Professor Edward Alpers studied African History at Harvard College and received his Ph.D. from the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London in 1966, where he studied under Richard Gray. Before joining the UCLA Department of History in 1968 he taught for two years at the University of Dar es Salaam (when it was still a college of the University of East Africa). In 1972-1973 Ned conducted research in eastern Tanzania; in 1980 he taught at the Somali National University, College of Education, Lafoole as a Fulbright Senior Scholar. He served as President of the African Studies Association (USA) (1994) and Chair of its National Program Committee (2001). His research and writing focus on the political economy of international trade in precolonial eastern Africa, including the manifold cultural dimensions of this exchange system, with special attention to the wider world of the Indian Ocean. At UCLA Alpers served as chair for sixty-two Ph.D. dissertations.