Manuel João Ramos

Manuel João Mendes Silva Ramos (born 1960) is a Portuguese anthropologist, artist and civil rights advocate. As an author, he is widely held in libraries worldwide.

Early life and education

Ramos was born in Lisbon, Portugal, the eldest son of late actor , He took his BA in Anthropology in 1982, at New University of Lisbon, his MsC in Comparative Literary Studies in 1987, also at New University of Lisbon, and his PhD in Symbolic Anthropology at ISCTE-IUL.

Career He joined the Anthropology Department of ISCTE-IUL in 1984 as Assistant Lecturer, where he now teaches as Associate Professor, specializing in Symbolic Anthropology. He is also Principal Investigator at the Centre of International Studies of ISCTE-IUL (formerly Centre of African Studies), and its subdirector since 2006. He is the head of the Central Library of African Studies, a MERIL research building located at the ISCTE-IUL's Library. In 2009, he was elected to the board of directors of Africa-Europe Group for Interdisciplinary Studies (AEGIS).

Ramos has maintained a parallel career as draftsman and illustrator, working for Portuguese periodicals, frequently with writer . Part of his illustration work has been published in the form of travel journals.

Since the death of his eldest daughter in a car crash in 1998, he has participated in the cause of road risk reduction and self-mobilization for more just and sustainable forms of mobility. He is the head of the Portuguese NGO Association of Self-Mobilized Citizens. These activities led hims election as councillor of Lisbon City Council in a citizen's list. He became vice-president of the European Federation of Road Traffic Victims (FEVR) in 2008 and later member of the board of directors of the Global Alliance of Road Safety NGOs. He is presently FEVR's representative at the UN Road Safety Collaboration UNRSC, a UN consultative forum and partnership.

Main works Ramos' publications in the area of anthropology include studies in Christian symbolism and mythology (his Essays in Christian Mythology: the metamorphoses of Prester John, first published in Portuguese in 1998, were translated in English in 2006) and research in Ethiopian oral traditions (Histórias Etíopes: Diário de Viagem, 2000, new edition in 2010). With historians Isabel Boavida and Hervé Pennec, he published a scholarly edition of the História da Etiópia of the Spanish Jesuit missionary Pedro Páez (1564 – 1622), first in Portuguese in 2008, in the collection of Obras Primas da Literatura Portuguesa, and then at the Hakluyt Society's third series' collection. The latter was translated by Christopher Tribe, with the title Pedro Páez's History of Ethiopia, 1622, in two volumes.