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Department of African American and Diaspora Studies

Tracy Denean Sharpley-Whiting

Professor of African American and Diaspora Studies and Professor of French
Gertrude Conaway Vanderbilt Distinguished Chair in the Humanities, Vice Provost for Arts and Libraries

Professor Sharpley-Whiting is currently researching, a biographical study of four African diasporic figures across French historical movements. She is the author/editor or co-editor of fifteen books. She is co-editor of the Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism, editor of the journal Palimpsest, one of the series editors of "Blacks in the Diaspora" (Indiana University Press, 2007-2015), and co-series editor of "Philosophy and Race" (SUNY Press). She served on the Executive Council of the Modern Language Association (2014-2018). 

Specializations

  • Comparative Black European Studies
  • Slavery and the Atlantic World
  • Diaspora Literary/Cultural History
  • Black Women's Studies
  • African American Studies

Representative Publications

  • Black Venus: La Vénus Hottentote ou Haine Aux Françaises (Autrement mêmes, Vol.135 (2020)
  • Bricktop's Paris: African American Women in Paris Between the Two World Wars and The Autobiography of Ada Bricktop Smith, or Miss Baker Regrets  (SUNY Press, 2015)
  • Pimps Up, Ho’s Down: Young Black Women, Hip Hop and the New Gender Politics (New York University Press, 2007)