Imani Perry

Imani Perry brings history, law, literature, gender studies, and cultural criticism into an interdisciplinary body of scholarship and writing. She holds Harvard professorships in Studies of Women, Gender, and Sexuality and African and African American Studies, along with a position at the Radcliffe Institute. South to America combines memoir, travel writing, and history to examine the American South's place in national life. The book received the 2022 National Book Award for Nonfiction. Perry's other books include Looking for Lorraine, Breathe, May We Forever Stand, and Vexy Thing. She earned both a law degree and a doctorate from Harvard in 2000, later teaching at Rutgers and Princeton before joining Harvard's faculty in 2023. The MacArthur Foundation selected her as a fellow that same year for scholarship and writing on Black American history, culture, and social life.