Jessina Emmert

Jessina Emmert earned her Ph.D. in women, gender, and sexuality studies from the University of Kansas, where she also completed a Graduate Certificate in African American Studies. Her research examines Black women's and girls' experiences in the nineteenth-century South through the lenses of Black feminist theory, Black geographies, and digital humanities. Emmert’s dissertation explores how enslaved Black women and girls navigated systems of racial and gendered power through movement, performance, and everyday spatial practices. Her teaching invites students to engage critically with archival sources, digital humanities tools, and interdisciplinary approaches to studying the past.

Recent Courses Taught

Black Feminist Thought

Distinctions

• American Dissertation Fellowship, University of Kanses (2024-2025)
• Chancellor’s Doctoral Fellowship, University of Kanses (2020-2024)

Selected Publications

• Emmert, Jessina. “Sally Hemings, Reproductive Governance, and the Making of Democracy.” Ms. Magazine, part of the America’s Founding Feminists Project. (forthcoming)
• Emmert, Jessina, and Clementine, Arlowe. “12 Blocks: Queer Geographies and the Spatial Work of Black Lesbian Belonging.” In An Era of Rights: Kansas City’s Struggle for Equality, edited volume and digital history project, University of Missouri–Kansas City (UMKC) Center for Digital and Public Humanities and the Kansas City Public Library (KCPL). (forthcoming)
• Emmert, Jessina. “The Home: Fancy Girls’ Fugitive Geographies in 19th-Century New Orleans.” Journal of Women’s History, Prizes and Research Grants, Honorable Mention, 2025. (revise and resubmit)
• Emmert, Jessina. Review of Beyond NOLA: Exploring Zora Neale Hurston in Bogalusa, Louisiana’s Magic City. by Sondra Bickham. The History of Black Writing, 2025. https://hbw.iu.edu/researchpublications/bbip-reviews/beyond-nola.html
• Emmert, Jessina. Review of The Global History of Black Girlhood, edited by Corinne T. Field and LaKisha Michelle Simmons. Women, Gender, and Families of Color, 2022, pp. 207-209.

Appointed to the Faculty

2026

Educational Background

Ph.D., University of Kansas
M.A., University of Kansas
M.A., University at Albany
B.A., University of Arizona

Dissertation

Fancy Movements: Black Women and Performance in 19th-Century New Orleans