As a seminary-trained anthropologist focused on the stories and experiences of Black women in the U.S. South who is especially interested in how they understand their bodies and sexualities, these are the resources that speak to me and inspire my work.
Womanist God-Talk
- Katie’s Canon: Womanism and the Soul of the Black Community by Katie Geneva Canon
- Sexuality and the Black Church: A Womanist Perspective by Kelly Brown Douglas
- Passionate and Pious: Religious Media and Black Women’s Sexuality by Monique Moultrie
- Red Lip Theology: For Church Girls Who’ve Considered Tithing to the Beauty Supply Store When Sunday Morning Isn’t Enough by Candice Marie Benbow
- Sensual Faith: The Art of Coming Home to Your Body by Lyvonne Briggs
- The Hero and the Whore: Reclaiming Healing and Liberation through the Stories of Sexual Exploitation in the Bible by Camille Hernandez
- Our Lives Matter: A Womanist Queer Theology by Pamela Lightsey
Black Feminist Theorizing
- Sister Outsider: Essays and Speeches by Audre Lorde
- Feminist Theory: From Margin to Center by bell hooks
- The Source of Self-Regard: Selected Essays, Speeches, and Meditations by Toni Morrison
- Sing a Black Girl’s Song: The Unpublished Work of Ntozake Shange, edited by Imani Perry
- Funk The Erotic: Transaesthetics and Black Sexual Cultures by L. H. Stallings
- Jezebel Unhinged: Loosing the Black Female Body in Religion and Culture by Tamura Lomax
- Between Sundays: Black Women and Everyday Struggles of Faith by Marla Frederick
- Shapeshifters: Black Girls and the Choreography of Citizenship by Aimee Meredith Cox
- The Pursuit of Happiness: Black Women, Diaporic Dreams, and the Politics of Emotional Transnationalism by Bianca Williams
Fiction That Sings
- The Color Purple by Alice Walker
- Beloved by Toni Morrison
- The Salt Eaters by Toni Cade Bambara
- Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston
- For Colored Girls by Ntozake Shange
- The Secret Lives of Church Ladies by Deesha Philyaw
Shows That Captivate
- P-Valley on Starz
- The First Wives Club on Netflix
- Young Love on Max
- Call the Midwife on PBS
Deirdre Jonese Austin 