About

Dr. Nneka D. Dennie is a Black feminist scholar with specializations in nineteenth- and twentieth-century African American history. Her research examines Black intellectual thought with an emphasis on nineteenth-century African American history. Dr. Dennie is an Assistant Professor of History, core faculty in the Africana Studies Program, and affiliate faculty in the Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Program at Washington and Lee University. She is also a 2024 recipient of the Mellon Emerging Faculty Leaders Award from the Institute of Citizens and Scholars.

Dr. Dennie’s first book, Mary Ann Shadd Cary: Essential Writings of a Nineteenth-Century Black Radical Feminist, is a primary source collection of work by and about Shadd Cary— an abolitionist, suffragist, and one of the first Black women newspaper editors in North America. Mary Ann Shadd Cary won the 14th MLA Prize for Bibliographical or Archival Scholarship. Dr. Dennie’s monograph, Redefining Radicalism: Black Women Intellectuals in the Nineteenth Century, is a study of early Black radical thought that is under contract with the University of Pennsylvania Press.

In 2018, Dr. Dennie co-founded the Black Women’s Studies Association. She is also the founder and CEO of Diaspora Discoveries™, an educational travel company that coordinates group trips to the Caribbean with an emphasis on Black history and culture.

Research