Gloria Jean Watkins,better known by her pen name bell hooks,was an American author,theorist,educator,and social critic who was a Distinguished Professor in Residence at Berea College. She was best known for her writings on race,feminism,and class. She used the lower-case spelling of her name to decenter herself and draw attention to her work instead. The focus of hooks' writing was to explore the intersectionality of race,capitalism,and gender,and what she described as their ability to produce and perpetuate systems of oppression and class domination. She published around 40 books,including works that ranged from essays,poetry,and children's books. She published numerous scholarly articles,appeared in documentary films,and participated in public lectures. Her work addressed love,race,social class,gender,art,history,sexuality,mass media,and feminism.
Sheryll D. Cashin is a law professor at Georgetown University Law Center. She was born and raised in Huntsville,Alabama,where her parents were political activists. Her parents' role in the civil rights movement impressed on her the importance of political engagement,and instilled values that still influence her research and discussion.
Katherine Tate is an American political scientist best known for her research on race and ethnic minority politics. She is a professor of Political Science at Brown University.
Lesley Naa Norle Lokko is a Ghanaian-Scottish academic,and novelist. From 2019 to 2020,she was a professor and served as Dean of the Bernard and Anne Spitzer School of Architecture in New York,in addition to holding teaching and other positions in Johannesburg,London,Accra and Edinburgh.
Genuine Negro Jig is the third studio album of the Carolina Chocolate Drops,one of the few African-American string bands playing today. Its label debut was released on February 16,2010,while its vinyl version,which included the album on 140-gram vinyl and CD,was released on July 13. This is the first album the band has recorded for Nonesuch Records. It was highly successful,reaching the top ten on the Billboard Folk chart and the top of the Bluegrass chart. It was also the last CCD recording to include collaborator and Sankofa Strings co-founder,Sule Greg Wilson.
Monica A. Coleman is a contemporary theologian associated with process theology and womanist theology. She is currently Professor of Africana Studies and the John and Patricia Cochran Scholar for Inclusive Excellence at the University of Delaware,as well as the Faculty Co-Director Emerita for the Center for Process Studies. Her research interests include Whiteheadian metaphysics,constructive theology,philosophical theology,metaphorical theology,black and womanist theologies,African American religions,African traditional religions,theology and sexual and domestic violence,and mental health and theology. Coleman is an ordained elder in the African Methodist Episcopal Church.
Tina Fernandes Botts is an American legal scholar and philosophy professor currently teaching at the San Joaquin College of Law. She is known for her work in legal hermeneutics,intersectionality,feminist philosophy,and philosophy of race. Previous posts include Visiting Scholar at Dartmouth College;Visiting Professor of Law at University of the Pacific,McGeorge School of Law;Assistant Professor of Philosophy at California State University,Fresno;Visiting Assistant Professor of philosophy at Oberlin College;Fellow in Law and Philosophy at the University of Michigan,Ann Arbor;and Assistant Professor of Philosophy,and Faculty Associate and Area Leader in Public Policy and Diversity,at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. She is the former chair of the American Philosophical Association's Committee on the Status of Black Philosophers (2013-2016).
Imani Perry is an American interdisciplinary scholar of race,law,literature,and African American culture. She is currently the Henry A. Morss,Jr. and Elisabeth W. Morss Professor of Studies of Women,Gender and Sexuality and of African and African American Studies at Harvard University,a Carol K. Pforzheimer Professor at the Harvard Radcliffe Institute,and a columnist for The Atlantic. Perry won the 2022 National Book Award for Nonfiction for South to America:A Journey Below the Mason-Dixon to Understand the Soul of a Nation. In October 2023,she was named a MacArthur Fellow.
Mary Pattillo is an American professor and ethnographer of African American studies at Northwestern University. She is the Harold Washington Professor of Sociology and chair of the Department of Black Studies. As of 2016,she has served as director of undergraduate studies in African American studies and has been a faculty associate in Northwestern's Institute for Policy Research since 2004. She has formerly served as chair of Northwestern University's department of sociology.
Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor is an American academic,writer,and activist. She is a professor of African American Studies at Northwestern University. She is the author of From #BlackLivesMatter to Black Liberation (2016). For this book,Taylor received the 2016 Cultural Freedom Award for an Especially Notable Book from the Lannan Foundation. She is a co-publisher of Hammer &Hope,an online magazine that began in 2023.
Sandra Lynn Barnes is an American educator,author,ordained Baptist minister,and documentary filmmaker. She is the C.V. Starr Professor and Chair of the Dept. of Sociology at Brown University. From 2008-2021,she was a joint-appointed Professor of Sociology in the Department of Human and Organizational Development in Peabody College of Education and Human Development and the Divinity School at Vanderbilt University.
Tiffany Willoughby-Herard is an American academic and author who is currently an associate professor in the Department of African American Studies at the University of California,Irvine and President of the National Conference of Black Political Scientists. Her research focuses on black political thought,black radical movements,and queer and trans sexualities.
Rita Geier is an American civil rights pioneer,attorney at law,and public servant. As a professor at Tennessee State University,she was the original plaintiff in a landmark lawsuit that lead to the racial integration of higher education throughout the State of Tennessee.
Ralina Joseph is an American academic. She is a professor in the Department of Communication at the University of Washington,examining representations of race,gender,and sexuality in popular media.
Marcia Chatelain is an American academic who serves as the Penn Presidential Compact Professor of Africana Studies at the University of Pennsylvania. In 2021,she was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for History for her book Franchise:The Golden Arches in Black America (2020),for which she also won the James Beard Award for Writing in 2022. Chatelain was the first black woman to win the latter award.
Barbara Ellen Smith is an American author,activist,and educator. She is known for her involvement and writing about social justice in Appalachia,particularly the Black Lung Movement and advocacy for coal miners. Smith sustains her career of more than 40 years by continuing to make contributions in the intersecting disciplines of women's and gender studies,sociology,geography,and Appalachian studies as a professor and author.
J. Yolande Daniels is an American architect,designer and educator. She is a founding principal of studioSUMO,an architecture firm that speaks to socio-cultural landscapes through design.
Miriam DeCosta-Willis was an American educator,writer,and civil rights activist. The first African-American faculty member at Memphis State University,having previously been denied admission to the school as a graduate student due to her race,she spent her career as a professor of Romance languages and African-American studies at a variety of colleges in Memphis,Tennessee,and the Washington,D.C.,area. She published more than a dozen books throughout her career,largely dealing with Afro-Latino literature and Black Memphis history.
Kishonna L. Gray is an American communication and gender studies researcher based at the University of Kentucky College of Arts and Sciences. Gray is best known for her research on technology,gaming,race,and gender. As an expert in Women's and Communication Studies,she has written several articles for publications such as the New York Times. In the academic year 2016–2017,she was a Visiting Assistant Professor in the Martin Luther King,Jr. Visiting Professors and Scholars Program at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology,hosted by the Department of Women's and Gender Studies and the MIT Comparative Media Studies/Writing Program. She has also been a faculty visitor at the Berkman Klein Center for Internet &Society at Harvard University and at Microsoft Research.
Debra Mubashshir Majeed was an American religious historian,activist and womanist.
