File:Jennifer Christine Nash.jpg, ''A candid image of Jennifer Nash looking out of a window''
Jennifer Christine Nash (born 1980) is the
Jean Fox O'Barr Professor of Gender, Sexuality, and Feminist Studies at
Duke University
Duke University is a Private university, private research university in Durham, North Carolina, United States. Founded by Methodists and Quakers in the present-day city of Trinity, North Carolina, Trinity in 1838, the school moved to Durham in 1 ...
within its Trinity College of Arts and Sciences
and Director of the Black Feminist Theory Summer Institute.
In 2016, Nash arrived at
Northwestern University
Northwestern University (NU) is a Private university, private research university in Evanston, Illinois, United States. Established in 1851 to serve the historic Northwest Territory, it is the oldest University charter, chartered university in ...
, where she worked as an Associate Professor of African American Studies and Gender and Sexuality Studies before joining Duke University in 2020. Her research interests include
Black feminist theory,
feminist legal theory
Feminist legal theory, also known as feminist jurisprudence, is based on the belief that the law has been fundamental in women's historical subordination. Feminist jurisprudence the philosophy of law is based on the political, economic, and socia ...
, Black sexual politics, black motherhood, black maternal health, race and law,
and
intersectionality
Intersectionality is an analytical framework for understanding how groups' and individuals' social and political identities result in unique combinations of discrimination and privilege. Examples of these intersecting and overlapping factor ...
.
[Faculty profile at duke.edu](_blank)
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Education
Nash earned her PhD in African American Studies
Black studies or Africana studies (with nationally specific terms, such as African American studies and Black Canadian studies), is an interdisciplinary academic field that primarily focuses on the study of the history, culture, and politics of ...
at Harvard University
Harvard University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the History of the Puritans in North America, Puritan clergyma ...
, her JD at Harvard Law School
Harvard Law School (HLS) is the law school of Harvard University, a Private university, private research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1817, Harvard Law School is the oldest law school in continuous operation in the United ...
, and an AB in women's studies at Harvard College.
Career
Nash is critical of approaches to intersectionality
Intersectionality is an analytical framework for understanding how groups' and individuals' social and political identities result in unique combinations of discrimination and privilege. Examples of these intersecting and overlapping factor ...
that demand either uncritical, unqualified support or outright rejection, calling instead for a critical engagement with the discursive formations produced under the heading of intersectionality. In particular, Nash has identified and problematized an emerging posture of territoriality and defensiveness characterizing some intersectionality discourses. This territorial posture objects to a critical regime created by and for Black women being "appropriated" for the struggles of other marginalized groups. Professor Nash sees this posture as a reiteration of a regime of territoriality, which threatens to make intersectionality into property to be defended and guarded despite black feminism's longstanding anticaptivity orientation, and the tradition's deep critiques of how logics of property enshrine boundaries and ensure that value is communicated exclusively through ownership.[''Black Feminism Reimagined After Intersectionality''. ]Duke University Press
Duke University Press is an academic publisher and university press affiliated with Duke University. It was founded in 1921 by William T. Laprade as The Trinity College Press. (Duke University was initially called Trinity College). In 1926 ...
, 2018. p. 131.
Selected publications
* ''How We Write Now: Living With Black Feminist Theory''. Duke University Press
Duke University Press is an academic publisher and university press affiliated with Duke University. It was founded in 1921 by William T. Laprade as The Trinity College Press. (Duke University was initially called Trinity College). In 1926 ...
, 2024.
* ''Birthing Black Mothers''. Duke University Press
Duke University Press is an academic publisher and university press affiliated with Duke University. It was founded in 1921 by William T. Laprade as The Trinity College Press. (Duke University was initially called Trinity College). In 1926 ...
, 2021.
* ''Black Feminism Reimagined: After Intersectionality''. Duke University Press
Duke University Press is an academic publisher and university press affiliated with Duke University. It was founded in 1921 by William T. Laprade as The Trinity College Press. (Duke University was initially called Trinity College). In 1926 ...
, 2018.
* ''The Black Body in Ecstasy: Reading Race, Reading Pornography''. Duke University Press
Duke University Press is an academic publisher and university press affiliated with Duke University. It was founded in 1921 by William T. Laprade as The Trinity College Press. (Duke University was initially called Trinity College). In 1926 ...
, 2014.
Edited publications
* ''Gender: Love''. Macmillan Reference, 2016.
* ''The Routledge Companion to Intersectionalities.'' Routledge, 2023. Co-editor with Samantha Pinto
* ''Black Feminism on the Edge.'' Duke University Press, 2023. Co-editor with Samantha Pinto.
Awards
* Alan Bray Memorial Book Prize. Awarded to ''The Black Body in Ecstasy: Reading Race, Reading Pornography'' by the GL/Q Caucus in the Modern Language Association
The Modern Language Association of America, often referred to as the Modern Language Association (MLA), is widely considered the principal professional association in the United States for scholars of language and literature. The MLA aims to "str ...
.
* Gloria AnzaldĂșa Book Prize. Awarded to ''Black Feminism Reimagined After Intersectionality'' by the National Women's Studies Association
The National Women's Studies Association (NWSA) is an organization founded in 1977, made up of scholars and practitioners in the field of women's studies also known as women's and gender studies, feminist studies, and related names in the 21st c ...
.
* Honorable mention for Gloria AnzaldĂșa Book Prize. Awarded to ''Birthing Black Mothers'' by the National Women's Studies Association
The National Women's Studies Association (NWSA) is an organization founded in 1977, made up of scholars and practitioners in the field of women's studies also known as women's and gender studies, feminist studies, and related names in the 21st c ...
.
References
External links
Faculty profile at duke.edu
Living people
Duke University faculty
Harvard College alumni
African-American feminists
American feminists
21st-century African-American academics
21st-century American academics
Year of birth missing (living people)
Harvard Law School alumni
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