture on the role and place of children in France and Ghana.
  • International Conference on Contemporary Marketing Issues (ICCMI, Athens, 2014). Cultural values reflected in American, French and Ghanaian television advertisements targeting children.
  • International Conference on Research in Advertising (ICORIA, Amsterdam, 2014): The role of children in American, French and Ghanaian society and its effect on advertising messages.