School of Humanities and Sciences
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Shelley Fisher Fishkin
Joseph S. Atha Professor of Humanities and Professor, by courtesy, of African and African American Studies
BioShelley Fisher Fishkin is the Joseph S. Atha Professor of Humanities and Professor of English at Stanford, where she is also Director of Stanford's American Studies Program and Co-Director of the Chinese Railroad Workers in North America Project. She is the author, editor, or co-editor of forty-eight books and has published over one hundred fifty articles, essays and reviews, many of which have focused on issues of race and racism in America, and on recovering and interpreting voices that were silenced, marginalized, or ignored in America's past. Her books have won awards from Choice, Library Journal, the New York Public Library, and elsewhere. She holds a Ph.D. in American Studies from Yale. Before coming to Stanford in 2003, she was chair of the American Studies Department at the University of Texas at Austin. Her research has been featured twice on the front page of the New York Times, and twice on the front page of the New York Times Arts section. In 2017 she was awarded the John S. Tuckey Lifetime Achievement award by the Center for Mark Twain Studies in recognition of her efforts "to assure that a rigorous, dynamic account of Twain stays in the public consciousness," and stated that "Nobody has done more to recruit, challenge, and inspire new generations and new genres of Mark Twain studies." Her most recent book, Writing America: Literary Landmarks from Walden Pond to Wounded Knee, came out in 2017. Junot Díaz called it "a triumph of scholarship and passion, a profound exploration of the many worlds which comprise our national canon....a book that redraws the literary map of the United States."
She has served as President of the American Studies Association and the Mark Twain Circle of America, was co-founder of the Charlotte Perkins Gilman society, and was a founding editor of the Journal of Transnational American Studies. She has given keynote talks at conferences in Beijing, Cambridge, Coimbra, Copenhagen, Dublin, Guangzhou, Hong Kong, Hyderabad, Kolkata, Kunming, Kyoto, La Coruña, Lisbon, Mainz, Nanjing, Regensburg, Seoul, St. Petersburg, Taipei, Tokyo, and across the U.S.
In June 2019, the American Studies Association created a new prize, the "Shelley Fisher Fishkin Prize for International Scholarship in Transnational American Studies." The prize honors publications by scholars outside the United States that present original research in transnational American Studies. In its announcement of the new award, the ASA said, "Shelley Fisher Fishkin's leadership in creating a crossoads for international scholarly collaboration and exchange has transformed the field of American Studies in both theory and practice. This award honors Professor Fishkin's outstanding dedication to the field by promoting exceptional scholarship that seeks multiple perspectives that enable comprehensive and complex approaches to American Studies, and which produce culturally, socially, and politically significant insights and interpretations relevant to Americanists around the world." In 2023 the American Studies Association awarded Fishkin the "Bode-Pearson Prize for Lifetime Achievement and Outstanding Contribution to the field of American Studies." Her current book projects include a book entitled "Jim (Huckleberry Finn's Comrade)" forthcoming in Yale University Press's "Black Lives" biography series, and a book about Hal Holbrook and Mark Twain. -
Rachel Jean-Baptiste
Michelle Mercer and Bruce Golden Family Professor of Feminist and Gender Studies, Professor of History and of African and African American Studies
BioPh.D., Stanford University
M.A., Stanford University
A.B., Bryn Mawr College
Rachel Jean-Baptiste is a historian of 19th-21st century West and Equatorial Africa and the French-speaking Atlantic World. Her research interests include the histories of: marriage and family law; citizenship; urbanization; family and childhood; women, gender, and sexuality; colonialism; and race. -
Lerone A. Martin
Martin Luther King, Jr. Centennial Professor, Professor of Religious Studies and of African and African American Studies
BioLerone A. Martin is the Martin Luther King, Jr., Centennial Professor in Religious Studies, African & African American Studies, and The Nina C. Crocker Faculty Scholar. He also serves as the Director of the Martin Luther King, Jr., Research and Education Institute and Senior Editor of the Institute's Martin Luther King, Jr. Papers Project.
Martin is an award-winning author. His latest book, "Young King: The Making of Martin Luther King, Jr." chronicles the overlooked adolescence and calling of Martin Luther King, Jr. It will be published by HarperCollins in May 2026.
Martin is also the author of "The Gospel of J. Edgar Hoover: How the FBI Aided and Abetted the Rise of White Christian Nationalism." The book, published in February 2023 by Princeton University Press, has garnered praise from numerous publications including: The Nation, Foreign Affairs, The Guardian, Religion News Service, Publisher’s Weekly, and History Today.
In 2014 he published, "Preaching on Wax: The Phonograph and the Making of Modern African American Religion." The book received the 2015 first book award by the American Society of Church History, an affiliated organization of the American History Association (AHA).
In support of his research, Martin has received a number of nationally recognized fellowships, including the National Endowment for the Humanities, The American Council of Learned Societies, The Institute for Citizens and Scholars (formerly The Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundation), The Teagle Foundation, Templeton Religion Trust, the Louisville Institute for the Study of American Religion, and the Forum for Theological Exploration.
Most recently, Martin became Co-Director of $1 million grant from the Henry Luce Foundation to fund “The Crossroads Project,” a four-year, multi-institution project to advance public understanding of the history, politics, and cultures of African American religions.
He has also been recognized for his teaching, receiving institutional teaching awards as well as fellowships from the Wabash Center for Teaching and Learning in Theology and Religion.
His commentary and writing have been featured on The NBC Today Show, The History Channel, PBS, CSPAN, CNN, and NPR, as well as in Time Magazine, The New York Times, The Boston Globe, and the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. He also served as an advisor on the critically acclaimed PBS documentary series The History of Gospel Music & Preaching.
Lerone is currently working on a graphic novel version of "Young King," also to be published by HarperCollins. -
Kimberly Thomas McNair
Lecturer
BioKimberly Thomas McNair, PhD is a Lecturer in the Department of African & African American Studies at Stanford University. She earned her Ph.D. in African Diaspora Studies from the University of California, Berkeley, her M.A. in Afro-American Studies from the University of California, Los Angeles, and her B.S. in Africana Studies from North Carolina State University. Her areas of specialty include twentieth century and twenty-first century African American history, clothing and Black expressive culture, Black popular culture, and contemporary Black feminisms. Dr. McNair previously served as a Postdoctoral Fellow in the Department of African & African American Studies at Stanford University.
