Kinitra D. Brooks
Home institution
Michigan State University
Research project
Divine Conjurers: Recovering Black Women’s Intellectual Histories of Spirit Work
This project explores the origins of Black Southern women’s spirit work with an emphasis on the West African influences upon the spiritual and physical healing practices of the conjure woman.
Profile
Kinitra Brooks is Associate Professor and the Audrey and John Leslie Endowed Chair in Literary Studies in the Department of English at Michigan State University. She specializes in the study of black women, genre fiction, and popular culture.
Dr. Brooks earned a PhD in comparative literature from UNC Chapel Hill and also holds an MPH in international health and development from Tulane University. Prior to joining MSU, she was the Ricardo K. Romo Endowed Professor in the Honors College at the University of Texas at San Antonio, where she also completed a postdoctoral fellowship.
In addition to peer-reviewed articles in journals, including The International Review of African American Art, Obsidian, and the African American Review, Dr. Brooks has three books in print: Searching for Sycorax: Black Women’s Hauntings of Contemporary Horror, a critical treatment of black women in science fiction, fantasy, and horror; Sycorax’s Daughters, an edited volume of short horror fiction written by black women; and The Lemonade Reader, a collection of essays on Beyoncé’s 2016 audiovisual project, Lemonade. She is also the co-editor of the New Suns book series at Ohio State University Press.
Course
HDS 3088: Conjure Feminism: Black Women's Spirituality in the U.S. South (spring 2023)