Stanford Humanities Center
Christen A. Smith (Stanford Humanities Center class of 2005-06) is Director of the Center for Women’s and Gender Studies and Associate Professor of African and African Diaspora Studies and Anthropology at the University of Texas, Austin. Her research examines the gender and racial dimensions of state violence, and Black women’s intellectual contributions to the Americas. Her first book, Afro-Paradise: Blackness, Violence and Performance in Brazil, looks at the performative dimensions of anti-Black police violence, and won honorable mention for the 2017 Errol Hill Award. She is currently working on two projects. The first, tentatively titled Sequelae: Violence, Space and Time, considers the lingering, deadly impact of police violence on Black women, and its temporal and spatial dimensions. The second is a collaborative translation project that explores the life and work of Black Brazilian radical thinker Beatriz Nascimento. Smith is deeply committed to and engaged in transnational collaboration, and actively works to promote social justice through transnational dialogue.
