Brian Kelly

Dr. Brian Kelly is a Professor at Queen's University Belfast in the School of History, Anthropology, Philosophy and Politics. His research focuses on US labor history, African American history, and the Reconstruction era. He directs the After Slavery Project, which produced an influential website and edited volume on post-emancipation societies. Kelly has held fellowships at Harvard’s Du Bois Institute and the National Humanities Center. He teaches courses on the American South, Reconstruction, and empire, and supervises PhD students in related fields. Awards include the Mitchell Prize and Simkins Award for his 2001 book Race, Class, and Power in the Alabama Coalfields.

• Education: Doctorate in History (university unspecified).
• Research Themes: Interracial labor cooperation, W.E.B. Du Bois’s intellectual legacy, comparative post-emancipation studies, and Black Lives Matter pedagogy.

His recent work includes a monograph on Reconstruction in South Carolina and a PALS Fellowship at Birzeit University. Teaching innovations include modules on Atlantic slavery and Palestinian settler colonialism.